Tag: Ethical Pool

Press Release: @UMG and @TIDAL Partner to Work on Artist-Centric Royalties

New York, January 31, 2023 – TIDAL, the global music and entertainment platform, and Universal Music Group (UMG), the world leader in music-based entertainment, today announced that the two companies will work together to explore an innovative new economic model for music streaming that might better reward the value provided by artists and more closely reflect the engagement of TIDAL subscribers with those artists and music they love.

Streaming has revolutionized music, catalyzed industry growth, transformed the entertainment experience and provided incredible opportunities for engagement, to the benefit of artists and fans alike. As it has gained mass adoption over the past decade, there is more desire from all parties to look at how to best economically align fans’ interests with those of their favorite artists.

TIDAL and UMG will research how, by harnessing fan engagement, digital music services and platforms can generate greater commercial value for every type of artist. The research will extend to how different economic models could accelerate subscriber growth, deepen retention, and better monetize fandom to the benefit of artists and the broader music community.

“From day one, TIDAL has stood out as artist-first, leading with a premium subscription tier to pay artists more and experimenting with new ideas like fan-centered royalties to see if there are fairer and more equitable ways to get artists paid,” said TIDAL Lead Jesse Dorogusker. “We are setting aside our current fan-centered royalties investigation to focus on this opportunity for more impact. We’re thrilled to partner and learn along the way about the possibilities for more innovative streaming economics. This partnership will enable us to rethink how we can sustainably improve royalties’ distribution for the breadth of artists on our platform.”

“As the digital landscape continues to evolve, it’s become increasingly clear that music streaming’s economic model needs innovation to ensure a vibrant and sustainable future,” said Michael Nash, UMG’s Executive Vice President, Chief Digital Officer. “Tidal’s embrace of this transformational opportunity is especially exciting because the music ecosystem can work better – for every type of artist and fan – but only through dedicated, thoughtful collaboration. Built on deeply held, shared principles about the value of artistry and the importance of the artist-fan relationship, this strategic initiative will explore how to enhance and advance the model in keeping with our collective objectives.”

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For more information contact:

TIDAL: Sade Ayodele, Head of Communications – sayodele@tidal.com

Universal Music Group, Global Communications: James Murtagh-Hopkins  james.murtagh-hopkins@umusic.com

Read the press release

@stuartdredge: ‘Ethical Pool’ idea could let fans choose user-centric royalties

[This 2018 MusicAlly post by the great Stuart Dredge summarizes my “Ethical Pool” strategy as an intermediate step toward solving the unsustainable streaming artist royalty issue. The Ethical Pool can be implemented immediately–SoundCloud’s “Fan Powered Royalty” version demonstrates the immediate application potential while further engaging fans. It also blows past the complexity objection from streaming services which is the threshold rejection when user-centric (or what I call “artist centric”) is presented because the Ethical Pool is essentially bolted on to the existing royalty system so that services run both simultaneously. That’s what SoundCloud has done with FPR and that’s why it is an intermediate step. You would have to make some decisions about what business rules would allow the two systems to operate side by side, but because all participants in the Ethical Pool would be opt-in you would not have to amend any existing contracts, pass any laws, or change any existing royalty accounting systems. The “Big Pool” stays as is, the Ethical Pool is a new and separate license. The market will tell us if it flies or crashes and burns. It must also be said that there is a tremendous amount of fraud in streaming services–naturally, it’s on the Internet after all–and any royalty system like the Ethical Pool that encourages the existence of actual fans is likely to create natural barriers to fraud.

But know this–the status quo is not sustainable (as Professor Claudio Feijoo and I wrote in our WIPO study on streaming remuneration). Stuart returns to this topic in a recent MusicAlly post in light of Sir Lucian Grainge’s recent statements about sustainability.]

Industry blog Music Tech Solutions has been thinking about the debate around ‘user-centric’ streaming royalties. That’s where the royalties from every paying streamer’s monthly subscription are divided only between the artists they listen to, rather than going into a bigger pool divided by overall listening share on the entire service.

MTS’ new idea: let fans choose if they want their subscriptions to be divided up in this new way. “When the fan signs up for a service, let the fan check a box that says ‘Ethical Pool.’ That would inform the service that the fan wants their subscription fee to go solely to the artists they listen to,” it explains, suggesting that this would ensure streaming services don’t fall foul of contracts that require them to treat royalties in the traditional ‘Big Pool’ way. “Artists also would be able to opt into this method by checking a corresponding box indicating that they only want their recordings made available to fans electing the Ethical Pool.  The artist gets to make that decision. Of course, the artist would then have to give up any claim to a share of the ‘Big Pool.’ Existing subscribers could be informed in track metadata that an artist they wanted to listen to had elected the Ethical Pool. A fan who is already a subscriber could have to switch to the Ethical Pool method in order to listen to the track.”

Read the post on MusicAlly

@musicbizworld: BMG RESPONDS TO ARTIST STREAMING REVOLT IN GERMANY: ‘IT IS TIME FOR RECORD COMPANIES TO CHANGE.’

[Editor Charlie sez:  Rather than rearranging the deck chairs, we think there are two separate issues with streaming rates.  First and most important services need to exercise pricing power to increase the revenue pie or stop asking artists and songwriters to fund and invest in their growth strategy without getting stock or upside.  Second, the method of allocating streaming royalties could change so that you don’t hear fans saying “Sick of my money funding crap.”  Chris Castle’s “Ethical Pool” approach in the influential post “Arithmetic on the Internet” is an interesting interim step that allows both artists and fans to opt in to an allocation based on usage not market share.  If that’s not fixed, it’s just rearranging the deck chairs and artist need to be careful they’re not being used by services.]

As MBW reported Friday (January 24), a group of managers and lawyers representing some of Germany’s biggest artists have written a joint letter to the leaders of the four largest music rights companies in the market – Universal, Sony, Warner and BMG.

The agenda of the letter, undersigned by representatives of 14 artists, “becomes clear very quickly”, according to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper (F.A.Z), which published a more detailed story on the matter today (January 26) on the front page of its business section. Translated, F.A.Z says that the artist reps are demanding “more money from the booming business [created by] music streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music”.

What’s also clear from the letter, according to F.A.Z: unlike prior artist protests against streaming, the letter does not direct its ire towards digital platforms, but instead “attacks record companies” and is “of the opinion that [the majors] are taking too much of the streaming millions”.

Read the post on Music Business Worldwide