Amazon High Definition Music Streaming Service

[PAP]

17 hours ago, PAR said:

Yes, well now you can be a one hit wonder and make several million.

 

I am assuming that your point is that you  think the sums are low?

 

You seem not to appreciate how those small figures accumulate in streaming. In the days of physical sales a fairly successful album may sell, what, 50,000 copies in a year. A hugely successful one from a world class act 1,000,000. Let's say that they earned $2 per copy ( not unreasonable for a big act). So in one year that hugely successful act earned $2M from that album.

 

Now understand that streaming means huge numbers. Last year from Spotify only Beyoncé  alone had over a BILLION streams for  a single new album. Now take your rate per stream for Spotify and multiply it by 1,000.000,000. That's what Beyoncé  earned from a single  service for one  album. She also got sums from all of the other services, plus world sales, plus radio play, plus her back catalogue  , plus , plus.

 

Now , of course an unsuccessful artist will earn significantly less. And these figures hide a major problem for minority interest music genres like classical or jazz where the annual streams per album may be  in single or double figures.

 

But if you consider that the rates that you cite are for streaming services currently in their formative days such rates per stream are generally likely to remain in the same area although the yield will be even higher . If you imagine that they should be significantly increased then , as the streaming service would have to pay them  and that they get their income from their subscribers ,  expect a monthly subscription to be not $9.99 but, what,  $99.90 or $999 or more ? I trust that you can appreciate the existential problem.

 

 

 

 

Quote

''But musicians still aren't getting a fair shake. Here's the math: Spotify pays about $0.006 to $0.0084 per stream to the holder of music rights. And the "holder" can be split among the record label, producers, artists, and songwriters.''...."For example, Taylor Swift earned between $280,000 and $390,000 for her song "Shake It Off" which garnered 46.3 million streams"

''"When people bought albums and even mp3s, there was a glimmer of hope that a musician could earn a decent income on sales. But now musicians are essentially giving away their music."

 

Read on; https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/26/how-spotify-apple-music-can-pay-musicians-more-commentary.html

 

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

32 minutes ago, PAP said:

 

Musicians need to stop signing away their rights to make more money. It’s the same as it ever was, but now with streaming. 

[PAR]

The income streams for  music rights holders have always had to be split between various parties. These splits are by agreement or otherwise are usually imposed by a decision from a legal body  such as a tribunal or court. Streaming does not change this fundamentally. There will , of course, always be disputes. No matter what structure is adopted each contributor will consider their input superior to any other. Fortunately, on the other hand,  the music business is ego free 😉 .

 

I haven't a great deal of knowledge about current pop music but if Ms. Taylor earned < $390K for a single song from one medium of distribution only then that seems a fair shake to me. And when you say her song,then as an ex-music business copyright professional I take what you say as indicating that as well as royalties from the song that she wrote then she also got even more from her recorded performance of it including broadcast royalties ( outside the USA), possibly synchronisation etc. And , of course actual SALES!

 

Basically successful musical artists have little to complain about earning more than most countries' presidents or prime ministers and certainly greater than e.g. cancer treatment specialists or others to whom society owes a great deal . However in regard to those working in specialist genres there is a case to be made.

 

Fundamentally the distribution of rewards in the entertainment industry in general has always been skewed.  It is not a symptom unique to streaming services . Try looking online to articles about salaries at the BBC and gender, for example. I am not defending the situation  but , having no ready solution and not being in a position to influence anyone , I just  have to accept that his is currently how it is .

 

[Jud]

The economics:

 

- There are a very few artists who could actually get rich from streaming. But unless you want to listen to the same hugely popular artists over and over, musicians making money from streaming is not a sustainable model. Streaming has cut deeply into digital and physical album sales. The latter in particular offered greater compensation for artists. The story for most artists can be found here - artists would need hundreds of thousands of streams per month on the more popular services just to make minimum wage, and minimum wage doesn't pay for studio time or band members: https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2018/12/25/streaming-music-services-pay-2019/

 

- The artists aren't generally making money, and according to the link above, the vast majority of streaming services are big money losers. So who's making money? The labels (or rather the conglomerates that own them), of course.

 

- Given this situation and nearly non-existent US anti-trust enforcement, I'm a little surprised Amazon, Apple and Google haven't just bought the music industry. But perhaps that would make things more complicated for them in Europe and/or the enormous potential Chinese market.

 

 

[Jud]

22 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Musicians need to stop signing away their rights to make more money. It’s the same as it ever was, but now with streaming. 

 

Think about relative economic power and access to the market. They sign or no one hears them. Someone as hugely popular and talented as Prince saw his sales go down the tubes when he left his label, so how well will an anonymous newcomer do?

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 hour ago, Jud said:

 

Think about relative economic power and access to the market. They sign or no one hears them. Someone as hugely popular and talented as Prince saw his sales go down the tubes when he left his label, so how well will an anonymous newcomer do?

I’m with you 100%. But, the choice is there.  Macklemore & Ryan Lewis did it with great success. 

 

It’s all about what artists want. Fame? Money? Control? Freedom? There are different roads to get there. It just rings hollow when artists complain about the decision they made and blame others. 

[Ralf11]

hallow

[Jud]

3 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I’m with you 100%. But, the choice is there.  Macklemore & Ryan Lewis did it with great success. 

 

Interesting: "Macklemore, in a slightly unusual recording contract, pays a nominal percentage of sales to use Warner Bros. Records's radio promotion department to push his singles."

[The Computer Audiophile]

40 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

Interesting: "Macklemore, in a slightly unusual recording contract, pays a nominal percentage of sales to use Warner Bros. Records's radio promotion department to push his singles."

It seems opposite of normal where labels pay a nominal percentage to have the artist create history 😁

[Ralf11]

as consumers we might want a setup that encourages a large number of artists to create music

 

you listed 2 who 'made it' under this system, but I'm inclined to agree with Jud that options, while non-zero, are limited

[The Computer Audiophile]

8 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

as consumers we might want a setup that encourages a large number of artists to create music

 

you listed 2 who 'made it' under this system, but I'm inclined to agree with Jud that options, while non-zero, are limited

I agree with you and Jud. Options are limited. 

 

 

[PAR]

10 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

It seems opposite of normal where labels pay a nominal percentage to have the artist create history 😁

I expect that you will see more of this kind of thing in the future. It relates strongly to your observation earlier that :

 

15 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Musicians need to stop signing away their rights to make more money

 The role of the record company has been fundamentally changed by the digitisation of music . This ranges from artists  no longer requiring professional studios by being able to create their recordings in a converted spare bedroom to undertaking their own publicity /marketing routes via the interweb.

 

What has therefore been happening is that many artists now produce and own their own recordings and licence them to a record company. The relationship between artist and record company is then inverted. Artists can now effectively hire the record company for the skills they can offer in a similar way to how other businesses hire/buy external skills.

 

Actually this is not fundamentally all that new but modern technology is making it more common. Many of the mega artists over the past four decades have  been in this position, hence you can find them moving from record company to record company over the years, not because the last record company dropped them but because they dump the record company finding a better deal elsewhere. But even less stratospherically placed artists with good business knowledge have been able to own and exploit their own creations even since the 1960s. I don't know if she means much in the USA but the English pop singer of that era Sandie Shaw has always owned her own copyrights.

 

There is also the fact that in some cases the artist is more the creation of their management and the record company than being a natural outcome of any significant innate talent. I am thinking of certain successful boy bands of a few decades ago where the very existence of the band and virtually every aspect thereof was created by the management with the band members ( who had been  selected by the management) being paid a weekly wage. IMO in some cases any other decent looking lad could have been substituted for any one of them.

 

So, many artists made bad business decisions in the past. No doubt some still do.  I know that here in the UK both the record industry and artists' representative organisations have used a lot of resources to upskill artists in understanding how the business rather than just the musical aspects of their career works ( e.g. The Brit School and several music business courses at universities/ colleges plus shorter seminar type events).  There are even books they can read ( am I assuming too much?) on how everything in the business works , like Passmore's "All You Need to Know...." ( now in 8th edition I note - so someone has been upskilling).

 

So artists should now stop signing their rights away and be aware that they are in a real business. Record companies will IMO function more as "one stop shops" for marketing , career development, specialist legal skills and catalogue management expertise. After all many of them have already jettisoned ( in whole or in part) those expensive parts of their business which were once integral to their existence ; manufacturing and distribution, which are now often outsourced.

 

As for streaming per se, which artist was it who recently received a cheque for $15K for streaming an album that he made 40 years ago then, instead of treating it as a nice unexpected windfall, complains that it wasn't enough?  Talk about greed.  How many reading this still get paid for a job they did 40 years ago?

 

 

 

 

[firedog]

2 hours ago, PAR said:

 

 

As for streaming per se, which artist was it who recently received a cheque for $15K for streaming an album that he made 40 years ago then, instead of treating it as a nice unexpected windfall, complains that it wasn't enough?  Talk about greed.  How many reading this still get paid for a job they did 40 years ago?

 

Don't agree at all. 
The record labels used digitization and streaming to cut the artists and songwriters out of most of the royalty streams, in comparison to the era of vinyl and CD, where performers and songwriters were well compensated for each copy of an album sold. 

I think you are referring to Peter Frampton. So what if he made a record 40 years ago? People still listen to it and he's getting a tiny percentage of the revenue it generates from streaming. Getting paid a few thousand dollars for a million streams - and you accuse him of being greedy?

 

You are asking the wrong question. The right question would be, "Why is the artist getting such a small share of the  present day revenue when the record company and corporate interests made massive profits 40 years ago from the original release?"

The label is clearly doing nothing to promote the album or invest in the artist anymore...the album is being streamed because people like the music, yet the corporations  keep the money generated away from the artists. The artist got $15K? And the record label, streaming service, etc split another 30, 40, or 60K....

[Jud]

5 hours ago, PAR said:

This ranges from artists  no longer requiring professional studios by being able to create their recordings in a converted spare bedroom to undertaking their own publicity /marketing routes via the interweb.

 

Would you give some examples of musicians making good livings in this way?

[firedog]

18 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

Would you give some examples of musicians making good livings in this way?

There are the exceptions that prove the rule. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

18 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

Would you give some examples of musicians making good livings in this way?

I've always wondered this, but musicians aren't public companies so the data is sketchy at best. even for the biggest artists the numbers are waaaaay off. When I read Artist XYZ made 120 million touring this summer I always laugh. It's probably 120 million gross ticket sales. Once you subtract the cost of touring with a small city for support and all other expenses, that 120 looks much more like 20. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

P.S. Then divide the 20 by five band members :~)

[PAR]

Yes, it's appalling. Each band member in your example only made 4 million this summer from touring . Plus , of course, their other income streams. A  hand to mouth existence. And remember that just like you or me they have to pay their chauffeur, valet, personal cook and flower arranger out of this.

[Patrick Cleasby]

It's gone live BTW...

[The Computer Audiophile]

4 minutes ago, PAR said:

Yes, it's appalling. Each band member in your example only made 4 million this summer from touring . Plus , of course, their other income streams. A  hand to mouth existence. And remember that just like you or me they have to pay their chauffeur, valet, personal cook and flower arranger out of this.

 P.S. take out taxes, so each is down to 2 million. Far from 120 million for the biggest band in the world. How much does the CEO of the biggest corporation in the world make each year? Far more.

 

My example is about the misrepresentation and impossible to find real numbers for what artists make per year, not whether its enough to make a living etc...

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 minute ago, Patrick Cleasby said:

It's gone live BTW...

Wow.

 

https://www.ft.com/content/5fa24c64-d89d-11e9-8f9b-77216ebe1f17

[The Computer Audiophile]

Working on details now

 

 

[Patrick Cleasby]

8 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Working on details now

 

 

I've been working on using it!

[Patrick Cleasby]

the Neil quote is priceless

 

[Patrick Cleasby]

Of note is that go annual and you get 12 months for the price of 10 so it's almost down to old-world 'normal' price.

 

And it works with HEOS!