The Death of the Middle-Class Musician

This feel like it's related to the problem of no more mid-budget movies. Now that physical media (CD/VHS/DVD) isn't a thing, there is no long tail of fans to sustain mid-market efforts. Movies that cost a few tens of millions usually didn't make their budget back in the theater -- it was VHS and DVD sales that made up the difference. But now that doesn't happen, so those movies either don't get made, or they're made by the streamers.

Same thing with music. Streaming pays so little compared to physical media now that artists never make up the difference.

> or they're made by the streamers.

Not sure what the problem is, the streams will pay the budget of the movie, just like the old movie studios did. So where is the difference? Do they pay much less and no royalties?

It's really hard to become a cult classic when it's only on Netflix. But also yes, until recently (and even now), it pays a lot less to the people involved in the movie. There weren't really any residuals, the streamers make a one time payment.

Either you're part of the algorithmic elite or you're scraping by

yes, there's just less money going around with streaming - think about it, rentals sustained hundreds of physical buildings with multiple employees