Music Business/Law Tips - "Streaming"

The 2 best known sources for streaming music in the US are Pandora and Spotify. Pandora is what is known as a “non-interactive” platform because its sort of like a traditional radio station where the listener has no real control over what is played (other than fixing genres/similar artists that cause a narrowcast). Spotify is known as an “interactive” platform because the listener gets to choose what they listen to (click). While streaming of music is great for the discovery of new music/artists, currently it does not pay out much in royalties to the performers/songwriters. Although it’s hard to say for sure, approximately 140 streams equal what is earned from 1 digital download sale on iTunes. Due to the explosion of cellphones, iPads, etc. (worldwide) where music can be listened to from anywhere via this platform, it will only get to be bigger. We will have to stay tuned to see how the money trickles down to the creators as this new model evolves. Ben McLane Esq Benmclane.com