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I ditched Spotify and set up my own music stack

(leshicodes.github.io)
275 points starkparker | 4 comments | 04 Sep 25 22:47 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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cortesoft ◴[04 Sep 25 23:21 UTC] No.45133347[source]▶
So the author talks about how little money per stream artists make... but how much SHOULD they be making? What is fair compensation for writing a song?

In the old days, artists would join a label and put out an album. The artist would earn about 10% of sales or so (varies of course, but on average). So a $15 CD would earn an artist $1.50.

The article lists the 'price per stream' as about $0.005. So it would take about 300 streams of a song to earn the same amount as selling a CD used to make.

I feel like that isn't categorically less money than artists used to make per song listen? There are many albums I own that I have listened to way more than 30 times, which is what it would take for a 10 song album to get 300 song 'streams'

Is that a fair compensation? Why or why not?

I think artists should be able to earn money from creating music, but I don't know how we decide how much they actually deserve if we aren't just going based on the price the market sets.

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probably_wrong ◴[05 Sep 25 00:57 UTC] No.45133951[source]▶
Without giving specific numbers, I think the following situation is inherently unfair:

I pay Spotify $20. They take their cut (say, 50%) and there's $10 left for the artists. I've only listened to one small artist throughout the entire month. The artist does not get $10 but much less despite Spotify knowing precisely which artists I listened to.

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lawgimenez ◴[05 Sep 25 05:32 UTC] No.45135259[source]▶
I just found out Spotify is $20? In my country it's less than $3. Why the huge pricing difference.
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al_borland ◴[05 Sep 25 06:14 UTC] No.45135465[source]▶
It usually comes down to cost of living in the county.
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1. aspenmayer ◴[05 Sep 25 06:56 UTC] No.45135702{3}[source]▶
Speaking of Spotify, they apparently just updated their Terms of Use as of September 3, 2025, effective September 26, 2025. From the email I received:

> We have clarified that you may only access the version of the Spotify service available where you live at the applicable price set for that version of the service.

> We have clarified how we bill you for subscriptions and how subscriptions may be canceled.

> We have provided more information about different ways in which content may be posted or shared on the platform.

> We have also provided more information about our content policies and practices, and our personalized recommendations.

> We have included links to important user policies and guidelines for your ease of reference.

> We are making some updates to the arbitration agreement.

Found some more discussion of pricing issues:

https://old.reddit.com/r/digitalnomad/comments/1n4x58f/spoti...

And this change was not called out in the email, but seems interesting to note:

https://musictechpolicy.com/2025/09/02/ai-implications-of-sp...

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2. shrikant ◴[05 Sep 25 09:49 UTC] No.45136781[source]▶
YouTube have done the same with the Premium subscription. From the email I received:

> We are updating the Terms of Service for YouTube Premium, YouTube Music Premium and YouTube Premium Lite subscriptions ('Terms'). These new Terms will be included in the YouTube Paid Service Terms of Service and will come into effect on September 26, 2025.

> We are making these changes to improve clarity and transparency regarding your subscription, including:

    Clarifying our plan types.
    Explaining our policies on promotional offers and accepted payment methods.
    Clarifying that your subscription access should be predominantly from the country where you signed up.
    Providing additional explanations and clarifications on our subscription policies.
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3. aspenmayer ◴[05 Sep 25 09:58 UTC] No.45136818[source]▶
I believe that the date may be the end of Q3 for the financial year, if I had to guess, which might explain the similar moves by both parties, though I'll admit that I'm speculating on that point. There's a lot of overlap in vested interests on Spotify and YouTube, when it comes to music especially.
4. nisegami ◴[05 Sep 25 15:43 UTC] No.45139877[source]▶
I guess it's time to cancel my youtube premium sub since it's US-based but I no longer live there and it's not available where I live now.