Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists • Hacker News Board

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#51

Post by dangerface » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:39 PM UTC

_fizz_buzz_ wrote: post #18

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…

I think that's unlikely. If I am not mistaken, the EU directive will not be implemented for another two years.

You are mistaken, it's in effect today but EU members and businesses have UP TO two years to implement it.

Why would Spotify wait until they are sued to do something about it?

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#52

Post by zimpenfish » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:40 PM UTC

jasode wrote: post #33

the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is there another plausible reason for Spotify shutting down direct uploads that's unrelated to copyrights? It's a service very few people use that costs them money to maintain and support. You already need to go through cdbaby and similar services for all other distributions and being just on spotify instead of all of them is not very appealing.

>It's a service very few people use that costs them money to maintain and support. I'm not a Spotify expert so I'm not understanding why independents artist without labels "costs money to maintain support" that isn't already spent to enable the labels to upload their artists' songs. Let's say a Universal Music Group[1] representative logs into Spotify's system to upload Justin Bieber's latest 4-minute song. (Spotify…

> Why does it cost more to Spotify to let the unknown-Joe-Blow-not-signed-to-a-label upload his 4-minute song?

Unless I'm mistaken, Spotify would get the new Bieber automagically via an ERN (Electronic Release Notification) delivery which contains asset links, artist, meta, rights information etc. Since that's from a trusted* source, it can be ingested as-is and everyone is happy. For independent uploads, there's almost certainly several steps of human review and possibly interaction - which costs money and time.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#53

Post by zimpenfish » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:42 PM UTC

sk0g wrote: post #27

jasode wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there an advantage for Spotify to allow 2 more years of copyright-infringing uploads that they have to clean up later? Is there another plausible reason for Spotify shutting down direct uploads that's unrelated to copyrights?

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... :)

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#54

Post by jwerle » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:42 PM UTC

nullify88 wrote: post #5

rhamzeh wrote: post #3

Google did the same a couple of months back[1]. Is there a reason these companies are actively against independent artists being able to upload the music directly? [1]( https://9to5google.com/2019/04/03/google-play-music-shutdown... )

Perhaps pressure from record labels? I hope artists can flock to somewhere like Bandcamp, or alternatives.

I worked at Spotify and I am very close with several folks there who worked on this initiative. This is almost certainly the fault of the labels.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#55

Post by rectang » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:43 PM UTC

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?

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#56

Post by zimpenfish » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:46 PM UTC

jasonlingx wrote: post #13

Soundrop and Amuse.io are 2 free alternatives that distribute to a range of platforms. And this is a pretty comprehensive and objective overview of them all: https://aristake.com/post/cd-baby-tunecore-ditto-mondotunes-...

I've used Amuse for two tracks (easily findable if you like minimalist dark ambient noisescapes) and ... it's fiddly (lots of form fields and you need your tracks in Dropbox/iCloud) but , barring an approval snafu for track 2 which got sorted out after I bitched at them on Twitter and their insanely long 30 day release window, it's working ok.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#57

Post by TeMPOraL » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:51 PM UTC

criley2 wrote: post #20

toxik wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

It keeps happening with their draconian regulations. After the privacy/data protection bill, I hear that the european market for online advertising imploded trying to meet regulations and Google Ads gobbled up some 30-40% more market share in Europe. It came down to the fact that Google was able to meet the regulations fastest, and achieve informed user consent across a wide userbase dramatically faster than small lo…

It might actually turn out for the better. Google is a big target; they can't fly under the radar.

As for demolishing small businesses, small businesses aren't an universal, unquestionable good. In this particular case, we need less adtech business in general. It's like dumping toxic waste into rivers - not only lots of small polluters aren't better than few big ones, the desirable thing is just having less polluters.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#58

Post by jakelazaroff » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:51 PM UTC

jsilence wrote: post #19

toxik wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Self hosted, federated alternative: funkwhale.audio

Does this pay artists? I can't find any mention of it on their website.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#59

Post by rectang » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:53 PM UTC

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

Even when the humans that run these distribution broker companies have the best of intentions, economic pressures create risk over the long run that the broker will act in ways which its artist customers do not like.

This really seems like a place for a member-controlled cooperative.

Re: Spotify shuts down direct music uploading for independent artists

#60

Post by barkingcat » Wed, Jul 03, 2019, 12:58 PM UTC

jasode wrote: post #33

the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is there another plausible reason for Spotify shutting down direct uploads that's unrelated to copyrights? It's a service very few people use that costs them money to maintain and support. You already need to go through cdbaby and similar services for all other distributions and being just on spotify instead of all of them is not very appealing.

>It's a service very few people use that costs them money to maintain and support. I'm not a Spotify expert so I'm not understanding why independents artist without labels "costs money to maintain support" that isn't already spent to enable the labels to upload their artists' songs. Let's say a Universal Music Group[1] representative logs into Spotify's system to upload Justin Bieber's latest 4-minute song. (Spotify…

Your assumption that they go through the same work flow might be mistaken.

The same type of questioning applied to banks and transferring money:

Why would it cost a bank more money to print and mail checks to individual people when they already do balance transfer payments every night to other banks and branches?