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Ghost artists on Spotify

(harpers.org)
556 points greenie_beans | 1 comments | 19 Dec 24 14:12 UTC | HN request time: 0.199s | source
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timoth3y ◴[19 Dec 24 23:01 UTC] No.42466636[source]▶
The entire history of the music business is one of attorneys developing ever more inventive ways of screwing over musicians.

The sad thing (for artists) is that it seems like most Spotify listeners don't care.

Most of our music consumption today seems to be as a kind of background vibe rather than an appreciation of the music itself.

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amelius ◴[19 Dec 24 23:15 UTC] No.42466733[source]▶
It's a good demonstration of how the simple and seemingly solid foundations of our free market can still lead to extreme unfairness.
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equestria ◴[19 Dec 24 23:25 UTC] No.42466811[source]▶
If a customer wants endless elevator music, then I don't think that Spotify is wrong to generate endless elevator music for them. The problem is deception. If you want to listen to human performances, then Spotify should give you choice instead of hoping you don't notice.

Free market means you can vote with your wallet. If you don't, then it says less about markets and more about our stated vs revealed preferences. Maybe we just don't care if real artists go away.

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text0404 ◴[19 Dec 24 23:47 UTC] No.42466967[source]▶
"we" care - the businesses that have inserted themselves as middlemen to extract profit have found that it's cheaper to deceive consumers, drag the quality of art down, and eliminate artists from art completely (or at least what a business executive thinks art is). _those_ are the people who don't care if artists go away. we as human beings are worse off for it.
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1. troupo ◴[20 Dec 24 17:29 UTC] No.42472995[source]▶
You mean the business that lets you listen to your favorite music on nearly any device in existence with seamless switching between them is actually a good business, and the actual middle men are these (quote from the article):

--- start quote ---

In reality, Spotify was subject to the outsized influence of the major-label oligopoly of Sony, Universal, and Warner, which together owned a 17 percent stake in the company when it launched. The companies, which controlled roughly 70 percent of the market for recorded music, held considerable negotiating power from the start.

... Ek’s company was paying labels and publishers a lot of money—some 70 percent of its revenue

--- end quote ---

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