The music industry is one where if you are popular, you make a ridiculous amount of money but if you are trying to start out, revenue can be scarce. Sahir mentions in his blog post “Music Industry Today” that artists, no matter what their level of fame, earn between $0.006 and $0.0084 per song play on Spotify. Even though I completely agree with Sahir’s opinion regarding the fact that this amount is very small and this shows a negative trend in society in regards to paying for quality music, I believe there is some value in the free downloading market.
Free streaming hurts the main players in the music industry hands down, but in ways it can be an advantage to the up and coming. During our Comm 101 class where the Sauder Alumni visited, Tom Dobrzanski (Founder of Monarch Studios) mentioned that there exists a market for free/illegal music downloads for bands who are trying to start out like “Said the Whale” and “Hey Ocean” once were. By having this service available, these emerging artists are able to spread their music out to the public without having to thin their admirer’s wallets. If this illegal downloading system did not exist, there would be no way for these up and comers to have their music heard. Like Sahir mentioned, it would severely impact the diversity of music available to the listeners.
In summary, as much harm as free downloads can be to the big boys in the market, like Eminem, or Taylor Swift (who can definitely afford to take the hit regardless), they allow people to appreciate good music that wouldn’t otherwise have been out there and accessible to the public.
Image References:
https://spotifypresscom.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/spotify-logo-primary-horizontal-dark-background-rgb.jpg