They still haven’t paid songwriters…

The traditional music business is in danger of being hit by a ‘brain drain’ as streaming services raid top executive talent.

The latest high-profile figure to cross the divide is former Def Jam and Warner boss Lyor Cohen, whose appointment at YouTube has set industry tongues wagging worldwide.

He’s not the only one: we hear Troy Carter at Spotify has just swooped for his former Atom Factory management colleague Sam Berger.

Meanwhile, Spotify is hiring for a Head of International Licensing, as a position also opens at Facebook for a global boss of music deal-making.

The smart money is on at least one of these vacancies being filled by a senior figure from a record company. Any guesses?

When you scan back over the past few years, a very definite pattern becomes clear: a long line of senior label execs have been poached by the likes of Spotify, Apple Musicand YouTube – and it’s a trend which is increasing in intensity.

Here, MBW presents a extensive run-down of who’s gone where.

It’s a list which poses two key questions:

(i) How worse off is the ‘traditional’ music rights business due to the loss of this executive talent to ‘the other side’?; and (ii) Who’ll be next…?