The Verge:
Adele’s 25 is the biggest album in the world right now, and it’s made it there all without a single stream on Spotify. In fact, it might have made it there because there hasn’t been a single stream on Spotify: Adele and her label made the decision not to stream 25 anywhere online, encouraging people to actually buy the album or its songs outright. But despite the ban, some services have songs from 25 up streaming.
25 isn’t on Pandora because Adele specifically wanted it there. It’s on Pandora because Adele and her label don’t have a say.
This is a great example of the giant hairball that is streaming services and the confusion that consumers have with regards to which service does what and how they play you music.
Why confusion? Pandora is not an a la carte streaming service, it is radio. Pandora customers do certainly know that, just like they know that they can e.g. not stream an entire album.
What does create confusion here is the continuous misreporting (hyping) of streaming services by most media. Streaming is not dominating anything, online and physical sales combined are still the by far most common mean of music consumption. Not allowing it is the best thing a real artist can do. The streaming royalties can maybe feed some hip hop clown who samples other people’s work on his $200 Windows box, it can’t feed an entire band, and certainly no big band or orchestra.
Look at what “all you can eat” and cheap food have done to food quality. Hint: it’s gone. I do not want the equivalent of chloride chicken and GMO potatoes coming out of my speakers. Fuck streaming.
Guess the author doesn’t know this but there are thousands of streaming radio stations out there of which many play whatever music is currently popular. Any consumer that listens to internet radio realizes this.
The key market for pop music is the age group from teens to those in their early 30s – a group that has no trouble understanding enough of how these services operate differently. My daughter, who is no technophile, has zero trouble. As she tells me, “I was born and raised in this world of internet services.” In other words, it’s no harder than choosing a restaurant. You don’t need to know what you are missing. You just need to know what you are consuming.
I must be the only techie with no interest in the politics of pop music.