Spotify denies “30-second trick” can make artists rich

nme.com:

Spotify has denied claims that users can repeatedly listen to their own uploaded 30-second song in order to receive monthly royalty payments.As BBC News reports, finance analysts at JP Morgan had previously claimed that subscribers to the streaming service could make $1,200 (£960) a month by listening to their track on repeat for 24 hours a day.The apparent trick suggested that Spotify’s royalty payment structure could be manipulated.

However, the music platform’s CEO Daniel Ek has now said this is not how the app’s royalties function.The theory was first reported in the Financial Times.

Yesterday (September 11), Julian Klymochko, founder of Canadian-based investment company Accelerate, tweeted a screenshot of the article in question.“According to JPMorgan, if someone uploaded their own 30-second track to Spotify, and then programmed their phone to listen to it on repeat 24 hours a day, they would receive $1,200 a month in royalties,” he wrote.In response to the post, Ek said: “If that were true, my own playlist would just be ‘Daniel’s 30-second Jam’ on repeat!“But seriously, that’s not quite how our royalty system works.”A label owner replied to Ek, writing: “It’s not how your royalty system works directly, but the 30-second cutoff for receiving payout has trended songs to be shorter and shorter, and the ‘TikTok part’ is usually always at 31 seconds in.”Ek then explained: “Yes, some songs have gotten shorter.

However, most popular songs are still around 4 minutes.”Per the Financial Times‘ article, JP Morgan executives estimate that as much as 10 per cent of all streams are fake.