Streaming royalties have notoriously been a hot topic of conversation. And, as one of the top streaming stories, Spotify’s newest announcement has been welcomed by many.
Spotify has launched their new web portal, Loud & Clear; created to give artists and listeners an insight into streams and how royalties are worked out.
“Artists deserve clarity about the economics of music streaming. This site aims to increase transparency by sharing new data on the global streaming economy and breaking down the royalty system, the players, and the process.”
What does Loud & Clear do?
Loud & Clear was built to help offer transparency in the rather complicated world of streaming. It was designed to allow artists and listeners an insight into how streaming royalties are worked out and how the wealth Spotify’s artists are performing.
They also wanted this tool to help artists build a career through their music on Spotify:
“Artists want the opportunity to make a living from their work. We want that, too: Although more artists than ever are finding success through streaming, we’re nowhere near done, and we’ll keep pushing to grow the industry.”
You won’t be able to see how much cash individual artists are earning (there are no names of individual artists on the site). However you can see breakdowns of how certain types of artists are performing. Along with this are break downs of the global streaming landscape and Spotify’s royalty calculations, configurations and processes.
How can independent musicians benefit from it?
It’s been long argued that artists and musicians deserve more clarity about their earnings from streaming and how they’re calculated. With this new offering, Spotify have presented valuable insights into the relatively secretive streaming landscape. This is welcome news to many independent artists that make up this landscape that they previously didn’t know much about.
By educating musicians about the streaming landscape and Spotify’s inner workings, they can make more informed decisions when it comes to where they offer and market their music.
What useful features does it contain?
There are copious useful resources contained within the website, such as:
- “Loud & Clear: How the money flows” – an informative video about Spotify’s money streams, how artists get paid and everything in between.
- Streaming numbers in context – a tool where you can compare your monthly listeners and total streams with the rest of Spotify’s catalogue.
- Meet the artists on Spotify – a breakdown into the different types of artists on Spotify, along with insights into their average earnings and how many there are.
- Q & A – answers to the most common industry questions asked by artists and industry professionals.
We hope that this offering of transparency helps independent artists and musicians learn how they earn their money, and more about how the streaming landscape is constructed.
Head over to Loud & Clear and have an explore yourself – there’s lots to learn!
