Spotify Reports First Full-Year Profit

Seeing news of this trash heap of an enterprise bragging about their earnings back to back with Bandcamp donating some of theirs is quite the whiplash effect.

 

Padme/Anakin meme: That means they're gonna start paying artists more right?

 

Currently reading this book about how much Spotify sucks, and I highly recommend it!



Mood Machine

 

Definitely gonna check it out. Have debated soooooo many times about giving Tidal another shot or Apple Music.

 

I kind of think there's something inherent about streaming that is bad for our overall connection/attachment to music, but Spotify seems especially evil based on this book.

 

I'll always get behind anyone paying artists more, but it should be noted that Spotify paid out 70% of revenues to rights holders (artists / labels / publishers / songwriters) while losing hundreds of millions of dollars in operating expenses. You had massive institutional investors basically paying artists. Becoming a sustainable, profitable business means that they can continue to generate money for artists across the world for years to come, and hopefully pay higher rates in the future.

Apple paid 70% of every 99-cent download to rights holders and no one got bummed at Apple for turning a profit. Spotify paid out $10 billion last year, but it was spread across way more people due to the democratization of creation and distribution.

If you want artists that you love to get paid more, buy their digital albums on Bandcamp or iTunes, even if you never download the files. I'd illegally download music on Napster / Kazaa / Bit Torrent and then go to Best Buy or my local record store to buy the CDs that I loved. I already had the music for free, but I wanted to support the artist and have the collectable.

 

I went back to an iPod. The $10-$20 I’d spend on streaming I would spend on new or underappreciated artists on Bandcamp or ITunes if left no choice. Also over the last 18 months, most bigger artists release a $5 digital download for the week to the album is released to generate position for the charts. Most artists I feel like I’ve bought the record to death back in the day or wouldn’t notice if I made a purchase on their bottom lines, I just checked the cd out from the library and put it on.

Hate how little your favorite artist gets paid off streaming, don’t play the game.

 

I've been purchasing quite a bit of vinyl from artists lately, trying to support them. It's expensive but fun, and you really feel like you're making an impact buying physical merch from them.

 

I switched to Tidal last year, have not regretted. It was very easy to move all my songs and playlists across.

 

Happy for them, what a great company

 

I've never been super into streaming (still have my own itunes library an vinyl collection), but recently gave Tidal a try. I'm technically a student right now so I figured it was worth it with the discount. I've been pretty pleased so far. The quality sounds great and there has only been one album they didn't have that was on other platforms. Got my dad to switch too from spotify after telling him that they donated to trump's inauguration.

 

Out of curiosity, I looked at their cost structure and just realized that artists earn more royalties when Premium users stream their music. Not even sure how that can be legal.

 

spotify stinks

 

short spotify, company is a dumpster fire