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Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

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Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#111

Post by fabbari »

Melting_Harps wrote: post #95

Or you know... a large part of small business who once used this service in their stores/shops no longer exist, and the 25%+ of unemployed people, and God only knows all over the World, had to make cut backs to non-essential expenses. Streaming services like Spotify never really made sense to me as business model, for the artists it could be a double edged sword at best if they get the desired exposure and total wast…

  A bit of a tangent here. I remember the TV commercials by music labels in the early days of online piracy telling people: "If you download music you're killing the little music shops in your neighborhood!". 

  The moment labels moved to online streaming, the little shops in your neighborhood could go and f*** off.

  The irony was never lost on me.

Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#112

Post by awild »

josephg wrote: post #60
grawprog wrote: post #49

Streaming music sucks. It might seem weird but I don't like it. The first music I ever 'owned' myself personally were songs I taped off the radio. After that I started pirating music the same way I would collect songs on the radio, after that I started buying CD's, today I buy songs and albums from artists and producers directly. Building playlists on a streaming service is not the same as building a music collection…

I hear what you’re saying, but Spotify solves a problem I never managed to solve with CDs: it solves discovery. I used to go to music shops and browse albums, and I had no idea which CD would be worth my money because I couldn’t listen to them and find out! Even from a band I like I would often buy their other albums then get home and be disappointed because they didn’t work for me. In comparison, spotify will find a…

From my own experience, Spotify is better than going in blind but much worse than using RateYourMusic and superficial scanning of music journalism sites. I've started using Spotify the beginning of the year (Before that a mix and match of Vinyl, Bandcamp and piracy; fuelled by friends, a bit of /mu/, RYM and music journalism) and I've discovered a handful of musicians I didn't know before, but it usually just recommends me stuff I already know (and often don't care for). Conceptually I like their mix of the week playlists, but I prefer listening to whole records, so I often just skip through the playlist until I find something that sounds interesting, which isn't much better than RYM/Journalism, but without any menaningful context (so it's worse).

This is pretty much my favorite recommendation by Spotify: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9982wYPPm0

Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#113

Post by awild »

arcturus17 wrote: post #98
josephg wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear what you’re saying, but Spotify solves a problem I never managed to solve with CDs: it solves discovery. I used to go to music shops and browse albums, and I had no idea which CD would be worth my money because I couldn’t listen to them and find out! Even from a band I like I would often buy their other albums then get home and be disappointed because they didn’t work for me. In comparison, spotify will find a…

Like I said in a sibling comment, I love Spotify but I think its recommendation and discovery mechanisms are really subpar. They're merely "good enough" IMO. I can go to "Song Radio" or "Artist Radio", and browse through related artists and the like. But the latter still requires a significant amount of effort on my part, and the autogenerated radio playlists are nothing to write home about. I think it's fine that th…

You might find this interesting and depressing at the same time: https://www.reddit.com/r/LetsTalkMusic/comments/c2b20d/lets_...

Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#114

Post by gitowiec »

grawprog wrote: post #49

Streaming music sucks. It might seem weird but I don't like it. The first music I ever 'owned' myself personally were songs I taped off the radio. After that I started pirating music the same way I would collect songs on the radio, after that I started buying CD's, today I buy songs and albums from artists and producers directly. Building playlists on a streaming service is not the same as building a music collection…

I agree with everything what you said. My collection of MP3 is huge. And collecting this music gave me so much fun. Discovery in Spotify is much less fun. There is no friend with similar taste, no DJ you know from gigs you party, no radio editor which voice you love, it is just an algorithm. And serving content right away fast without searching and waiting makes that one does not listen repeatedly songs just discovered. Just jumping from one to next. This destroys the ritual, which is very important as rituals keep and enforce identity of the listener. When I was listening Goa trance I felt connected to gigs I was partying. When I switched to Legendary Pink Dots or Radio Head I was connected to my inner sorrow and so on and on... It all became more mechanical with streaming, soulless...

Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#115

Post by i_am_proteus »

josephg wrote: post #60
grawprog wrote: post #49

Streaming music sucks. It might seem weird but I don't like it. The first music I ever 'owned' myself personally were songs I taped off the radio. After that I started pirating music the same way I would collect songs on the radio, after that I started buying CD's, today I buy songs and albums from artists and producers directly. Building playlists on a streaming service is not the same as building a music collection…

I hear what you’re saying, but Spotify solves a problem I never managed to solve with CDs: it solves discovery. I used to go to music shops and browse albums, and I had no idea which CD would be worth my money because I couldn’t listen to them and find out! Even from a band I like I would often buy their other albums then get home and be disappointed because they didn’t work for me. In comparison, spotify will find a…

Go to a good used record/CD shop and they'll let you listen to anything that isn't factory-sealed. Great way to spend a few hours.

Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#116

Post by i_cannot_hack »

antfarm wrote: post #110
i_cannot_hack wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This really can't be emphasized enough. The younger generation has no concept of listening to a song you "don't like" 50 times, simply because you listened to the album you purchased 100 times. Not necessarily true. When Spotify reaches the end of one of my playlists, it automatically starts playing a radio of "recommended songs" based on the playlist. However, these recommended songs are usually the same, with onl…

You can turn this off in the settings, it's called Autoplay .

I know, but I don't dislike the feature in general - I've discovered several songs this way.

Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#117

Post by atoav »

josephg wrote: post #60
grawprog wrote: post #49

Streaming music sucks. It might seem weird but I don't like it. The first music I ever 'owned' myself personally were songs I taped off the radio. After that I started pirating music the same way I would collect songs on the radio, after that I started buying CD's, today I buy songs and albums from artists and producers directly. Building playlists on a streaming service is not the same as building a music collection…

I hear what you’re saying, but Spotify solves a problem I never managed to solve with CDs: it solves discovery. I used to go to music shops and browse albums, and I had no idea which CD would be worth my money because I couldn’t listen to them and find out! Even from a band I like I would often buy their other albums then get home and be disappointed because they didn’t work for me. In comparison, spotify will find a…

I often get told that my music collection is great by random guests and people. For me music discovery is an active act, so every other month I spend an afternoon to find new things read up on certain scenes etc. E.g. I stumble uppon Iranian 60s rock and roll, find a few artists that are more unique in aound and the way they do "rock", I download things, tag them, sort them, create playlists and store them away.

This way when I play the music (e.g. at a dinner with friends) not only do I know what it is going to be, but I can also tell them a little story about it.

Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#118

Post by Siira »

rectang wrote: post #58
throwaway13337 wrote: post #44

An aspect here is that a lot more people are primarily on social media services like YouTube and twitch. The people they follow cannot play popular music because of DMCA take downs. The result is that a natural avenue for discovery music is cut off. Consumers will not associate the experience of the thing they're enjoying with the music as has traditionally been the case with TV, movies, and bars. The setting has a l…

> no company should own that. In a world without licensing, the companies who make money off of art are the the ISPs.

ISPs in a proper regulatory environment should have minimal margins.

Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#119

Post by temp0826 »

cinquemb wrote: post #70
josephg wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear what you’re saying, but Spotify solves a problem I never managed to solve with CDs: it solves discovery. I used to go to music shops and browse albums, and I had no idea which CD would be worth my money because I couldn’t listen to them and find out! Even from a band I like I would often buy their other albums then get home and be disappointed because they didn’t work for me. In comparison, spotify will find a…

Soundcloud solves discovery for me. Every week I look through their search for words i filter on and sample all the songs (40-100 songs, maybe takes 1-2 hours at most) and download them if I like them (some weeks none, some weeks more than others), follow the artist if I like more than a couple (and what they are liking and re-posting), and occasionally pay the artist directly for files even if I already downloaded i…

I agree with you. SoundCloud is a breath of fresh air pending you don’t mind the underproduction. I’m relatively new to it (and didn’t understand the social aspects of it until recently), but it was pleasant to see this whole world of artists just doing their thing, as opposed to listening to the same regurgitated stuff we’re all used to. I still get a hankering for my old favorites and use spotify often when I’m in that mood- and do find it strange that I consider “that stuff” “old”.

Re: Streaming Is Stalling: Can Music Keep Up in the Attention Economy?

#120

Post by ianai »

ramraj07 wrote: post #63
grawprog wrote: post #49

Streaming music sucks. It might seem weird but I don't like it. The first music I ever 'owned' myself personally were songs I taped off the radio. After that I started pirating music the same way I would collect songs on the radio, after that I started buying CD's, today I buy songs and albums from artists and producers directly. Building playlists on a streaming service is not the same as building a music collection…

Just sounds like a whole load of "these kids are ruining what used to be the good old times". Of course, I also think music from back in the day was better, but I am also aware that its just a matter of taste and our tastes are molded by prevailing business-social pressures as ours was back in the day. If music appreciation sucks today it can be blamed more on the music industry and their idol manufacturing pipeline…

I used to think music from back in the day was better. Then I washed my predilections out and did a clean take on modern music. There are some real gems there. They’re also ... new.
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