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Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

djmag.com

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Re: Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

#21
When I read the headline, I assumed this was to disincentivise uploading thousands of cheap AI-generated songs. There's tons of this on the platform, and it looks like it was generated automatically in bulk.

But the article makes it sound like this was not a factor?

Re: Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

#22

I think this is the wrong approach. If they have issues with people abusing the revenue model by publishing white noise and generating fake plays - go after that. However the 1K streams per track thing is going to negatively impact small artists who might have relatively large collections, but few over 1K annual streams. If it's a processing cost issue then make it so that payouts need to meet some reasonable minimum…

This is an issue I've seen with every platform that primarily exists online. They buy every digital service and increase prices with or without the customer's consent. Aside from being annoying and largely pointless, it's anti-competitive because if you subscribe to Spotify you are discouraged from subscribing to some other, better podcast service you actually want because you're already paying for one. It gets even worse as more services get bundled together.

Re: Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

#23

"Additionally, Spotify now requires a minimum number of unique listeners for royalties to apply. This attempt to stop "further manipulation by bad actors"" What a load of manure. The only reason manipulation of royalties even works is that they pool the streams such that the consumer wont pay the artist he listens too. Just tie the royalties to what each user listens to and what they pay. Solved. No abuse possible. B…

Wait, what. Are you saying that the costs of using the service should be tied to how much listening one does? Because if you're not, then what you are saying should have no bearing at all on how much royalties anyone gets.

Assuming a fixed fee, it's a tradeoff. Do you let the people with more plays steer everyone else's money, or do you let plays from different people be worth different amounts?

I think the first option is worse.

Neither option pays a fixed amount per play, so that factor doesn't favor either choice.

Re: Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

#24

And the enshitification begins. Remember that you as users are next. Find a sustainable alternative now. I personally recommend bandcamp + youtube combo. Yt to explore and find new music, Bc to buy the music I enjoy and __own__ it.

It is not exactly the new kid on the block, but I find tons of interesting music on the music blog aggregator Hype Machine. YMMV depending on your preferred genre.

Re: Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

#25

"Additionally, Spotify now requires a minimum number of unique listeners for royalties to apply. This attempt to stop "further manipulation by bad actors"" What a load of manure. The only reason manipulation of royalties even works is that they pool the streams such that the consumer wont pay the artist he listens too. Just tie the royalties to what each user listens to and what they pay. Solved. No abuse possible. B…

You could just listen to your buddie's streams on loop while your asleep so they get a portion of your fees.

Re: Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

#26

"Additionally, Spotify now requires a minimum number of unique listeners for royalties to apply. This attempt to stop "further manipulation by bad actors"" What a load of manure. The only reason manipulation of royalties even works is that they pool the streams such that the consumer wont pay the artist he listens too. Just tie the royalties to what each user listens to and what they pay. Solved. No abuse possible. B…

Wait, what. Are you saying that the costs of using the service should be tied to how much listening one does? Because if you're not, then what you are saying should have no bearing at all on how much royalties anyone gets.

I read this as splitting each user's monthly payment only across the artists they themselves listened to (like how YouTube premium works) instead of pooling everything together. So artists with more paying listeners would get more, while artists who only get listened to by free bot accounts wouldn't get anything.

Re: Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

#27

I don’t know much about how music licensing works. But would this cause smaller musicians to decide to pull their stuff off Spotify? I listen to a lot of music on Spotify. And some of it is from smaller indie artists. Not a huge amount, but I’ve definitely listened to songs that are in that It surprises me how much of my Spotify library is no longer available. There’s at least a few dozen songs in my Spotify library…

> It surprises me how much of my Spotify library is no longer available. There’s at least a few dozen songs in my Spotify library that have been taken off the platform. It shows up in the list greyed out. A lot of good songs too. This probably has more to do with publishers and licensing contracts than artists pulling their music off from platforms. Sometimes even bigger artists' albums disappear when publisher is so…

It’s infuriating.

Spotify for instance had some Spotify exclusive “DJ mixes” that were all an hour of well-mixed playlists. Spotify got artists to curate them and would have “XYZ’s DJ Mix”. They were perfect for seamless music listening at the gym. No breaks between songs. Non stop music. I listened to them all the time.

But one day a few months ago they all just vanished. Every one. I had added several to my Spotify library. For a bit they were playlists of grayed out songs. And then the playlists themselves vanished too. This content was all Spotify exclusive- the music is just gone now. It’s not available elsewhere.

It was all “mixed” versions of songs with smooth transitions in an out. Luckily I had added most of the original songs to other Spotify playlists that I had. But still, the mixes themselves are gone.

Re: Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

#29

I don’t know much about how music licensing works. But would this cause smaller musicians to decide to pull their stuff off Spotify? I listen to a lot of music on Spotify. And some of it is from smaller indie artists. Not a huge amount, but I’ve definitely listened to songs that are in that It surprises me how much of my Spotify library is no longer available. There’s at least a few dozen songs in my Spotify library…

I use YouTube Premium 90% of the time now for this reason. All the remixes and other indie mixes that I listen to are on YouTube and YouTube has so much more that I find it a hard value proposition to beat.

Re: Spotify demonetizes all tracks under 1k streams

#30

"Additionally, Spotify now requires a minimum number of unique listeners for royalties to apply. This attempt to stop "further manipulation by bad actors"" What a load of manure. The only reason manipulation of royalties even works is that they pool the streams such that the consumer wont pay the artist he listens too. Just tie the royalties to what each user listens to and what they pay. Solved. No abuse possible. B…

I've recently learned how extraction of funds from gift cards and hacked accounts works. What I've come to understand that obfuscation of monetization model, with simple info for the creators "beyond this many discoveries, we'll pay you some portion of general activity" is actually a good way to avoid abuse and allow for easier management of apps funds in general.

If that's all they wanted to achieve, then maybe they can pool that "demonetized" money and raffle it to the smaller musicians. If the outcome is only that Spotify stops paying out on something they used to pay for, by unilaterally changing the terms for the users without any bargaining power, then it feels like any effect other than increasing net profit is just the cherry on top.

You can't just say "in order to improve your experience we've decided to stop paying you" and expect people to trust your motives.

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