According to loudwire.com, it is the time of year for Spotify to reveal their annual statistics from last year’s streaming music. Among the artists sharing their thanks to their fandom for the support was artist Weird Al Yankovic, who used the platform to not only thank his fans but to take jab at what Spotify pays artists in the process. In his video shared through Spotify and relayed on another social media account by a fan, Yankovic states: “I’ll make this really quick. I just want to thank you all for your amazing support It’s my understanding that I had over 80 million streams on Spotify this year. So if I’m doing the math right, that means I earned … $12. So you know it’s enough that I can get a nice sandwich at a restaurant. So from the bottom of my heart, thanks for your support … and thanks for the sandwich.”
Back in January Ditto Music reported that Spotify paid artists between $.003 and $.005 per stream on average and that works out as an approximate revenue split of 70/30 – 70 percent to the artist/rights holders and 30 percent the streaming platform. Then in October Music Business Worldwide reported that Spotify would be employing rules that will dictate that a track’s annual streams must meet a minimum threshold to generate royalties. There will also be financial penalties for record labels who attempt to game the system with fraudulent activity on tracks.
Plus, a new minimum play time requirement will be implemented on non music and noise tracks. The changes come from conversations that have been going on between Spotify and the three major labels Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Music Group.
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