Here we go again.
In 2009 there was a major discussion about Spotify’s ability to earn artists money. Lady Gaga complained to Spotify about her revenues, and others rightfully pointed out that it may be the labels (with a stake in Spotify) who hold back the cash.
Two years have passed by and the industry is still divided on the topic. Metronome pulled some interesting quotes from both sides, including the following from a music label executive.
“Our income from iTunes, Beatport, emusic, Amazon etc is pretty good. The income from Spotify is MICROSCOPIC – LAUGHABLE – PATHETIC. The fact that haven’t been sufficiently called out on this is a SCANDAL. Spotify are old school monopoly capitalists masquerading as painfully hip young “edgy” entrepreneurs. Their game plan is to devalue music 10 – 20 fold and then swallow it up like Pacman.”
On the flip side there are also positive comments, this one’s from a band.
“Spotify *do* feature unsigned artists – my own band, The National Pep, are on there, and our label is a CD burner and my mate’s printer. All you have to do is sign up with a distributor like CDBaby.com , who then act as the ‘label’. And 50% pro rata of ad revenue seems reasonable enough to me – if it’s not a sustainable business model, it won’t be made more so by paying more than 50% of the ad money, will it?”
To be continued.
