Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

altpress.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 200 posts

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#131

Post by [deleted] »

criley2 wrote: post #102
jonathanstrange wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Although I generally agree with your sentiment, please don't forget that, unlike the US, the EU also has antitrust and anticartel laws with teeth and has applied them in the past against large quasi-monopolists like Microsoft and Google.

With all due respect, America has a long history of busting monopolies, and while we haven't gone on a busting spree this generation, we're awfully close to doing the one thing that Europe would never, ever be able to accomplish: Break up companies like Google and Facebook. (As this thread demonstrates, Europeans would potentially be against us doing so, and would be pro-monopoly?) I actually think the Google reorgan…

[deleted]

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#132

Post by Sargos »

zimpenfish wrote: post #53
sk0g wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, they could build an in house alternative to the YouTube algorithm to detect dupes/ infringing material. Spotify please hire me so I can work on this, tack.

> Spotify please hire me so I can work on this, tack. I know some people who are working on something like that with the added benefit* of being on Ethereum if that interests you... :)

What is the project name?

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#133

Post by creaghpatr »

njl wrote: post #113
jasode wrote: post #14

The submitted article doesn't mention it but my guess at connecting the dots is that it's related to EU Article 13's stringent requirement of "upload filters"[0]. Yes, Spotify's direct uploading "gave opportunity for small artists to share their talent" -- but that same mechanism also made it too easy to upload copyright infringing content. Since Spotify does not have a machine learning AI copyright filter like Youtu…

Spotify has internal fingerprinting stuff that can handle this easily enough. The shutdown is entirely due to pressure from the record labels. It's a shame; this was a surprisingly difficult product to get off the ground, and a lot of folks put in heroic efforts to make it work.

Apparently not, because it's number one streamed track "Old Town Road" never cleared the Nine Inch Nails sample it used.

https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2019/05/29/lil-nas-x-sample...

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#134

Post by oldgregg »

neka wrote: post #114
oldgregg wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. All the major labels did not support spotify out of good will-- Spotify uses hollywood accounting to give the labels the spoils. Same exploitation of artists thats been going on for 100 years.

No it doesn't, Spotify provides line-level accounting for every stream to the rightsholders. What they then do to account to artists could be anything.

Doesn't matter. Do they provide line-level accounting for ad revenue? Do you know what percentage of TOTAL revenue gets paid to artists?

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#135

Post by CaptainZapp »

criley2 wrote: post #90
CaptainZapp wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If stringent government regulation got you here, maybe it will be less of that, not more, that gets you out. Yeah, we see how fantastically that one worked with the Boeing corporation and their newest flagship plane, The 737MAX.

Gotta love the uber-intellectual reply that any valid criticism of European regulation brings: "but WHATABOUT " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism

Other commenters pointed out with far more eloquence, why your accusation of absolutism is a pretty cheap rethoric trick.

But here's something else to chew on:

European regulations often benefit me, the individual, instead of corporations.

It guarantees that I don't pay 6$ a minute for a phone call from Tallinn to Tulouse. It ensures that I'm not ripped off 30 Euros for making an intereuropean money transfer, it provides my airline with a pretty good motivation not to bump me for fun and profit and it seems to work a lot better in the food safety department.

Granted, not all regulation is good regulation, but overall it seems more beneficial to society at large than to some scummy ad-tech business specifically.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#136

Post by pcsanwald »

circlefavshape wrote: post #22

Most likely explanation - nobody was using it. They only introduced it as a beta feature recently, and you have to use a distributor like CDBaby or distrokid to get your music onto other streaming sites anyway, so unless you were only interested in Spotify there was no point

+1. I'm a musician who has released albums and I'd never use something like this, because who wants to manage distribution for every platform?

DistroKid/CDBaby are a much better way to do this.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#137

Post by rectang »

neka wrote: post #115
rectang wrote: post #55

There are always the distribution broker services (DistroKid, CDBaby, TuneCore...) but they can go bad. I've contemplated 1) writing some open source quality control software for scanning music distribution uploads, and 2) forming a collective (probably 501(c)(3) charity non-profit) which would serve in the distribution broker role and redistribute income. I wonder if such things could ever come to pass. Any thoughts…

What problem are you trying to solve?

The unreliability of distribution brokers as artist allies.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#138

Post by logifail »

criley2 wrote: post #102
jonathanstrange wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Although I generally agree with your sentiment, please don't forget that, unlike the US, the EU also has antitrust and anticartel laws with teeth and has applied them in the past against large quasi-monopolists like Microsoft and Google.

With all due respect, America has a long history of busting monopolies, and while we haven't gone on a busting spree this generation, we're awfully close to doing the one thing that Europe would never, ever be able to accomplish: Break up companies like Google and Facebook. (As this thread demonstrates, Europeans would potentially be against us doing so, and would be pro-monopoly?) I actually think the Google reorgan…

> we haven't gone on a busting spree this generation, we're awfully close to [..] break[ing] up companies like Google and Facebook

Source?

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#139

Post by Broken_Hippo »

toxik wrote: post #17
jasode wrote: post #14

The submitted article doesn't mention it but my guess at connecting the dots is that it's related to EU Article 13's stringent requirement of "upload filters"[0]. Yes, Spotify's direct uploading "gave opportunity for small artists to share their talent" -- but that same mechanism also made it too easy to upload copyright infringing content. Since Spotify does not have a machine learning AI copyright filter like Youtu…

Good job, EU! Squelch your citizenry in the interest of the copyright industry. Content filtering is draconian and fundamentally opposed to a free and open society.

Content filtering is draconian and fundamentally opposed to a free and open society.

Now, I'm not a supporter of current copyright laws as I think they are absolutely ridiculous as is, however, I disagree with your statement. It all depends on who is doing the filtering. Done correctly, content screening is a part of a free and open society. And with some care, sometimes it is required.

I am also going to assume that you are more referring to the entertainment industry than the "copyright industry" since the topic is content instead of, say, logos or toaster design.

If I had children, I'd really want age-appropriate filtering to be available and I understand someone wanting "wholesome" content for themselves. I simply don't want them choosing for me and I am not the one to choose for my spouse. In most cases, as long as I have control over what sorts of content filtering I'm good. I do think society should be free from rhetoric that puts others in danger (anti-vaxx) or that calls for dehumanizing or wiping out others or their religion in most cases (white supremacy, for example). I don't think we should be so open that our brains fall out, in other words.

But more to the point: All of that entertainment that was listed was made by someone. Likely many someones. So was the music people listen to in a store. And the art people look at in restaurants and people's homes.I completely understand people wanting to make money from their own work. When there is absolutely no screening, you get places that steal others work - music, art, entertainment, and so on - and make money from it. This might come in the form of making purses and coffee cups with art or someone getting taking your music and performing it for money. It is a real issue - and the "big industries" are not innocent of this. So yeah, if it is technologically possible for an entity to filter content based on these things, I can understand requiring it. Beethoven might not have been able to stop folks from memorising his music and playing it in a foreign land, but he would have had a chance with today's tech.

Content filtering itself isn't bad - and I post this on a site that filters content to a point - and it doesn't make the "copyright industry" bad. The copyright laws make the copyright stuff bad.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#140

Post by xtracerx »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #108
criley2 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I literally cannot imagine supporting monopolies/oligopolies over healthy competition. There really is more than just an ocean between America and Europe, the culture is so dramatically different. How can one honestly believe that a Google data monopoly is better for privacy and innovation? It seems to fly in the face of every lesson learned by every monopoly in history.

> I literally cannot imagine supporting monopolies/oligopolies over healthy competition. Implicit in my post was that I don't want to support healthy competition in adtech, or any competition at all. I want this industry to disappear entirely. I have no tears for the small adtech businesses whose market got scooped up by Google; I only hope that by presenting a bigger target, Google's adtech activities will be easier…

So if I open a new small business and want to advertise it on AdWords or elsewhere on the internet I have no recourse? Word of mouth is random and unreliable even if you have a good product. Advertising is a healthy and essential signalling mechanism to broadcast the availability of a new service and there is absolutely nothing morally wrong with it in its self. The non-benneficial side-effects like extensive user tracking and practices that drastically harm user experience however are bad and a seperate issue to be dealt with.
Post reply on HN