Welcome to the era of only Spotify Plays matter - let’s take a look at the underbelly of streaming scams affecting independent artists.
Welcome to the era of only Spotify Plays matter - let’s take a look at the underbelly of streaming scams affecting independent artists.
The contracts that steal music from artists haven’t changed one iota. Unless you’ve got juice like Paul McCarty, Beyonce, or Taylor Swift, and even then it can be a fight that takes years.
I have a feeling it’s easier to put your music out there as an independant artists. There’s always someone taking a cut but the contacts are optional and there isn’t much gate keeping like before.
It’s like every other media industry. The monoculture is dying. Everyone’s who’s “about it” is into niche subcultures and micro-celebrities you’ll probably never hear of.
There was a weird period of time from the mid-20th through the early 21st century where radio and TV had very strongly concentrated media production which made up most people’s media consumption.
For the last 15 years or so the tools of professional-looking media production for mass consumption have been available to anyone with a few hundred bucks to spare.
In some ways it’s a communist utopia. The means of production have been commodified so much virtually anyone can afford them. However capitalists have moved on from owning the means of production to owning the means of distribution (the platforms).