Spotify allegedly retaliating against Apple Music exclusives by 'burying' artist content [u]
While Apple is buying exclusives to keep music off rival streaming services, its main competitor -- Spotify -- is reportedly firing back by "burying" content from artists who sign those deals.
Artists who debut tracks as Apple Music exclusives are being told they won't get their music on featured Spotify playlists, Bloomberg said on Friday, citing anonymous sources. Moreover, these musicians are said to be finding their songs lower in Spotify's search rankings, potentially impacting the amount of plays -- and hence royalties -- that each track generates.
While one source claimed that Spotify has been using these tactics for about a year, others suggested that the company has intensified its campaign in recent months. The approach is also supposedly being applied to artists with exclusives on Tidal.
An unnamed singer-songwriter allegedly cancelled plans to launch a song on Zane Lowe's Beats 1 show, worried that they would lose promotional backing on Spotify.
The company remains the global leader in on-demand streaming, with over 30 million paid subscribers compared to Apple Music's 15 million. It also has even more people using its free ad-based tier, though it pulls in significantly less revenue from that audience and needs to convert more of it if it intends to turn a profit.
In fact Apple Music is growing fast, and doesn't necessarily need to turn a profit, as it's mainly a way of luring or locking people into Apple's hardware ecosystem. The service is available on Android, but deeply integrated into iOS devices.
Further pressure on Apple's use of exclusives is coming from Universal Music Group, which recently mothballed all exclusives with Apple Music or otherwise. The company is one of the four major international labels, and hence a weak spot in Apple's exclusivity strategy.
Update: In a response to allegations that it buries music from artists who release their work as exclusives on other services, Spotify told Recode that the claims are "unequivocally false."
Artists who debut tracks as Apple Music exclusives are being told they won't get their music on featured Spotify playlists, Bloomberg said on Friday, citing anonymous sources. Moreover, these musicians are said to be finding their songs lower in Spotify's search rankings, potentially impacting the amount of plays -- and hence royalties -- that each track generates.
While one source claimed that Spotify has been using these tactics for about a year, others suggested that the company has intensified its campaign in recent months. The approach is also supposedly being applied to artists with exclusives on Tidal.
An unnamed singer-songwriter allegedly cancelled plans to launch a song on Zane Lowe's Beats 1 show, worried that they would lose promotional backing on Spotify.
The company remains the global leader in on-demand streaming, with over 30 million paid subscribers compared to Apple Music's 15 million. It also has even more people using its free ad-based tier, though it pulls in significantly less revenue from that audience and needs to convert more of it if it intends to turn a profit.
In fact Apple Music is growing fast, and doesn't necessarily need to turn a profit, as it's mainly a way of luring or locking people into Apple's hardware ecosystem. The service is available on Android, but deeply integrated into iOS devices.
Further pressure on Apple's use of exclusives is coming from Universal Music Group, which recently mothballed all exclusives with Apple Music or otherwise. The company is one of the four major international labels, and hence a weak spot in Apple's exclusivity strategy.
Update: In a response to allegations that it buries music from artists who release their work as exclusives on other services, Spotify told Recode that the claims are "unequivocally false."
Comments
Pay the artists table scraps and then bite the hand that feeds you(artists) by feeding them even less scraps.
Oh yeah, artists are gonna love daddy spotty.
First they keep whining to the public about how unfair Apple is with their subscription policies (multiple times), then they whine about their App being rejected when they knew damn well they were going against App Store policies, then they claim Apple is trying to hurt them by requesting higher royalties to be paid and now they're being petty with musicians.
And people say Apple needs to be better than Spotify to take over? They're already better than those bunch of whiners.
Getting more money, exclusivity, whatever.
You know, good ol' capitalism and all that.
What will happen here is that people won't find artist they want on spotify and small time artists (most) will desert spotify (they're not making money there anyway) and go "exclusive" to Apple and Google or Amazon and Spotify can go punt.
Spotify is a whiny little bitch about this and deserves to DIE.;
& how can a totally burnable subscription service "lock" anyone in?
*actual monopoly not required for Apple
http://www.recode.net/2016/8/26/12663230/spotify-music-artists-exclusive-deals-apple-tidal
"It's OK"
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Seinfeld was exclusive to NBC. Dexter was exclusive to Showtime. Nobody complained; these were differentiators for the respective companies. Not a perfect analogy, I realize, but worth considering.
"It's wrong."
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In the traditional "buy an album at the store" days, I could buy a new release from Tower Records or Barnes & Noble. All content was available from all retailers. Again, not a perfect analogy.
It's a gray area, in my eyes.
There's nothing wrong with exclusives as long as you don't have a monopoly and it's not permanent.