Recent news revealed that Spotify’s CEO Daniel Ek has been investing heavily in military tech companies, which adds another ethical layer to a platform already criticized for how little it pays musicians !
Spotify only pays artists about $3–5 per 1,000 streams, using a pro-rata model that directs most money toward major stars… By contrast, Qobuz (≈$18–20 per 1,000 streams) and Tidal (≈$12–13) pay far more fairly!
However Tidal is far from ethical. Most of its revenue is controlled by private investors and founders and small artists still earn very little…
More fair-minded platforms like Bandcamp, Resonate, Ampled, or SoundCloud’s fan-powered royalties prioritize musicians over investors.
With these more ethical alternatives available, why do we keep using Spotify?
So much money dropped at on cue / sam Goody’s back in the day only to get that tape / CD home and realize that one song on the radio was fire… but the rest of the album was just a train wreck of flaming garbage.
Isn’t that why we used to buy 45s? And if you discovered the B-side was good then maybe someone would buy the album and everyone else would tape it?