Why would artists favor free streaming?

While streaming services are becoming the dominant way to consume recorded music, professional musicians remain divided in their opinion toward streaming, especially toward free (ad-supported) services that generate very low royalties. This paper is one of the first attempts to analyze empirically t...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of cultural economics 2020-06, Vol.44 (2), p.255-280
Main Authors: Aly-Tovar, Ramadan, Bacache-Beauvallet, Maya, Bourreau, Marc, Moreau, Francois
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Artists
Arts
Consumers
Consumption
Cultural Economics
Discovery
Economic Policy
Economics
Economics and Finance
Habits
Humanities and Social Sciences
Microeconomics
Music
Musicians
Musicians & conductors
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Regional and Cultural Studies
Revenue sharing
Streaming media
Streaming services
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:While streaming services are becoming the dominant way to consume recorded music, professional musicians remain divided in their opinion toward streaming, especially toward free (ad-supported) services that generate very low royalties. This paper is one of the first attempts to analyze empirically the drivers of the artists’ opinion on free streaming. Using survey data from more than 1100 French professional musicians, we emphasize that beyond their individual preferences, four main determinants affect the opinion of artists on free streaming: (1) Free streaming stands as a discovery tool that helps consumers to explore the music catalogue beyond stars and already well-known artists; (2) free streaming generates a positive externality on the live music market; (3) the contractual situation of the artist also matters, since the biggest recording companies obtain much more favorable conditions in revenue sharing from streaming services; (4) the opinion of artists is also shaped by the consumption habits of their fans.
ISSN:0885-2545
1573-6997
DOI:10.1007/s10824-019-09358-z