The pyramid of music streaming just gets more and more exaggerated – last week, striking figures were released by entertainment data company Luminate (formerly SoundScan) detailing 2023’s stats. Out of 184 million total tracks on streaming platforms, nearly 25% - 45.6 million - were not played at all. Another 61% – 113 million tracks – were streamed 1,000 times or fewer. Which means Spotify’s new royalty scheme for 2024 - which won’t account to tracks under 1,000 annual streams - leaves roughly 86% of all recordings demonetized.
What was wrong with piracy, again…?
In the picture above, the only tracks earning anything from Spotify – anything! – will be in the blue stripe near the top, and the yellow eye of providence above that which is pretty much where all the money in recorded music now resides.
