Streaming — Is Music Free Now?
“Everything is free now,” sings Gillian Welch in her song released nearly twenty years ago. The song was partly a response to Napster, a peer-to-peer file sharing software that threatened Welch’s and other artists’ ability to make a living from their music. Napster allowed its users to share music files (MP3s) freely. While the original Napster has been shut down for copyright infringement issues, many fear that music is becoming increasingly free still, this time due to streaming. Streaming services like Spotify allow users to stream music for free so long as they listen to an occasional advertisement. So is music free now?
The Notion of Free Music
For many listeners, it’s safe to say that music has become virtually free. Think of the last time you bought a CD or purchased an MP3. Setting aside those who collect vinyl (which are on the rise, interestingly), most listeners stream music these days. Of course, some pay a monthly subscription for ad-free streaming, but the average listener spends far less money on music than they used to.
Streaming services can offer free music by selling advertising time to third parties. Part of Spotify’s ad revenue is then passed on to the artist. Whether the revenue generated by Spotify ads (and subscriptions) makes up for what Spotify takes away from direct music sales is another question. In any case, streaming contributes to the notion of music as free.
Consider the parallel state of movies. Streaming subscriptions like Netflix blur the value of movies. Instead of buying a movie, you pay a monthly subscription for access to an unending selection of movies. Movie watchers no longer associate the movie with a fixed DVD price but with a perk included in their online subscription.
Music is being dissociated from a price tag, too. We pay a monthly subscription or, better yet, tolerate advertisements, and the song is free, at least “that’s what they say” according to Welch.
Streaming Shifts the Value of Music
While artists are not necessarily worse off with streaming, streaming has diluted music with advertising. Music earns less money directly from listeners and more money indirectly from advertisements. Of course, more people listen to music when it is free. But whether that extended reach leads to a net gain for most artists is uncertain.
Again, the free nature of music is telling. Streaming has subtly shifted the value of music away from the music to the listeners. The listeners have been turned into an advertising opportunity. Streaming services can afford to offer music for free because they are not really selling music; they are selling access to listeners and data. As with other free internet services, “if you’re not paying for it; you are the product.” This inversion of products should raise concern for listeners, but artists do not benefit either. Artists earn money with every stream, but the money no longer comes from the fans. It comes from unrelated ad revenue. Shifting the stream of revenue away from the listener weakens the perceived value of music. Music turns from a product into a platform for other products. The simplified schematic below helps conceptualize the described shift.
Artists Create With or Without Streaming
Whether artists make more or less money with streaming, streaming has devalued music as an isolated product. Streaming services offer music for free, and listeners perceive it as free. It comes as no surprise, then, that “Everything is Free” has experienced a resurgence. Several artists have covered the 2001 song in the last few years: Courtney Barnett, Conor Oberst, Father John Misty, Phoebe Bridgers, and Sylvan Esso to name a few. Together they sing the following:
Someone hit the big score
They figured it out
That we’re gonna do it anyway
Even if doesn’t pay
Presumably, the singers blame streaming for exploiting their creative drive. The music industry has “figured it out.” Whether or not the music industry pays artists fairly, artists will “do it anyway.” In the context of the song, streaming has merely capitalized on artists’ music in a new way. Father John Misty gives an ironic critique of streaming when he covers “Everything is Free” for the Spotify Singles series. At best, streaming has had mixed reception among artists.
The Perception of Music as Free
Streaming creates the perception that music is free. Interestingly, most of the artists who cover what has recently turned into an anti-streaming anthem still enjoy successful music careers. Whether streaming harms those careers or not, the singers rally together against the notion of free music. If not in real measures, streaming makes music free in perceptual terms. Nobody is returning to buying music when they have had it for free for so long.
The net effect of streaming on artists is hard to measure, but the cultural perception of music as free is obvious. Of course, streaming did not invent the notion of free music. Pirating did that before streaming could. After all, Gillian Welch wrote “Everything Is Free” in protest to pirating, long before streaming. However, streaming has only reinforced listeners’ expectation that music should be free.
So is music free? No, but the illusion of free music is alive, strong, and pervasive. And though the future of music remains unpromising for artists, they will likely keep singing.
