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After announcing increased prices, Spotify to Pay Songwriters About $150 Million Less Next Year (www.billboard.com)

submitted 6 months ago by fpslem@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

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When Bloomberg reported that Spotify would be upping the cost of its premium subscription from $9.99 to $10.99, and including 15 hours of audiobooks per month in the U.S., the change sounded like a win for songwriters and publishers. Higher subscription prices typically equate to a bump in U.S. mechanical royalties — but not this time.

By adding audiobooks into Spotify’s premium tier, the streaming service now claims it qualifies to pay a discounted “bundle” rate to songwriters for premium streams, given Spotify now has to pay licensing for both books and music from the same price tag — which will only be a dollar higher than when music was the only premium offering. Additionally, Spotify will reclassify its duo and family subscription plans as bundles as well.

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[–] viking@infosec.pub 55 points 6 months ago (4 children)

Yeah I'm done with spotify.

Back when it was a fiver, I could get the appeal and had a subscription myself.

At 11 bucks it comes at the price of a CD per month, every month. I didn't buy that much music annually, ever. So right now we are entering a territory where streaming is exceeding the price of my regular music consumption patterns. I'll go back to buying physical media and torrenting whatever old stuff is no longer available and can't be found on ebay.

Fuck 'em with a cactus.

[–] theangryseal@lemmy.world 12 points 6 months ago (1 children)

CDs are cheap as fuck now.

I’d cancel my Spotify but my teenager would drop dead.

[–] wrekone@lemmyf.uk 3 points 6 months ago

That's what's stopping me too. I've tried to convince them that Youtube Music (I'm a holdover from the Play Music days, RIP) is good enough but they won't have it. I miss Songza.

[–] GarytheSnail@programming.dev 9 points 6 months ago (1 children)

I typically like to just buy my music but the appeal of spotify, to me, is the algorithm and being able to play random singles and one offs from artists I would probably not ever hear a single thing from otherwise.

[–] jjjalljs@ttrpg.network 3 points 6 months ago

I like bandcamp a lot more than spotify for finding new music. A lot of it feels less soulless because it is (presumably) written by real people.

https://daily.bandcamp.com/essential-releases/essential-releases-may-10-2024 - timely https://daily.bandcamp.com/lists/japanese-acid-folk-list - genre deep dive

Plus on a given album page, like https://castleratband.bandcamp.com/album/into-the-realm-2 , it has links to "Other people liked this", and the genre tags. It's pretty good for discoverability, though maybe not as smooth as the soulless algorithms of spotify.

Bandcamp sold to epic and then got sold to some other vultures so they might turn to shit, but until that happens it's a good, profitable, seemingly equitable platform. Artists got a big cut, you got drm-free music. The idea seems solid, if you can avoid the "infinite growth at all costs" and "i'm gonna sell out, fuck you" traps.

[–] TheLowestStone@lemmy.world 7 points 6 months ago (2 children)

I use Spotify regularly on my PC without a subscription and an ad blocker running. Does that qualify as fucking them with a cactus?

[–] viking@infosec.pub 4 points 6 months ago

I do the same with youtube and adblock, so I guess that qualifies.

[–] Grandwolf319@sh.itjust.works 3 points 6 months ago

Yeah, people forget that the appeal of Spotify was being able to make a free account and listen to any music. It was okay that it was worse cause it was easy.

Idk how paying for it became common… maybe cause those free users got too comfortable with it.

[–] CrayonRosary@lemmy.world -1 points 6 months ago

I don't subscribe, bit I wouldn't think about it compared to the price of physical media. I would compare it to satellite radio. Or cable radio. (Does Spectrum still do that?)

All three are paid, ad-free radio, sorta, though streaming services are on-demand.