Spotify has been quick to dismiss recent criticisms that it is not generating enough money for artists, with reports that over a million plays of a popular ditty by Lady Gaga netted the artist a mere $167.
The original report emerged from Swedish publication expressen.se, claiming that Lady Gaga's hugely popular song Pokerface, managed to generate her just around enough money for a decent meal for two in a nice West End restaurant. Without too much wine, that is…
Poo-poos critics
Spotify has rubbished the claims, issuing the following statement:
"Firstly, any payment to STIM would only represent a fraction of the payments rights holders receive and only for music played in one country (in this case Sweden) as we pay not only collecting societies, but also publishers and the record company to play their music.
"Secondly, the figure (unrepresentative as it is) is from a short period just after our launch last year, way before we'd established ourselves as a music service and built up a large user base. Specific payments are of course confidential, but this is certainly wide of the mark."
So there we go. And while Spotify still has its detractors within the music industry that continue to claim it is not the 'saviour of the commercial recording industry' that many paint it to be, the bottom line is that the service continues to accrue users – both of its free and paid-for options on its various desktop and mobile clients.
So here's hoping the service can reveal some solid financial results in the near future to silence the naysayers and start to pay artists a decent whack!
Via Spotify
