Apple Trying to Torpedo Spotify's U.S. Launch?

[aliensporebomb]

Yes!

Apparently YOU do not understand radio.
Radio stations log every record they play and pay significant fees to agencies like ASCAP & BMI (US) and PRS (UK). These royalties are then paid to the publishers and songwriters.

Correct! And how do the radio stations acquire these fees to pay the agencies? Advertising!

 

[aliensporebomb]

Okay, so how many tracks by Freak Kitchen can you "spotify"?

FWIW, Apple has 50 tracks from 7 of their albums (including 1 from some 'various artisis' compilation CD), as well as 45 cuts from 2 solo albums by the band's brilliant leader, Mattias Eklundh.

[btw, in case the irony is lost on anyone... Freak Kitchen hails from Gothenburg, Sweden.]

I love it - as an aside Mattias is one of my favorite guitarists in the past five years or so now. His sense of humor, technicality and musicality sets him apart quite nicely.

 

[aliensporebomb]

One more thing....

As an actual musician who has music up on both spotify and itunes I do make more from itunes than I do spotify - the spotify setup (at least where I'm concerned) is that you get a percentage of their advertising.

So, you can always hope they will get more advertisers I suppose.

Still, this graph shows that you'll need a hell of a lot of plays/streams to get cash from spotify:

http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/2010/how-much-do-music-artists-earn-online/

FYI.

 

[macsmurf]

As an actual musician who has music up on both spotify and itunes I do make more from itunes than I do spotify - the spotify setup (at least where I'm concerned) is that you get a percentage of their advertising.

So, you can always hope they will get more advertisers I suppose.

Still, this graph shows that you'll need a hell of a lot of plays/streams to get cash from spotify:

http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/2010/how-much-do-music-artists-earn-online/

FYI.

Interesting stuff! How much would an artist get for radio airplay?

BTW, the premium setup allows you to stream to your mobile phone/iPod, which I believe is a significant incentive for consumers to pay a monthly fee.

In other news:

http://www.thelocal.se/27438/20100624/
http://www.swedishwire.com/business/687-spotify-overtakes-apples-itunes3

 

[Gakboi]

Interesting stuff! How much would an artist get for radio airplay?

BTW, the premium setup allows you to stream to your mobile phone/iPod, which I believe is a significant incentive for consumers to pay a monthly fee.

In other news:

http://www.thelocal.se/27438/20100624/
http://www.swedishwire.com/business/687-spotify-overtakes-apples-itunes3

In the UK artists are banded into groups. The top artsist will get 'A' playlisted and get paid bucket loads of money (differs depending on station listenership numbers) and the smaller artists get ******* all.

 

[JoEw]

@JoEw: are you kidding? Of course artists make money from downloads, ESPECIALLY indie artists. I run a small indie record company, and I can safely say that we make much more from digital downloads than from CDs.

i directed my comment to artists who are with the big four label companies and it has been proven artists who are signed with one of the four huge label companies the record keeps a large part of the digital download.

If you really wanna support an artist see them in concert!

 

[heavensblade23]

If you really wanna support an artist see them in concert!

Not as true anymore, now that labels are trying to get a cut of concert revenues and t-shirts since they can't be downloaded over the internet.

 

[julie.hao]

The company released an iPhone application last year to allow users to stream music via Wi-Fi or 3G, although the application is obviously only available in countries where the service is offered.

There is stated "the Spotify app is not available in the U.S. App Store" - who cares about Spotify app when you can use one of many other streaming apps? (I use WiFi2HiFi - it is good both for Grooveshark and Spotify).

 

[samcraig]

Earlier in the thread people complained about the cost of movies (.99)

You have to remember - the amount of people who get a cut from a movie is far greater than the # of people entitled to royalties from a song. That's why.

As for the topic at hand - I don't doubt Apple is lobbying against Spotify. Why wouldn't they.

As a consumer, however - these bully tactics (if they are pushing their weight around) is unacceptable. I'm not a big fan of monopolies. And choice is always a good thing.

Apple ultimately wants to control all media. How anyone could write "Go Apple!" on this is just crazy.

 

[Gasu E.]

The iTunes Store seems to do fine in Europe despite Spotify's presence…



Fixed that for you. On a typical $15 album sold in a brick-and-mortar store, less than 50¢ goes to the musicians. So who's exploiting the musicians: pirates who attend concerts, or the other $14.50?

That's $.50 more than they would get from Spotify. Or rather, $.4995 more. Indy artists get something like $3 for every 50K downloads. The only musicians who get more are major label signees who may get a tiny amount of the large bribes that Spotify fronted the labels.

For selling 50,000 songs via CD-- assuming 10 songs per CD-- that would be $2500 at $.50 per CD. Not much, but a heck of a lot better than $3.

$.50 may indeed be skimpy, but it's a poor rationalization to give them essentially nothing instead.