• blazera@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    With hits that low, youre basically just advocating for UBI at that point, you cant expect pay for every little amateur hobby folks have.

    • Prunebutt@feddit.de
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      1 year ago

      People want to listen to it tough, don’t they? Don’t these amateur musicians provide a service that people value?

    • wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one
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      1 year ago

      Lol thats a lunatics take. You absolutely can be expected to pay every person who gives you content to farm users off of.

      Imagine applying your take to any other business. “Sorry john, I loved the soap, but you only have 4 people a week asking about you, so Im going to be keeping it for free.”

      “Love the scarf, really, but you only sold what, 25 this year? 50? Nah, Im just going to keep this. Let me now when you shift real sales, maybe then you will deserve being paid.”

      Nah dude thats lunacy

      • blazera@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        the product isnt being taken and needing replacing, this is like people coming to look at the soap you made. And if enough people come and look at it, an advertiser might give you some money to put an ad by the soap.

        Now, there’s nothing stopping you from selling the soap instead. There are avenues to sell your music instead of having it on a freely accessable platform.

        • wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one
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          1 year ago

          Except thats incorrect. Spotify is a store, asking musicians to give them the rights to sell their songs as a package deal in exchange for a cut based on popularity. All music gets ads. There is no “low popularity ad free” section.

          And now you, and spotify, are saying “yeah I know we agreed to pay you based on how many customers came in here for your stuff, but I think what you rightfully and legally earned is chump change, so I wont be giving it to you.”

          You are advocating scamming people because you, personally, think the money owed is a pittance. Thats an evil, black hearted mentality.

          • blazera@kbin.social
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            1 year ago

            It’s sort of a sliding scale between: making content that is popular enough for a platform to make considerable revenue from it and wants to pay you a portion to keep you there, because your content is competitive and could be making other platforms money. Or, it’s a free hosting site for data you’re uploading that’s funded with ads. Every other platform I know with this model, like Youtube or Twitch, have a cutoff between the two, it’s a hosting site for users until they’re popular enough to become business partners with a monetary agreement. It’s two way freedom between each party, spotify doesnt have to pay anyone anything, and no one has to host their content on spotify.

            This isnt a retroactive change of terms, it’s new terms starting next year. Everyone’s getting what was agreed to this year. If they dont support the new terms, they can leave the platform. They wont, because they’re using it as a free hosting platform and not a money maker, maybe with hopes they’ll be popular enough someday.

            • wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one
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              1 year ago

              “Its a sliding scale, we want your content but we dont want to pay you for it, so if we think youre not popular enough to take us to court over this we are sliding the scale of how much we pay you for the content to zero”

              You sound like an evil cartoon robin hood villain, do you get that? Are you floating about in chains and a nightgown, in preperation for scaring jeff bezos this christmas eve?

              “Nah its like youtube bro, the other super evil and morally bankrupt company!” Thats not a defense, why are you saying that like its a defense

              • blazera@kbin.social
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                1 year ago

                Im an artist trying to make a living with my art. Its not like a normal job where youre profitable from the beginning. Shit is competitive, people dont want to spend money on stuff they can get for free, unless its really good. A thousand free views doesnt amount to a dime for anyone. I can and do outright sell some art, but its taken like hundreds of thousands of free views before i was good enough where anyone would give me money for it. You could also compare like patreon subscribers to twitter followers, it is a huge ratio, way more than 1000:1. You can sell your art, you can go a subscriber model, you can be hired for your art, there are plenty of avenues to profit from your art, but the bottom line is people have to willingly pay money for it.

                • wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one
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                  1 year ago

                  Cool story bro, it has nothing to do with spotify ripping off artists.

                  Good for you that youre okay with being ripped off by spotify? I guess? But we arent talking about what immoral actions you are willing to ignore to further your potential career.

                  People are willingly paying spotify either monthly or via ads to listen to these artists. They have paid for the art. Spotify doesnt want to give the earned cut. Your willingness to give up your fair share in the hopes of future recognition is a personal decision, but that doesnt make it right. It just means you, personally, arent willing to fight off the boot on your chest.

                  Which is the mentality spotify is counting on to get away with ripping off you and everyone else who cant afford lawyers.

              • conciselyverbose@kbin.social
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                1 year ago

                His point is legitimate, though. Content people aren’t willing to pay for is a net cost.

                There’s some line where permissive ability to upload costs them money.

                • wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one
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                  1 year ago

                  That cost is paid 100000000000000x over from the other artists they are underpaying. If this was really such an issue of cost, and not penny pinching, they would have a filter for content that isnt played enough and remove it from the service.

                  Why dont they? Because they cost is almost nil, its covered a thousand times over by the money gained from the platform, and they just want to keep more cash from the people they know cant fight back.

                  His point doesnt apply to spotify. They arent a struggling indie service trying to cover server costs. Massive super star artists frequently complain about penny pinching from spotify. Theyre just greedy.

    • conciselyverbose@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      What they’re actually advocating for is dividing each user’s pot by their listens.

      If a user primarily listens to a handful of small bands, why shouldn’t their cut go to those bands, rather than being thrown into a big pool to be diluted? At first glance they’d be similar, but they’re arguing that if you do the math out they aren’t.

    • admiralteal@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      To be clear, what I said is Spotify should be sending them their annual several dollar checks. They shouldn’t be allowed to just trim away that cost entirely because the artists are small and Spotify wants more profits.

      And what you’re saying is that they shouldn’t get anything because it’s “just a hobby”.

      Fuck you, seriously.

      • blazera@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        Like, i dont think i deserve any money for getting some thousands of views of my art. I think im getting paid about how much money im making the platforms its on, which is nothing. Im not yet good enough to get a job making art, or to sell my art instead of making it freely viewable.