Comment on And they mocked me for my WoW subscription 😗

• UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

  I doubt they notice. Most artists either get income directly from fans at concerts, via merch, or through explicit patronage (Bandcamp, Patreon, etc).

  The money they get from streaming isn’t remotely enough to support a professional career. Streaming is more about promotion - to get you in the door at the next concert - than actual income.

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  • Alaknar@sopuli.xyz ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

    Sure. But getting more is better than getting less, no?

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    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

      Do artists benefit more from ad-dense, algorithm gamed, corporate controlled media outlets kicking them a few bucks every month?

      Or is a guerilla campaign of populist free-at-download distribution better for long term concert attendance and merch sales?

      On the whole, there is minimal moral difference between an individual playing an album on Spotify or lifting it wholesale from a seedy site. The actual difference is that if you are pirating or file-sharing, you’re about 30% likelier to actually buy music

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      • Alaknar@sopuli.xyz ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

        Do artists benefit more from ad-dense, algorithm gamed, corporate controlled media outlets kicking them a few bucks every month?

        No idea, I don’t use those.

        The service I use pays (for the 2023-2024 fiscal year) around US$0.01873 per stream in royalties to labels and publishers. Spotify (as of 2025) does $0.003-$0.005 per stream, so it actually improved massively - it’s only 6 times less than Qobuz (used to be 12 times less).

        Or is a guerilla campaign of populist free-at-download distribution better for long term concert attendance and merch sales?

        Doesn’t work for small acts that don’t do massive, world-wide tours. Nor for fully independent artists who just don’t have the budget to do larger concerts.

        The actual difference is that if you are pirating or file-sharing, you’re about 30% likelier to actually buy music

        Cool. Apparently I’m not “average person”, because that doesn’t apply to me.

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