This week I have created a PowToon check it out below.
To view on PowToon: http://www.powtoon.com/embed/cWHUTfjPJFg/
References
As i discovered so many great and interesting resources this week, check them all out on my scoopit. I have added my thoughts to each of my references for the week:
http://www.scoop.it/t/spotify-decreasing-piracy-or-diminishing-the-music-industry
Anna Selway 
Hi Anna,
This is Charmaine from #MANG2049! I really enjoyed watching the video that you made and found it very entertaining – great job! 🙂
I personally use spotify which is what drew me to your post. I have not upgraded to premium yet as I too, like many others, do not wish to spend money every month in order to listen to the music that I like. I agree with you that with spotify, the problems of piracy is diminished as it is a more ethical and legal way to hear our favourite music on the go without having to pay for it.
Personally, I agree with your argument that spotify does solve piracy issues and is actually helping a lot of artists gain followers and listeners via their platform. For example, I was first introduced to the 1975 on spotify. A lot of my current favourite tunes are also discovered by listening to the playlists made by other users!
All in all, I feel that spotify is a great app which brings the people who love different genres of music together! However, what do you think would be the outcomes for music artists in the long run if everyone was to choose to use the free version of the app? Will spotify then become an disadvantage instead of an advantage?
Would love to hear your opinion!
Cheers! 🙂
Charmaine
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Hello Charmaine,
Thank you for your post, it is great to get feedback from other modules across the University- way to collaborate interdisciplinarily!
I think that it is inevitable that most people will move over to spotify, I personally feel we will never be in a situation where no one pays for music, but I may be proved wrong! As a music student I have first have experience on the way the music industry is changing- I think many people believe spotify changed the industry, but it was just an inevitable change that was already occurring. I do not believe spotify will be detrimental to the music industry, I personally see it as a way of changing how we engage with music. Concert attendance in the last few years for artists who release free music has been HUGE. Lady Gaga who released her albums free of charge sold out her most recent tour in near enough every venue! Artists make a lot more money from tours and concerts than they ever could have from CD/Track sales. Therefore I believe that this is an inevitable change that artists are getting annoyed at spotify for, which truthfully would have happened anyway!
Thank you again!
Anna
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Hey Anna!
I am a student from the #MANG2049 module (http://blog.soton.ac.uk/mang2049/) and have just blogged about Topic 5 as well. I really liked the video you made, it was simple and clear. Great job!
Your blog post caught my attention as I am a user of Spotify as well. I do agree with your points that Spotify helps reduce piracy and helps promote an artist’s profile. I think Spotify is such a great way to discover new artists as they offer many recommendations from the type of music you have played. It’s almost like behavioural targeting and marketing for these artists.
What is your opinion on the issue of U2 releasing their album Songs of Innocence on iTunes for free? I guess they were giving open access to their music but there were negative reactions from the public as they criticized Apple and U2 for this publicity stunt. You can read more about it here: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/features/free-u2-album-how-the-most-generous-giveaway-in-music-history-turned-into-a-pr-disaster-9745028.html
Looking forward to your reply!
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Hi Yvonne,
Thank you for your comment 🙂 It is great to have so many people from other modules engaging with my blog posts!
Really interesting point, and a very interesting article- Thank you. I would argue that the U2 publicity stunt was not just releasing an album for free. The reason individuals had such a negative reaction is they were forced an album onto an already space restrict device. It’s breach of privacy- I would suggest it just scared people to think that apple can put stuff onto peoples phones as and when they feel like it. Had U2 released the album for free download, we may have seen a completely different reaction! Would people have downloaded it just to hear what it sounded like?
I believe they just went about the “free” album isuse the wrong way. What do you think?
Thank you again,
Anna
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Hello Anna! I am Zoe from #MANG2049 🙂
Your Powtoon video was really concise and gave a good overview of how Spotify is contributing to the industry! It was surprising to know that 55% of people swapped to legal streaming platforms when given the option. The case study about Taylor Swift shows the impact of how open access can help increase the exposure of artists and boost their sales. It was saddening that Taylor’s album became No.1 in privacy! However, Taylor did explain that her cause of leaving Spotify as she believed “artist should value their art work” and ensure that “people are paying enough for it”.(Engel, 2014)
Hence, do you think that the open access concept for Spotify will result in people failing to appreciate artworks and consistently gearing towards free music? I also feel that artists will gain lesser profits if they are always place their music on platforms like Spotify where people need not pay. Does that mean they can only rely on concerts for their main source of revenue?
Will be glad to hear your views! Cheers! 🙂
References:
Engel, P. (2014). Taylor Swift Explains Why She Left Spotify – Business Insider. [online] Business Insider. Available at: http://www.businessinsider.sg/taylor-swift-explains-why-she-left-spotify-2014-11/#.VIf2tTGUcxJ [Accessed 10 Dec. 2014].
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Hi Zoe,
Thank you for the post! You have raised some really interesting and important questions!
This interesting article: http://www.theguardian.com/music/shortcuts/2013/jul/15/spotify-musicians-money-thom-yorke shows where musicians make the most of their money. You can see that for CD’s/Downloads artists make as little as 8p (for the songwriter) whereas when doing a concert they can be paid around 2 million. Artists already make the majority of their money in other ways, not including CD/Downloads. The article also touches on all the other ways that artists make revenue including:
1. Every radio play
2. Private and other Gigs
3. TV shows (guest starring or their music being used!)
4. Films (guest starring or their music being used!)
5. Music used in Hollywood Films
6. Music used in an advert
7. They also receive a large amount of endorsements- anything from perfume/jewelry to clothing!
As you can see my point is that artists get the majority of their revenue already from other sources, these sources are just becoming more important with the development of the world wide web. Through spotify i do not believe that artists are being respected less. I do not personally listen to a song think “oh its free, therefore it must be rubbish”- I still appreciate a good song. I think Spotify has done so many beneficial things for the music industry, artists like Lorde and The 1975 would not be anywhere near as popular as they are currently if they had not been featured on spotify. It allows the outreach of music to a wider audience.
Thank you for your comment, sorry for the really long reply- any information you wish to comment on would be great.
Anna
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Hi Anna!
You have a very different take on this topic. Great use of Powtoon to illustrate your points on Spotify and the music industry with regards to piracy as well as highlighting the recent Taylor Swift decision to retract her music!
It’s true music industry has changed over the years. Open access on Spotify has revolutionised the way we listen to music. I liked what you’ve mentioned, that it’s: free and immediate.
https://news.spotify.com/us/2014/11/11/2-billion-and-counting/ by Daniel Ek (@eldsjal) clarifies the misconceptions about Spotify. Just because Taylor Swift decides to pull her songs and albums off from Spotify as she felt that to her music is an art, and streaming it for free or a small fee is no different from ‘piracy’. However, life goes on, people who wish to listen to her music but don’t wish to pay for it can still download her songs through Torrent sites. (at least if she kept her tracks on Spotify she could still earn some royalties from the number of plays)
What are your opinions on Taylor Swift retracting her songs? Do you think she has a point? Or would you rather agree with Spotify? Also, how do you think Spotify’s competitor (iTunes) would be affecting in the long run? because consumers are moving towards ‘free’ music.
Let me know your thoughts! 😉
Sara
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Hi Sara,
Thank you for your comment!
I believe Spotify is write, Taylor Swift has every right to do with her music what she wishes. However, spotify is moving individuals from an illegal platform of free music to a legal one. Spotify opens up opportunities to engage with music communities in a positive way, 55% of young people opted to move to a legal platform from piracy when given the option! I believe that Itunes was never sustainable as people would still use piracy. Yes in some way individuals are moving from iTunes to spotify- however it is also moving people from piracy to spotify. Spotify actually showed that the majority of their paying customers where originally using the free platform and converted after a year. And when you pay for spotify you actually on average spend double the average American would spend on music in a month. So overall this is benefitting the music industry- however by paying this is no longer completely “open access”. In my PowToon i discuss that Taylor Swift actually lost out in the long run by not putting her new album on spotify. However many artists choose to have a rule with spotify; for example Coldplay requires 3 weeks where it is not released free after each album release. Then spotify may put it up.
What do you think?
Anna
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Hi Anna,
I love that you’ve raised the topic of Spotify, but I’m afraid I’m going to have to disagree with your conclusions. Whenever an artist decides to pull music from Spotify or refuses to let their music be put on there, the response from Spotify is always the same: “If people are listening on Spotify, at least they aren’t pirating it!”
This relies on three assumptions:
1) That pirating is necessarily a bad thing
2) That Spotify gives artists a liveable wage
3) That there are no better alternatives for artists
It’s been shown many times that piracy actually correlates to more sales – Spotify becoming an “end-point” stifles that. The vast majority of users don’t buy albums if they’re available on Spotify – they think they are supporting the artist, but in fact, what Spotify pays to all but the most popular (e.g. Top 40) artists is but a pittance.
Moreover, there are a number of platforms, notably Bandcamp, which I find to be far more artist- and consumer-friendly.
What are your thoughts? Do you agree on the assumptions?
Thanks,
Calum
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Hi Calum,
I will have to disagree with you on this. Yes artists do not get a great amount of money from their Spotify plays, they also therefore “lose out on” CD sales.
The thing you are ignoring is that these sales are decreasing anyway. They were decreasing long before Spotify came about. And would continue without Spotify. People are quick to blame the new technology for a decrease in sales. The benefits Spotify has brought to the industry has been the availability of new music all around. New artists can be found quickly, unknown musicians are finding more followers. Gigs are getting more people attending, they can put their ticket prices up. Yes one place of revenue is decreasing- inevitably through the invention of the World Wide Web. However, other areas are increasing. With people having more availability to music tracks they are more likely to get the chance to have their music feature on an advert- a way of making way more money than is possible from cd sales.
My final point is, should music creation be all about money? Should it not just be a creative outlet of things we enjoy. A celebration of the process, the product and the community. The music industry has lost its focus of the music, and has become focused on the money.
Anna
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Hi Anna,
Very refreshing to watch a professional video instead of reading paragraph after paragraph! Theres just a few points I wanted to raise. When I touched on the subject of Spotify in my post I discovered that Spotify announced that they pay an artist £0.007 per stream which is obviously a very small sum when compared to the revenue stream generated from album sales, through CD’s or digitally. As can be read here – (http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-05-21/why-spotify-and-the-streaming-music-industry-cant-make-money) “Spotify has lost a total of $200 million since it was founded” and “70 percent of its revenue goes to royalties”. Considering that Spotify is struggling to generate profits as they spend so much on royalties for the music, do you think that this business model will survive?
Dom
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Hi Dom,
Thank you for your post. Like any new business it has a long way to go, a lot more to achieve- however I do think this model will work, once it is more concrete. I think the new way of looking at the music industry which is being created is fascinating and something that needs to be considered a serious development in the industry. However as we can see from them losing considerable amounts of money, they have not got it right yet. It has a long way to go!
I hope that helps answer some of your questions!
Thanks,
Anna
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