Artist rewarding scheme

[ptou]

My 10 bucks get divided to all artists in the world according to play count. It makes me feel my preference gets drowned into world play count.

If I listen to only one artist in a month, even 1 play count, I would like ALL my money given to him (and its label, and Spotify of course)

Why should other people, that maybe make 1000+ play counts per month, decide where my money goes?

If I go to a music store, all my money goes to the artist I buy, independently of how many times I play it.

That should be very appreciated also by labels, if I listen only to last century music, why should living artists benefit from my money? Only labels (and Spotify) should keep that money.

There remains a silly case where I give 10 bucks to Spotify and I don't listen to anything. In that case why should Spotify share this money with others?? 

Regards

P

[Marco]

Spotify has contracts with the labels that define the money Spotify has to pay for each played song. Your idea can not work as it would totally break this system.

I take it that all money received from subscription and ads (free users) get into one big account from which ALL royalties to the labels are paid from. So Spotify pays all labels from that money and hopes it's even or maybe a left over in the end. As you could read in the news that didn't work for the last years and Spotify even made a loss.

There was an idea to be able to donate to artists from within Spotify, but even that idea got declined, because it's not possible due to contracts with the labels. Check out the idea and official reply from Spotify staff here:

http://community.spotify.com/t5/Spotify-Ideas/Donate-To-This-Artist-button/idi-p/212214

[cmscode]

i recently read an article about how much spotify is paying artists (nearing 1B this year).  it was the article about thorne yorke taking his music off due to dismal royalties for small bands. what i'd like to know is, how is spotify actually helping small bands?  they dont actually say anything about it. this is the reason i'm considering cancelling my subscription. the way i see it, i can keep discoving music with my active pandora subscription, and take the $120/yr i was giving to spotify and buy an album every month for an artist i like and know they are getting more than chump change for their hard work.

and look, not to beat a dead horse here, but who would argue that many smaller, struggling artists are just more talented and hard working than your average pop star? i mean, there are notable exceptions, but seriously, why continue feeding the fire of lame pop music and monolithic record labels when we can be encouraging real music to be made? i am sorry but i'm just a little prefererntial to the genuine in music.

so fine - this payout scheme might not change - but give me and everyone who listens to good music a reason to keep paying into a  scheme that doesn't efffectively pay the artists i'm listening too.  we all know how to torrent, but i take pride in NOT doing it now b/c of spotify.  please give me a reason to feel like i'm at least contributing.  and yes, when i dl music that is 'shared', i ALWAYS support the artist. so lets leave that argument alone LOL.

[JamesGuthrie]

I agree entirely with the sentiments in the original post and those of cmscode.

I feel as though the royalty distribution model as explained here: https://www.spotifyartists.com/spotify-explained/#royalties-in-detail doesn't really reflect how royalties would be distributed in the real world. If I were to go out and buy my favourite artist's CD then the money I pay for that CD goes (through the label etc.) "directly" towards the artists which produced that CD. With Spotify's current royalty distribution model, the money I pay for my subscription doesn't go directly towards the artists I listen to.

As someone who primarliy listens to niche artists, I don't like the fact that my subscription money is going primarily to Top 40 artists whose music I don't appreciate or listen to. The royalty distribution model as it stands discourages niche artists/labels from providing their music on Spotify as it doesn't completely reflect what paying users are listening to.

Also, if you like this idea, you might like this one: https://community.spotify.com/t5/Live-Ideas/All-Platforms-Subscription-Voluntarily-pay-more-to-suppo... which proposes higher subscriptions of which everything above the "standard" premium amount is distributed only amongst the artists you listen to.

[Cyclerider]

I totally agree with this post and others with the same idea.  I want 70% of my subscription fee to go only to the artists I listen to.  That would result in my higher payments per stream for them.  It more accurately reflects the market and creates a direct relationship between the artist and their listeners.

The way it is set up now I'm paying for music that I never listen to.  This is very advantageous to big name artists and their labels.  With the current system, people like myself who listen to less well-known artists are subsidizing big name artists and labels who are not producing music we are interested in.  As others have pointed out, buying a CD or even buying song files from iTunes is a far better way to support  the people I listen to.  I like the spotify software and love being able to discover new music, but I think should go back to the ad-supported plan rather than pay a big chunk of my monthly fee to big labels.

While I love that Taylor Swift is promoting the idea that music is art and that art has value that should be paid for, I suspect that she's actually getting paid much more than she deserves because people like me who don't listen to her music are stuck paying for her streams.  It makes no sense to pay for music you're not listening to.  During months where I don't listen a lot, a huge percentage of my subscription fee is going to big labels I don't listen to.  The small guys lose big time.

[srednab]

Hello,

This is just a proposal for a fairer way to do the royalty pay out to artists.

From the "Spotify explained" page I see that part of the formula for artist pay out is:

Artists streams / Total Streams

I think this  should be reconsidered.

Let's use an example of Band A and Band B.
The fanbase of band A is 100 000, and Band B has a fanbase of 10 000. In this example a fan of band A never listens to band B and vica versa.

For many reasons, the avarage fan of band A have more time to use spotify and listens to band A, 3 hours per day.
The fan of band B only listens to band B, 1 hour per day.

With your model, in one day Band A is streamed 300 000 hours per day, while band B is streamed 10 000 hours per day. IF these were the only two bands on spotify band A would get

(300 000 / 310 000 )* 100 = 96,7 % of the income
but their fanbase is only
(100 000 / 110 000)*100 = 90,9 % of the users.

If this was back when fans bought records, fans of A would buy a 100 000 copies of the band A record, and fans of B would buy 10 000 copies of the band B record.
Seeing that band A would have gotten 90,9 % of the total income in record sales.

What I propose is a fairer system where individual user statistics is used.

Let's do a new example with user Avarage Joe (he listens to both bands!). From the 10 dollars AJ pays to Spotify each month, 3 dollars would be split
between artitsts his been streaming.
In January he streamed

Band B 66 %
Band A 33 %

Meaning Band B earned 2 dollars from AJs activity and Band A only 1 dollar.


I think this is a much fairer way to split the income of Spotify for the artists. The artists would once again be rewarded for fanbases, instead of
only trying to make one hit wonders which are played a gazillion times.

 Instead of the saying "Check out my album of Spotify", they would
rather say "Go listen to my album on Spotify dufus, I will make money".

[Marco]

Hey @srednab !

I've moved your post over here to have the discussion about a new artist rewarding scheme in one place.

[srednab]

Thanks Marco, I knew my idea was not orginiale, and I hope Spotify will implement this. This would benefit most artists.

[Marco]

Update: This idea has been reposted here.

Hello!

Your idea has been submitted a while ago but unfortunately hasn't gathered enough kudos (25 per year).
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