abrahamKim
Here's the problem with music listening in the past. I want to listen to a variety of artists, albums, and songs but I don't want to keep buying individual albums/songs. In the past, if there was one song you liked, you had to buy the whole album to get it unless there was a single. There was a risk with new artists because you had to buy before you try instead of the other way around. I think the way I listened to most music back then was the radio and CDs of favorite artists until good ol' MP3's came along.
Apple solved the problem for the customer. It started with being able to buy songs for $0.99 each and ended with Apple Music. I never thought I would switch over to streaming but here I am. The great thing about Apple Music is that anytime I look for a song or album, it's there. Now, there may be some obscure artists not on the platform. There have also been big names who were reluctant to play ball. If you are a super fan of a particular artist, you are probably still purchasing all their albums anyway.
One downside is that I'm locked into the monthly fee because once I cancel, it will all go away. I figured the monthly subscription is around the price of buying one album a month, so that makes it worth it to me. I've never used Spotify, but I hear it's roughly equivalent, and hey, good to have choices out there.
While Apple Music and Spotify are great for consumers, apparently they are not so great for the artists. There have been many reports about artists getting paid fractions of pennies per stream, which I'm sure for a lot of artists is less than what they were able to make in the traditional model. I don't know what the answer is to that, but since I am not a musical artist, I'm not inclined to solve for that side of the equation.
My question is where is the Apple Music/Spotify equivalent for TV shows and movies? The problem when we all cut the cord in hopes of saving money is that all these streaming services popped up with original content, and the only way to get it all is to subscribe to all the companies/channels. Just to name a few: Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, Amazon Prime, Disney+, HBO, Showtime. I suppose the answer is to only like content that is available for one or two of these and just go without or pay up?
Oh come on. Such statements are so decontextualized. Because distribution has become more open/easy (spotify/apple-music) there has been an increase in supply of musicians. To simply say artists are getting paid fractions of pennies per stream is not enough. Better argument would be examples of musicians who were making X amount in the pre-streaming and then contrasting it with current revenue. But even then you could provide counter-examples of people obtaining more traction and then monetizing through different aveneues than the sale of music itself --> whether in the form of sales or streams.
For TV/Movies best answer is have a network of friends each one with a different service and pool the user accounts lol.
Would like your input on this. Often a lot of creators are so desperate to leave their jobs and create full time. I observe that you aren't so in a hurry to do that and are fine grinding away for year while being a consultant.
I was actually thinking that the user-base for this site could appeal to such people. I find that Substack and Gumroad appeal more to the more I want to create now! I want to leave my job tomorrow! people