music-streaming

This report was commissioned by the Music Creators’ Earnings Project as an empirical analysis of justified and unjustified differences in music creators’ music streaming earnings.

Catalytic Sound, a cooperative organization comprising 30 avant-garde instrumentalists and composers, is attempting to actualize this dream — and hoping to help other similarly minded musicians do the same for themselves. In January, the co-op’s partners launched Catalytic Soundstream, a small-scale streaming platform that charges listeners $10 per month for access to a rotating library of albums from the fringes of improvised music.

According to the written evidence submitted by Dr. Franco Mariuzzo and Dr. Peter Ormosi to the Economics of music streaming inquiry of the UK Parliament, Digital, Culture, Media, and Sports Committee, the answer is no.

Our paper argues that fair competition in music streaming is restricted by the nature of the remuneration arrangements between creators and the streaming platforms, the role of playlists, and the strong negotiating power of the major labels. It concludes that urgent consideration should be given to a user-centric payment system, as well as greater transparency of the factors underpinning playlist creation and of negotiated agreements.