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...So I Finally Quit Spotify
(oliviarafferty.substack.com)
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this post was submitted on 30 Dec 2023
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You (or your label who represents you) voluntarily put your music on spotify and can always pull your content if you want.
Equating this to theft makes zero sense. And your post is universally upvoted. Wtf?
Have you considered the power imbalance when you describe them as voluntarily putting it on Spotify? What are your views on "paying people in exposure" or unpaid internships?
I would be open to hearing an argument as to why Spotify should pay no matter what. I could get behind that.
However, if you voluntarily put your music on spotify, and can remove it any time you want, and you are claiming spotify is committing theft against you. . .well, that just doesn't hold any water. I mean, you hold all the power in this case: it's your music that you fully control.
I can see both being beneficial, but most of the time lame. The latter is something that benefits the wealthy, so I think it should be discouraged. But if you voluntarily did either of these things and then tried to claim theft, I would meet it with the same argument.
Spotify can't tell big fish to go unpaid but they can target small creators as they're likely the ones who most need to be paid for their work. "Work for me for free and maybe I'll pay you in the future" is lame but consider the small print says "we may stop paying you in the future if you fall below a change in threshold in the future".
People say "internet piracy" is theft and that doesn't even deprive the person of a thing they had, merely a strongly assumed "lost sale". We know the creators had a sale because Spotify do this to make money earned by the works.
If I said I will donate money you give me to charity but I instead keep the money did you give it to me "voluntarily"? Probably not because you were deceived.
IIRC, we are talking about if you don't break the 3-5 dollar threshold. If you're banking on that money you've got way bigger problems than Spotify not buying you a cup of coffee.
The question is...do you think piracy is theft? If not, then I don't see why you would even bring up this point.
No, of course not, because you committed fraud by lying to me what the money would be used for.
If Spotify gave no warning and did it retroactively, then you have a point that it was deceptive and fraudulent, but this sounds like they have announced in advance that they are changing the policy. So this isn't them saying one thing and then doing another.
Is it safe to assume a significant portion of creators are in that threshold? 3-5 dolors from a lot of people for the biggest company in music streaming. I think Spoity nickel and diming a bunch of smaller creators is the real financial problem.
To determine where you draw the line I make small steps towards Spoity. If a Mafia gang member spells it out that you need to pay X every month or else while you live in this town, is it theft? You can just move away, do you have the power?
I believe my comment above was removed for the Oblivion guard line where if you are caught stealing you must pay a fine go to jail and if you refuse then you will be struck down. He does this even if you take something of little value. We all start earning at a low threshold for our creative works, those 3-5 dolors may be more important to them than you appear to value them. To me it's more important than taking 1000 from a big creator..
If the question is whether they should pay them, I agree they should. This is obviously an attempt to make more money.
But the question is whether this is comparable to theft. I think your reference to piracy, which you abruptly dropped, shows you agree with me. If piracy isn't theft, when that is taking their content involuntarily without compensation, and then certainly providing you voluntarily providing your content understanding you won't get compensated isn't theft. So is privacy theft?
Also, comparing it to the mob shaking you down for money makes no sense. You don't voluntarily enter into that agreement. With Spotify, you can either view the exposure as a good thing for you, and leave it and make no money from it, or you can view it as wrong to you and remove it, and make no money from it. Either way the outcome is the same for you, and it's your choice what to do. For the mob, you either have to pay them money, move, or be harassed (or worse). I can't fathom why this was brought up as an example to prove the point.
I don't consider "internet piracy" as stealing because it is copying. In an age where it is easy for anyone to copy then the expectation to have a temporary monopoly on distribution, as if it were a physical good, is unintelligible.
The point is "voluntarily" is more nuanced than merely people agreeing to it. I consider people free to choose when Spotify would get laughed at every single time. Instead it's sometimes an offer you can't refuse, either out of desperation or because they are ignorant of how they are being exploited.