I’ve recently been made aware of the non-sustainable business of Spotify (and other streaming services) https://youtu.be/gDfNRWsMRsU .

I think the best solution for all parties would be a federated streaming service. Instances could be hosted by record labels or indi-Artists. Of course there needs to be a fair donation/subscription. (Maybe similar to Patreon - get some extra goodies for supporting your artist directly)

Does something similar exist already? I would rather put my money somewhere where small artists are actually paid fairly for their work. (And put my own works there as well)

Thanks for reading :) I wish you a very pleasant day and I’m looking forward for your input.

    • Lennard@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      I looked at it, but got kinda confused. The instance I logged in didn’t seem to share any music with other instances.

    • aleph@lemm.eeEnglish
      11·
      1 year ago

      Obligatory mention of Bandcamp and Qobuz here - buying music outright ensures a much bigger payout for the artists.

    • Salix@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      3·
      1 year ago

      Unfortunately, not everyone can afford that. Spotify family plan is significantly cheaper than buying every single album from every artist I and my family listens to. Just for myself, I’d have to spend $5000+ for the amount of music I listen to if I bought the mp3 or flac files.

      • Lennard@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        That’s a great point. While I don’t think streaming services can uphold their low prices (and I’m also happy to pay 20 bucks when the artists gets a fair share) I think buying all albums you maybe wanna listen to is way to expensive. Buying music also raises the barrier to discovering new music and cultivatinng a diverse taste in music.

    • Lennard@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      I agree that it’s a great way to support your artist, but honestly I don’t think it stands a chance to become as big as streaming services. The convince of being able to explore almost every artists catalogue at the touch of a button is just too good. (Also great for sharing music or creating a shared playlist)

      I think the problem of storage space is also often overlooked. Not everyone has enough storage on their device. (I know I didn’t, when I still used MP3s on a modern smartphone)

      • locness3@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        AFAIK, Bandcamp lets you stream the tracks before you purchase them, Amazon also lets you stream free wth ads along with purchasing mp3s, so you can enjoy the catalogs and buy what you like on the same platform.

        You can store your music on any cloud storage you wish, the free capacites can be enough, or a NAS or something.

  • Navarian@lemm.eeEnglish
    8·
    1 year ago

    I worry that something like this would rapidly become the equivalent of paying for a hundred different shitty TV channels from cable TV so that you could get the few good ones you were actually interested in.

    • Lennard@lemmy.dbzer0.comOPEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      I guess that’s a possibility. But I think most artists want their work (at least their studio records) to be available to as many listeners as possible. I think paywalling most content will not be successful for the artist nor the record label. (The same way exclusivity deals with streaming services haven’t really worked out).

      But I wouldn’t really mind paying 1 dollar per artist for some bonus tracks, when I know that when 6000 people do the same they will be able to succeed financially