"Forty years ago, co-writing a song with Ringo Starr would have provided me a house and a pool. Now, estimating 100,000 plays on Spotify, we guessed we’d split about $80. When I got home, on closer study, I found out we were way too optimistic. Spotify (on par with other streamers) pays only .00065 cents per play."

How Songwriters Are Getting screwed in the Digital Age

Makes "4% of Something" look generous. I'd bet the label and producer that owned that particular record thought so.

Comments JK?

It is dreadful how ALL copyright owners are being screwed these days; I blame the BPI and other rights collectors (BMI, ASCAP, PRS) for allowing it to happen.

Some people would call this the natural result of technological progress, albeit disruptive technologies. Look what online shopping has done to the high street. In 20 years time, accountants will be defunct as automatic bookkeeping software comes into its own, and hundreds of thousands of white collar jobs will go in a similar fashion. Quill pens and parchment got replaced with fountain pens, biros and mass produced paper; then the typewriter came along and created work for an army of secretaries; these then got replaced with word processors and people in offices started typing their own letters. Now of course, there is a tendency to not even bother with paper and just keep digital copies of emails, word docs and PDFs. My bank offers me the option of going paperless!

The same can be said for recording technologies: It all began with wax cylinders; then we had gramophones and some bright Frenchman came up with the idea of paying royalties every time a song was played or performed live; later on reel to reel and tape cassette recorders kicked in, making it possible to record your favourite hits off the radio - the industry really hated this fact at the time. Nowadays of course, music can be streamed for free from Youtube, shared illegally on file sharing sites, or turned into mp3s for free by borrowing a CD from the library or a friend. As with all industries, the music business will have to evolve; into what though, is the mystery. The danger as far as I can see, is that pop stars are just being used as fashion mannequins to help sales of clothes and gadgets, and their music - or what's left of it - becomes an insignificant component which, like wallpaper, people are only vaguely aware of humming away in the background.