Music lovers take note: streaming a song on Spotify makes your favorite artists very little dough.
An analysis of data from December 2014 that Spotify recently released to music publishers shows that a song played on Spotify Premium—the ad-free service that costs listeners $10 per month—results in royalties worth 0.68 of a cent. If you think that’s a paltry sum, consider this: songs played on Spotify’s free service garner even less money: on average, 0.14 of a cent.
Because a song play on Spotify Free earns an artist about one-fifth as much as a play on Spotify Premium, the music streaming company is under pressure from some folks in the music industry to set restrictions on its free tier by limiting the music available to Free users, or by capping their song plays, The Wall Street Journal reports.
Right now, users of Spotify Free can access the same 30 million songs as Spotify Premium listeners, only with ads. The company has said that the current format turns free users into subscribers. Premium users made up 25% of Spotify’s 60 million active listeners last year, down from 28% the year prior.
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