Music Streaming Service Exclusives Make Pirating Tempting Again (theverge.com)

The advent of online music streaming service has made it easier for millions of people worldwide to listen to all of their favorite songs, and convinced plenty to pay for music. But with the space of music streaming service getting increasingly crowded and artists beginning to do exclusive with select platforms, it has again become inconvenient for people to get everything they want with one subscription. The Verge's Ashley Carman writes that this is pushing many people to resort to piracy. Carman writes: Rampant piracy could make a comeback, solely because streaming service exclusives, and complete artist opt-outs, make it impossible to get all music in one place. Last week, Drake dropped two new singles off his upcoming album Views from the 6. The tracks are currently only available on Apple Music. Last month, Kanye West released his newest album The Life of Pablo on Tidal only. It came to Spotify this month after an estimated 500,000 people had already torrented it. Big Sean and Jhen's Aiko released their collaboration album TWENTY88 on only Tidal at first. Beyonce and Nicki Minaj released a Tidal-only music video for Feeling Myself. More than a million people signed up for Tidal over the course of a day just to get Kanye's new album, though it's assumed that most won't stick around. At what cost to listeners are these exclusives being made and where does it leave fans? If users wanted to subscribe to only one service, it would come out to approximately $120 per year. Two services will cost $240, and three services, say, Apple Music, Tidal, and Spotify, will cost $360, which will be a substantial cost to casual listeners.

Comments

Re:Might?

[serviscope_minor]

Pirating stopped being especially tempting when the music industry realised that it ought to sell people what people wanted to buy, for a price they were prepared to pay and allow them to play their music whenever and whereever they liked without anything abusive.

Basically the various music stores, once they dropped DRM, did this. Hear a track, like it, buy it and play it back on anything, anywhere at any time. And the streaming internet radio only helped, since now there were nice options to listen to stuff more or less wherever you wanted.

But now, with exclusives, they're making it more awkward for people to get it through legitimate channels, so people go to the one channel which gives them the flexibility they want: piracy.

Here's the thing, most people aren't freeloading asshats. Most people are happy to pay a reasonable price for something they like, as long as they get something good in return. The "problem" with piracy is not that it was cheaper[*], the problem was it offered (and in the case of video still does) a *better* product.

You can play a pirated media file on any device. You never get unskippable ads with pirated media. With pirated media you don't have to connect your device to the internet because you tried to play the wrong kind of file. With pirated media, there are no DRM servers to be switched off rendering your collection worthless. And so on.

[*] Some people are freeloading asshats and will never pay anything. But you can't get money out of those people.

Shooting themselves in the foot.

[whoever57]

In the UK, music publishers got a ruling that ripping CDs is illegal. What is the likely outcome of that?

If I can't legally buy the CD, rip it and listen to the music on my devices, then I might as well fire up a torrent app and skip the whole "buy the CD" part.

False Equivalence

[Anonymous Coward]

Setting aside the debated-to-death difference between stealing and copyright infringement, your argument is based on another false equivalence;

I have a large choice of stores from which to purchase physical items. I may not be able to afford all the items that I want, but at the very least I do not have to pay $7.50/month in order to access WalMart, another $8.00/month in order to access Bed Bath & Beyond, and yet another $5.00/month to access my farmer's market - when I might only be interested in a few items from Bed Bath & Beyond that WalMart doesn't offer because WalMart doesn't like those things, and that one thing from the farmer's market because the vendor doesn't like WalMart. I can go to each one and pay piecemeal.

While understanding that streaming services have effectively brought the cost of music down to unprecedented levels, those services do have an upfront cost - and when you've got artists doing exclusives to services - where you cannot purchase this music piecemeal anymore - you're not at all being equivalent to stores.

Also, shoplifting isn't the same as copyright infringement. Thank you.

Re:Might?

[AmiMoJo]

This is nothing like shoplifting. Music is given away for free all the time, on YouTube and Vimeo, on the radio and the TV. Downloading a copy doesn't deprive anyone of anything, except the existential concept of a potential lost sale.

Watching a music video and then changing the channel when the ads come on isn't stealing. Humming a tune you heard isn't theft. Downloading a digital copy is at worst copyright infringement. It's definitely not theft, and it's not even that hard to morally justify as at the prices being offered most of these kids weren't going to pay anyway, so not even a potential sale was lost.