Alternatives to Spotify, Amazon Music, Youtube Music, Pandora, Tidal, etc.
Ampled is a Patreon-like platform for musicians, owned by its artists and workers.
When you buy something on Bandcamp, 80-85% of your money goes to the artist, and they pay out daily. The remainder goes to payment processor fees and Bandcamp’s revenue share, which is 10-15% on digital items, and 10% on physical goods.
Catalytic Sound is a music- based co-operative designed to help create economic sustainability for its artists through patron support. 50% of the money you spend at Catalytic Sound will always go directly to the musicians.
Community Bread is a queer-owned livestream & resource platform connecting audiences around the world with marginalized artists so they can easily receive donations to offset economic hardship during this global pandemic.
Electric Lady Bird (ELB) delivers commercial-free, curated music from Central Texas artists. The Live Music Capital's best is served up, 24/7, through a user-friendly digital music platform.
Hoopla is a digital media service offered by your local public library. that It allows you to borrow movies, music, audiobooks, ebooks, comics and TV shows.
Mixcloud is a British online music streaming service that allows for the listening and distribution of radio shows, DJ mixes and podcasts, which are crowdsourced by its registered users.
MUSICat empowers any library to collect, share, and support local music. Affordably priced for libraries serving populations of all sizes, MUSICat provides music streams and optional downloads to library users and gives librarians and musicians an extensive digital toolkit for building a collection together.
Resonate is a co-operative music streaming service. Pay as you play. User-centric.
SoundCloud is an online audio distribution platform and music sharing website offering user-centric payouts on the SoundCloud Premier, Repost, and Repost Select tiers.
Tracks Music Library celebrates and supports North Carolina's Triangle Area music community. A collaboration between Chapel Hill Public Library and Chapel Hill Community Arts & Culture, Tracks offers commercial-free, curated music and features albums from over 70 local musicians and bands.
Why Spotify?
1 - Spotify is increasing revenue but paying artists less.
Rate per stream is currently ~ $0.0038. At a $15/hour (living minimum wage) it would take 657,895 monthly streams to match per band member. https://help.songtrust.com/knowledge/what-is-the-pay-rate-for-spotify-streams
In 2019, Spotify’s revenue was $7.3 billion, with gross profit of $2 billion. They are growing each year, and have profited especially during the Covid pandemic. https://www.businessofapps.com/data/spotify-statistics/#3
Spotify stock has tripled during COVID and their current capitalization is over $60 Billion https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/9500822/music-stocks-spotify-live-nation-analysts https://www.google.com/finance/quote/SPOT:NYSE
Spotify claims a 35% global market share of the global streaming market, and they are growing. Comparatively, Apple Music has a 19% share and Amazon has 15%. https://www.counterpointresearch.com/global-online-music-streaming-grew-2019/
Streaming now represents 85% of recorded music income in the US https://www.riaa.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Mid-Year-2020-RIAA-Revenue-Statistics.pdf
In 2015 the sale equivalent (full revenue replacement value) of a stream was about $0.007. This is when streaming took up 20% of global industry revenue. Streaming now accounts for 57% of global revenue and the rate per stream has dropped to $0.0038. https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/sites/jrcsh/files/JRC96951.pdf
2 - Spotify is actively devaluing music as a commodity.
ARPU is falling (Average Revenue Per User). In 2013 ARPU was at $9.60 and in 2020 it is $5.12. https://www.goodwatercap.com/thesis/understanding-spotify https://www.midiaresearch.com/blog/spotify-q3-2020-what-price-growth#
Spotify has 286 million monthly users, 130 million of which are paid subscribers. In 2015 subscribers accounted for 30% of users and in 2020 it is at 45%. https://www.businessofapps.com/data/spotify-statistics/#1
In 2013 Spotify estimated that the average song generates between $0.006 and $0.0084 which means the royalty rate has dropped by 37% to 55% since then. https://business.time.com/2013/12/03/heres-how-much-money-top-musicians-are-making-on- spotify/
3 - Spotify doesn’t disclose payment figures and signs closed-door contracts.
Spotify conducts sweetheart royalty deals for major record labels in private, estimated to be as high as 52% for the largest labels, but none of these numbers are public. https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/features/spotify-million-artists-royalties-1038408/
The actual rate paid by Spotify is not fixed and their algorithm is not publicly known. https://haulixdaily.com/2020/08/spotify-pay-2020
4 - Spotify engages in behavior that may violate existing antitrust laws.
Spotify is becoming a dominant non-interactive streaming service, yet does not pay the additional royalties (Digital Performance Royalty) that digital radio is compelled to pay. Personalized and algorithmic playlist listening, has increased from 20% to 31% in the last two years and is continuing to increase. https://www.goodwatercap.com/thesis/understanding-spotify https://www.soundexchange.com/artist-copyright-owner/digital-royalties/
In 2016 the CRB judged Spotify as an interactive service. This judgment was wrong then and is even more wrong now. Spotify has a function called “Radio”. https://support.spotify.com/us/article/spotify-radio/ https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2016/05/02/2016-09707/determination-of-royalty-ra tes-and-terms-for-ephemeral-recording-and-webcasting-digital-performance
Spotify recently began offering preference in their algorithms to artists in exchange for lower payment rates. This is a pay-to-play practice akin to the now illegal payola in terrestrial radio. https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/could-spotifys-new-discovery-mode-be-considered-payola/
Why are master recording royalties rates not regulated? There is established oversight on how mechanical and performance royalties are paid out through CRB and Consent Decrees. https://www.rollingstone.com/pro/features/songwriters-spotify-amazon-crb-royalties-war-10151 16/
Spotify is suing the CRB to reduce the mechanical royalty rate they set. https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/podcast/wait-spotify-is-suing-songwriters-what-the- heck-is-going-on/
Bookshelf
Spotify Teardown - Maria Eriksson, Rasmus Fleischer, Anna Johansson, Pelle Snickars and Patrick Vonderau
Tell Tchaikovsky the News - Michael James Roberts
The People’s Platform - Astra Taylor