It’s Spotify Wrapped season, with followers throughout social media sharing the music they’ve loved during the last 12 months. Bizarre Al used the chance to focus on simply how little ‘smaller’ artists make on the platform with a little bit of facetious humor. Watch under.
Bizarre Al posted a message to his followers, saying, “It’s my understanding that I had over 80 million streams on Spotify this 12 months. So if I’m doing the match proper meaning I earned… $12.” Whomp whomp. Yankovic thanks his followers who helped him earn sufficient to “get a pleasant sandwich at a restaurant.”
Whereas the mathematics on his criticism isn’t proper—the spirit of it’s. Spotify not too long ago introduced a brand new coverage on royalty funds, eliminating payouts for songs with fewer than 1,000 annual streams. Dialogue round Spotify’s already low payout quantities has continued for years, with Digital Music Information yearly highlighting simply how little Spotify pays artists.
Spotify usually pays between $0.003 and $0.005 per stream underneath its previous construction, however that can change underneath its new royalty coverage. Music artists with fewer than 1,000 streams previously 12 months might be successfully locked out of Spotify’s royalty share.
Music streaming platforms have modified the panorama of the music business drastically, from the best way we devour music to the best way artists’ write their songs. Bizarre Al’s math on 80 million streams would equal nearer to $240,000 this 12 months, if he have been paid $0.003 for every of these streams.
That additionally assumes that Bizarre Al himself receives 100% of the royalty payment—which isn’t the case both. Yankovic is within the clear legally as parody is taken into account honest use, however he’s all the time gone out of his technique to get the unique writers’ permission. Al’s share of the songwriter credit score and royalties powerful to find out with so many parodies—making his royalty preparations distinctive even within the realm of streaming.
Royalty shares per Bizarre Al track can differ, as detailed by Yankovic’s lawyer, Chuck Hurewitz in his 1991 regulation journal, “Stranger in Parodies: Bizarre Al and the Regulation of Musical Satire.”
“Bizarre Al’s substantial market success is accountable for the willingness of copyright house owners to grant him permission to parody their music compositions, and has made it doable for Yankovic to cut price for a profitable share within the copyright of the parody model of the track.”