Podcasts about midia research

In this episode, we're shaking things up with our very first Live Music Draft 2025! Joined by MIDiA Research's Tati Cirisano, we're drafting our top music festivals, stadium tours, arena tours, concert residencies, over-performers, and under-performers of the year! 02:30 Music Festivals 09:21 Stadium Tours 14:04 Arena Tours (First Timers) 22:00 Vegas Residencies 25:07 Overperformers 28:53 Underperformers 29:51  Market Moves This episode is presented by State Farm, the home for your small business needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Listen in for our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.

In this episode, Dmitri speaks with Mark Mulligan, veteran tech analyst and leading digital thinker from MIDiA Research. Topics include the slowing growth of streaming revenue, shifts in market share among major and independent labels, the rise of the global south in subscriber numbers, and the impact of super-premium subscriptions on monetization. We also talk about the future potential disruptions from AI and legal challenges and how the music industry might adapt and innovate in the face of these changes.   News Shoutouts! The Music Industry Wants Solutions. But Do Listeners See Problems?   Ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt: AI That is ‘as smart as the smartest artist' Will Be Here in 3 to 5 Years   ​​Tariff-Proof, Recession-Proof Music Industry Will Thrive Despite Global Uncertainty   AI Music Invasion Doubles on Deezer: 20,000 Bot-Created Tracks Now Uploaded Each DAY to Streaming Platform   Record Scratch: How Tariffs and Uncertainty Are Hurting Vinyl Manufacturing in America   China Halts Critical Exports as Trade War Intensifies   The Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. Visit musictectonics.com to find shownotes and a transcript for this episode, and find us on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram. Let us know what you think!    Get Dmitri's Rock Paper Scanner newsletter.  

It's Data Week at Trapital! In 2024, music streaming revenue growth slowed down, but not for everyone! MIDiA Research's Mark Mulligan joins me to break down the compaby's annual report and the latest trends. How will the rise of the global south shape the industry? Which sectors of the “indie” market are actually growing? Will expanded rights be the next big thing? 03:18 MIDiA Research's Recorded Music Report 08:57 Expanded Rights and Fandom 13:06 Independent Music Growth 18:05 Non-Major Labels and Market Share 22:09 Future of Music Publishing MIDiA Research 2024 Global Recorded Music Revenue Report This episode is presented by State Farm, the home for your small business needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Listen in for our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.

Is Apple Music shaping the future of streaming, or is it just playing catch-up? In this episode, we discuss the past ten years of Apple Music, its role in music streaming, and whether it's more important to the music business than it is to Apple overall. Join me and Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research as we break down the moves that led to this point, the exclusives, its stalled growth in recent years, and how it fits into Apple's broader ecosystem. 00:15 Drake Announcing Apple Music at WWDC in 2015 04:30 Apple Music's Market Position 11:11 The Apple Ecosystem 18:53 Apple Music's Editorial and Curatorial Efforts This episode is presented by Trolley, the payout platform built for the music industry, helping artists, labels, and platforms seamlessly manage and distribute royalties worldwide.

What if the most important social network in the world isn't a social network at all?In this episode, we explore how WhatsApp—often overlooked in the U.S.—has become a lifeline for families, businesses, artists, and economies worldwide.Join me and Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research as we break down whether WhatsApp is the closest thing to a true “everything app,” how it differs from iMessage and texting, and why Meta has struggled to monetize it despite its massive reach.04:33 WhatsApp's Global Growth Strategy17:07 WhatsApp's Advertising and Privacy Dilemma21:34 WhatsApp's role in Meta l24:22 Instagram DMs vs WhatsApp29:38 WhatsApp's US Growth ProspectsThis episode is presented by State Farm, the home for your small business needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.Listen in for our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.If you enjoy Trapital, please rate and review on your favorite podcast platform!

Mishka wrestles with the implications of AppLovin's Triple Dot acquisition, while Scopely's latest move has everyone questioning the future of Pokémon Go. Eric breaks down the latest insights from the Turkish gaming industry, while Jen dissects the Midia Research gamer segmentation report. Phil revisits the hypercasual ad playbook, while Subway Surfers just keeps running. Plus, a final look at GDC announcements, the mobile vs. console showdown, and what it all means for the industry.The Deconstructor of Fun Newsletter:www.deconstructoroffun.com/subscribeContinue the conversation on our Slack channel:www.deconstructoroffun.com/slack04:24 Turkish Gaming Industry Insights06:20 GDC Event Announcements09:16 Triple Dot and AppLovin Acquisition Analysis22:58 Midia Research Gamer Segmentation Report30:10 Social Elements in Gaming30:35 Mobile vs Console31:13 Farmville, Monopoly Go, and Female Gamers33:41 Subway Surfers34:23 The Hypercasual Ad Strategy41:12 Scopely's Acquisition of Niantic Games44:04 The Future of Pokemon Go53:50 Scopely's Strategy

It's the perfect time to revisit one of our more popular episodes. Taylor Swift and Beyoncé are still at the top of the music industry despite the newer artists that do well on streaming and TikTok. That said, can today's new class of stars ever match that same level of superstardom? .In this episode, I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research to explore how artists like Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa, and Bad Bunny are navigating the ever-changing music landscape. What does it take to break through the noise, and is music stardom evolving into something completely different?Let's get into it02:00 Streaming's Impact on Music Industry07:06 The impact of streaming and TikTok11:09 Olivia Rodrigo's Streaming vs Sales15:03 Dua Lipa, Doja Cat, SZA23:23 Morgan Wallen, Bad Bunny30:28 "Music Industry Aspirations and Realities"33:39 Emerging Artists: Success Through Unique RootsTrapital Summit tickets are on sale! Super early bird discount until April 30. Register here.This episode is presented by State Farm, the home for your small business needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.Make sure you check out TechCrunch's flagship podcast, Equity.Listen in for our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.If you enjoy Trapital, please rate and review on your favorite podcast platform!

According to Bloomberg, Spotify is exploring a new premium tier, Music Pro, which will include several new features and perks. But given what we know about music streaming, consumers, and record labels, who is this product really for? Will it work?Listen to me and MIDiA Research's Tati Cirisano break down all aspects of the industry's goal to get consumers to pay more for music streaming.05:15 Breaking Down Music Pro07:52 Challenges in Music Streaming15:56 How Concert Presale Tickets Work20:33 Consumer Behavior with Music Streaming28:31 Alternatives to Music ProThis episode is presented by beatBread. Check out their Deal Comparison Tool at beatBread.com/compareListen in for our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.If you enjoy Trapital, please rate and review on your favorite podcast platform!

Every few years, Meta makes a big push with a media-related product, but few of then have lasted long.Instant Articles, Facebook Watch, Instagram Live, podcasts, music videos and more. Why don't these initiatives stick? Is this similar with most social media platforms that try new things? How will this evolve in the future?Join me and MIDiA Research's Tati Cirisano as we discuss Meta, its suite of apps, and why these initiatives come and go.04:32 Entertainment vs. Social Platforms12:29 Meta's Opportunity Cost17:01 Instagram, WhatsApp, and acquisitions23:21 The Future of Facebook25:38 Social Media Trends30:13 Open vs Closed Social PlatformsThis episode is presented by State Farm, the home for your small business needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.Listen in for our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.If you enjoy Trapital, please rate and review on your favorite podcast platform!

When it comes to music, Disney is a generational hitmaker. From Miley Cyrus to Hilary Duff, Disney has consistently produced some of the biggest names in music over the past few decades. We break down what worked well, what hasn't, and how it has evolved with artists like Olivia Rodrigo.Join me and MIDiA Research's Tati Cirisano as we dive in Disney's enduring influence in the music industry.02:00 The Pop Star Pipeline05:16 The Eras of Disney's Pop Stars09:04 Why Nickelodeon Doesn't Have a Pipeline17:33 Disney's Impact on Artist Careers34:32 Can Other Companies Do The SameThis episode is presented by State Farm, the home for your small business needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.Listen in for our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.If you enjoy Trapital, please rate and review on your favorite podcast platform!

In this episode of Growing Pains, GDL host and Games Strategy Consultant Jay Uppal sits down with Rhys Elliott, Games Journalist and Games Analyst at MIDiA Research, together they discuss some of the biggest gaming trends that are impacting the industry today. Delving into everything from AI to Ads and the ever-elusive Switch 2. This episode covers our top takes for some of what 2025 holds in stake from a broader business perspective for the Games Industry. Growing Pains is a series focusing on key business trends and people shaping the Global Games Market and their impact on the Games Industry. In this series Jay speaks with industry leaders across the Games and Gametech space; trying to demystify the industry, understand the state of leadership, and answer the all-important question 'Is having a fun game still enough to succeed in today's games market?'

YouTube turns 20 this year, and it's influence continues to grow. In music, video, podcasts, advertising, entertainment, attention, and more. It's in a unique role, where plenty of companies compete with YouTube, but few compete with it on all levels. But what does the future look like? Despite its edge, what are the challenges ahead?Listen to me and MIDiA Research's Tati Cirisano to break it all down.08:45 Video Podcasting Trends11:56 YouTube Premium20:52 Paying for Ad-Free Experience29:42 Competitors and ChallengesThis episode is presented by State Farm, the home for your small business needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.Listen in for our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.If you enjoy Trapital, please rate and review on your favorite podcast platform!

Entérate de lo que está cambiando el podcasting y el marketing digital:-El crimen real se convierte en uno de los géneros de pódcast más populares en los EE. UU.-MIDiA Research revela predicciones clave para el audio en 2025.-Atresmedia Radio (España) y RDF Media (Chile) se unen para crear y distribuir ficciones sonoras.-Los oyentes prefieren anuncios cortos, relevantes y creativos en pódcast.-Station: la nueva plataforma que conecta podcasters y audiencias de forma revolucionaria.-Exploran los diferentes modelos de negocio que existen en el mercado del audio digital.‘Favoritos del mes'‘Greal: El secreto de las ocho llaves' es un pódcast de ficción sonora que narra la historia de un periodista con aspiraciones literarias que, tras un misterioso encuentro, recibe un enigmático cofre. Con la ayuda de una experta en historia del arte, ambos emprenden una búsqueda por Cataluña siguiendo pistas sobre el Santo Grial y superando desafíos con la guía de un escritor reconocido. El pódcast está disponible al completo en todas las plataformas de podcasting.Patrocinios ¿Estás en la CDMX y quieres grabar tu pódcast? RSS.media by RSS.com es tu “ONE STOP SHOP”. Graba, edita, aloja, promueve y monetiza con nosotros. Visítanos en www.rss.media y haz tu idea realidad.Entérate, en solo cinco minutos, sobre las noticias, herramientas, tips y recursos que te ayudarán a crear un pódcast genial y exitoso. Subscríbete a la “newsletter“ de Via Podcast.

At our Trapital Summit, we had a fireside chat on the overlooked areas of music with Splice CEO Kakul Srivastava and MIDiA Research's Tati Cirisano. They discussed why it matters to invest in the new generation of talent, the tension between creators and rightsholders, and AI's influence in music creation. Hope you enjoy!08:22 Exploring differences between recorded music and creator tools.08:56 Focus on creative vision, subscription model success.12:34 Creating tools for human-centered artistic expression.16:31 AI enhances music accessibility while preserving creativity.20:23 Striving for better tools, UI in post-AI.21:48 Music's influence grows beyond TikTok expectations.25:34 Focus on nurturing young creators and fans.26:36 Conversations between creators and rights holders challenging.This episode was brought to you by Hangout. All your music in one place.Listen in for our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.

It's been five years since Mark Mulligan of MIDiA Research gave the keynote at the first Music Tectonics Conference. This year we had him, along with Tatiana Cirisano, back to Music Tectonics. Instead of the standard conference keynote (because why would we do standard?) we had an election-year style debate that we called The Great Bifurcation Debate. Tune in as they each argue their side – “Play” and “Listen” and their observations for what the future may hold with each.    Read MIDiA's report on bifurcation here. The Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. Visit musictectonics.com to find shownotes and a transcript for this episode, and find us on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram. Let us know what you think!

Here's another great fireside chat from our Trapital Summit. Listen to Warner Music Group's chief digital officer Carletta Higginson and MIDiA Research's Tatiana Cirisano discuss AI's impact on music, and the ongoing tug-of-war for startup founders asking for permission vs forgivenes.Higginson has seen it from all sides of the table; as an attorney, at YouTube, and now at a major label and rights holder.Enjoy!This episode was brought to you by Too Lost, the all-in-one technology solution for musicians and record labels. Learn more here.

This week we welcome Mark Mulligan of MIDiA Research who has had a ringside seat for years and years of bubbles, be it the creator economy, NFTs or AI music, or just everyone claiming they are gaining market share at the same time. He is the founder and driving force behind the tiny little company that an entire industry looks to as the source of truth.For more on Bubble Trouble, including transcripts of the show, visit us online at http://bubbletroublepodcast.comYou can learn more about Richard at https://www.linkedin.com/in/richard-kramer-16306b2/More on Will Page at: https://pivotaleconomics.com(Times below correspond to the episode without considering any inserted advertisements.)In this episode of Bubble Trouble, hosts Richard Kramer and Will Page are joined by Mark Mulligan, a leading music industry analyst and founder of MIDiA Research. They delve into the intricate world of the music industry, discussing the evolution from digital streaming to the rise of new phenomena such as NFTs and AI in music. The trio explores the concept of bifurcation in markets and the distinction between high-end experiences versus bargain deals within the industry. The conversation also touches on the significant cultural shifts, the role of trade associations, and the future of personalized music experiences. Despite the optimism around technology, the hosts remain critical of mainstream narratives, emphasizing the importance of genuine innovation and realistic market assessments. This insightful and provocative discussion is a must-listen for anyone interested in the intersection of music, technology, and finance.00:00 Introduction to Bubble Trouble01:02 Welcoming Special Guest Mark Mulligan01:26 Mark Mulligan's Background and Insights02:34 The Evolution of Music Supply04:20 The Democratization of Music Creation06:13 AI and the Future of Music12:16 Fragmentation and Hyper-Targeting in Media13:40 The Role of Superstars and Long Tail Creators19:20 Streaming Platforms: Carnivores vs. Herbivores25:45 TikTok's Influence on the Music Industry27:33 Part Two28:38 Diving into the Music Industry's Hype30:08 Constructive Criticism in Emerging Technologies30:39 The Metaverse and NFTs: A Skeptical View31:28 Frameworks for Assessing New Technologies33:10 The Future of Digital Fandom35:15 Bifurcation in the Market43:07 Pendulum Swings in Technology Adoption44:54 Lessons from the Aviation Industry46:29 Final Thoughts and Predictions52:00 Credits Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Δημοφιλή τα single-player games λέει η MIDiA Research, η Sony εξαφανίζει παιχνίδια και η Nintendo… τον ύπνο. Get in touch: Email | Twitter Ι Facebook Group Hosted by: Elias Pappas - Facebook | Twitter | Instagram Manos Vezos - The Vez | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram Ι Apple Music Konami και FIFA Konami replaces EA as FIFA's esports partner True Ending True Ending 145: Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown | Review True Ending 146: EA Sports FC 25 | Review True Ending 147: Sonic X Shadow Generations | Gamescom 2024 Preview Transmedia Universal Pictures and SEGA announce Shinobi movie Shinobi is the next Sega series getting a movie adaptation FU: Horizon Zero Dawn και άλλα Horizon Zero Dawn delisted on Epic Games Store ahead of Remastered release Sony is delisting LittleBigPlanet 3 on PS4 | News-in-brief Day 4 Night Red Dead Redemption Lead Designer and Writer Christian Cantamessa and Mario + Rabbids Creative Director Davide Soliani Launch Videogame Company Day 4 Night Studios with Funding from KRAFTON and 1Up Ventures. Αυξήσεις για FromSoftware FromSoftware to increase average basic salary pay by around 11.8% Nintendo, Σαουδική Αραβία και ξυπνητήρια Saudi Arabia trims stake in Nintendo Nintendo announces Nintendo Sound Clock: Alarmo alarm clock Ubisoft Bloomberg: Guillemot family and Tencent weighing buyout of Ubisoft Tencent and Guillemot family reportedly planning Ubisoft buyout Is the Star Wars franchise in crisis? | Opinion Halo Studios Halo Studios: New Name, New Engine, New Games, New Philosophy - Xbox Wire Unreal Engine Epic has a plan for the rest of the decade Single-player games Most gamers prefer single-player games Venus Vacation PRISM: DEAD OR ALIVE Xtreme Venus Vacation PRISM: DEAD OR ALIVE Xtreme adds Fiona

Δημοφιλή τα single-player games λέει η MIDiA Research, η Sony εξαφανίζει παιχνίδια και η Nintendo… τον ύπνο.

Let's take a trip inside Sphere in Las Vegas. This is a story about James Dolan's wild idea coming to life. We discuss U2's expensive yet lucrative residency, the 'Postcard from Earth' that prints money, and the endless advertising opportunities, and more. We break down the business, strategy, and challenges for the entertainment venue.I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research to break it all down. Listen wherever you get podcasts!Episode sponsors:-Downtown Artist & Label Services - reach your fans wherever they are - https://trapital.co/downtown-State Farm - the coverage for your small business needs: https://shorturl.at/Euwjl-Chartmetric - providing our stat of the week! https://trapital.co/chartmetric/

StubHub has IPO plans this year, so it was the perfect time to breakdown the complicated, controversial, and crazy story of this ticket resale marketplace. We discuss its 25-year history, M&A, impact on the live concert business, and ways to improve the secondary ticketing experience for fans.I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. Hope you enjoy!Learn more about the Trapital Summit here. Join us Oct 3 in LA!This episode is presented by State Farm, the home for your small business needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.Make sure you check out our Chartmetric Stat of the Week.Learn more about Alts music investor trip to Nashville!

A handful of artists are having their moment. Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan, Coco Jones, Victoria Monet, the list goes on. Will these artists be as big as Beyonce? Who knows, but they broke through an industry that becomes harder and harder to break through.But how does this change the strategy for the major labels? How are the companies outside of the label system handlling things differently. What do the economics of a true non-superstar model look like?To break it all down, I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. We first visited this topic in 2022, but so much has changed since then. Hope you enjoy!This episode is presented by State Farm, the home for your small business needs. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.Make sure you check out Chartmetric Stat of the Week.

On this very special YMC episode, your hosts Jay Gilbert and Mike Etchart talk with their friends Mark Mulligan and Tatiana Cirisano from MIDiA about their insightful report "MIDiA Research 2024-2031 Global Music Forecasts - The Rise of the Global South".    Subscribe to the newsletter! YourMorning.Coffee

The market is booming for generative music. Suno raised $125M and Udio has raised over $10M. The tools are impressive, but they raise some important questions:What data are these products trained on?Are startups in music incentivized to ask for permission?Is this what 'IG for music' looks like?Are these products or features?I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. Hope you enjoy listening.Make sure you listen to our Chartmetric stat of the episode!

NPR Tiny Desk is 15 years old and arguably stronger than ever. It helped Usher perform at the Super Bowl. It helped Tank and the Bangas break through to a Grammy nomination. And it elevated the perception of artists like T-Pain and Mac Miller.But how does Tiny Desk maintain its influence? Any company can host a stripped-down acoustic series for artists to perform in their office. But even if they did, it wouldn't hit the same.In this episode, we break down the dynamics that make Tiny Desk work, the tradeoffs that the show balances, how it maintains its status over time, and what the future may hold.Listen to me and Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research break it all down.Make sure you listen to our Chartmetric stat of the episode.

Despite the all-time record highs for the live music industry, music festivals haven't quite had the same post-pandemic recovery. Several well-known festivals have closed up shop, and others have had slower than usual demand (even Coachella!)To break it all down, I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. Hope you enjoy!Make sure you check out our Chartmetric stat of the episode!

From gamblers paradise to entertainment mecca, on this episode of Trapital, we take a trip to Las Vegas and how its coveted residencies have evolved over time, the economics of how they work, and predictions for the future.I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. We explore the Las Vegas' origin with mob ties, the ground-breaking 2003 Celine Dion residency, and the changing demographic of Vegas attendees.Want to leave us a question for our upcoming mailbag episode? Leave us a voicemail at memo.fm/trapitalThis episode is brought to you by DICE. Want to learn more about how you and your artists can reach a packed room of your superfans? Learn more at dice.fm/partnersMake sure you listen in for our new Chartmetric stat of the week!2:30 Las Vegas evolution in music14:26 Celine Dion's 2003 residency21:50 The millennial demand29:59 Weekends with Adele41:42 The Sphere48:04 The Future of ResidenciesEnjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by reading Trapital's free memo.

Radio is the music format with nine lives. Despite all of the new evolutions in AI, streaming, and short-form video, radio continues to live on; and will do so for several more years.In this episode, I'm joined by a friend of the pod, Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. We dive into radio's impact in music over the years, current cutbacks and layoffs, and what the future of radio looks like in today's era.Today's episode is brought to you by Bandzoogle. Build a stunning website today. Start your free 30-day trial and use promo code ‘trapital' to get 15% off your first year.Make sure you listen in for our new Chartmetric stat of the week!09:100 The underestimation of radio's impact.15:20 Debates for royalty payments22:20 How streaming flipped radio's role in promotion37:15 The Breakfast Club's success48:14 What streaming can learn from radioEnjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by reading Trapital's free memo.

Music has several big new stars with tons of talent, but will they ever have a year as big as Taylor Swift and Beyoncé in 2023. Both women have been commercially successful for decades and continue to dominate the charts even to this day. They came up in a different time, which works to their advantage.But what does this mean for the streaming and TikTok era artists who want to break through all the noise? Can they ever reach the same level of stardom?In this episode, I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research to discuss what it takes, the impact of streaming and TikTok, and whether artists like Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa, Bad Bunny and others will ever reach the level of superstardom of artists like Beyoncé, Drake, Adele or T Swift.04:16 Breaking through in a saturated industry08:32 Monoculture09:36 The impact of streaming and TikTok14:30 Billie Eilish, Olivia Rodrigo, Burna Boy, Post Malone33:44 Dua Lipa, Doja Cat, SZA58:29 Morgan Wallen, Bad Bunny01:11:23 The monetization of streaming by genreThis episode is brought to you by Steed, the tax strategy firm built for our industry. Trapital listeners can skip the 1,600 person waitlist and schedule your free tax consultation today.Enjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by reading Trapital's free memo.

Episode 33 is out!In this episode of JM International's ‘The Power of Music', we talk about the future of the music industry. Mark Mulligan is the Managing Director of MIDiA Research and a long-term media and technology analyst and a leading thinker on the music industry's digital transition. He will talk about the future and impact of consumer-generated music. We discuss the role of music in expressing identity, the development of streaming, and - of course - the power of music.JMI is a global network of NGOs that empowers young people through music across all boundaries. For more info go to https://jmi.net/ or check out all the amazing opportunities for musicians at https://mubazar.com/en.

Read the full article on Variety: https://aristake.io/spotify-varietyThis week, Ari Herstand discusses his recent article on Variety entitled Why Spotify's New Payment Model Falls Short For Emerging Artists.Articles mentioned:Spotify's article (Modernizing Our Royalty System to Drive an Additional $1 Billion toward Emerging and Professional Artists): https://artists.spotify.com/blog/modernizing-our-royalty-systemStreaming Fraud is More Serious (and Inventive) than you Think, with Andrew Batey and Morgan Hayduk of Beatdapp: https://aristake.com/andrew-batey-morgan-hayduk/Building a Fan Economy with Fan Powered Royalties from MiDiA Research: https://aristake.io/MiDiA-fan-powered-royalties--Order THIRD EDITION of How to Make It in the New Music Business: https://book.aristake.comSubscribe to The New Music Business: https://aristake.com/nmbAri's Take Academy: https://aristakeacademy.comWatch more discussions like this: https://bit.ly/3LavMpaConnect with Ari's Take:Website: https://aristake.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/aristake_TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@aris.takeX: https://twitter.com/ArisTakeThreads: https://www.threads.net/@aristake_YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/aristake1Connect with Ari Herstand:Website: https://ariherstand.comInstagram: https://instagram.com/ariherstandX: https://twitter.com/ariherstandYouTube: https://youtube.com/ariherstandEdited and mixed by Mikey EvansMusic by Brassroots DistrictProduced by the team at Ari's Take Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's hard to imagine what music would be like today without YouTube. The platform has done more to lower the entry barriers to music creation and distribution than any other platform.From the early days when acts like Soulja Boy harnessed the raw power of YouTube to drive their careers, to modern narratives like NBA YoungBoy mastering Creator culture, in this episode we delve into how YouTube's become an essential player in the music industry.In this episode, I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research to discuss the origins of YouTube entering the space, the rocky relationships with music rights holders, the importance of UGC (User Generated Content), and so much more.[00:01:23] YouTube Enters The Music Industry[00:08:37] Google Acquires YouTube, DMCA[00:21:12] The Monetization-Exposure Trade Off[00:28:36] YouTube's “Value Gap”[00:44:48] Improving Relationships With The Music Industry[00:49:49] Content ID[00:56:44] YouTube and AIThis episode is brought to you by Downtown Music, the world leader in music services with over 2 million clients. Visit Downtown today to learn more.Enjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by reading Trapital's free memo.

How much money does the music industry really make on an annual basis? The answer is not as straightforward as you think. Most of the outlets that publish figures only report on one side of the business. But since 2014, former Spotify chief economist and author Will Page has made it his job to answer this question in his annual report on global music copyright. This year the global value is at $41.5 billion.In this episode, I'm joined by Will and friend of the show, Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. We dive deep into the key findings of the report, the growth of publishing, vinyl sales, why “back catalog” is a dated term, AI's disruption, and a whole lot more.[00:04:06] The need for data transparency[00:30:51] The rise of vinyl[00:46:43] How music relates to gaming[00:54:42] Streaming price increasesThis episode is brought to you by DICE. Want to learn more about how you and your artists can reach a packed room of your superfans? Learn more at dice.fm/partnersWant to write a guest post while I'm on paternity leave in 2024? Here's the form to fill outEnjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by reading Trapital's free memo.

Music taste and fandom have always been tied to our identities, but today it can seem like musical genres themselves are being replaced by identity-driven scenes. At least, according to music researcher Kriss Thakrar, who recently wrote a piece for the music industry blog Midia Research. OttO Kent invites Christa Belle to the studio to discuss this potential ‘tug-of-war' between genre and identity. Plus: Controversial changes for Spotify streaming royalties, Missy Elliot becoming the first female rapper in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, rap history slipping away online and new Grammy categories.OttO Kent recommends you read this piece on the beef between DJ Akademiks and Saucy Santana.Check out Christa Belle's new favourite genre Skwee and OttO's favourite @thealgorythm on TikTok.Follow OttO Kent.Follow Electronic Beats.Follow Christa Belle.The Week is a production by Telekom Electronic Beats and ACB Stories.Host: OttO KentWriters for this episode: Aaron Gonsher, Helena Schmidt and Jacob SperberEdit and sound design: Marc ÜbelLead Producer: Isabel Woop Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, We're bringing you one of our favorite experiences of the 2023 Music Tectonics Conference: a fireside chat  with Tatiana Cirisano of MIDiA Research. We called it Music in a Post-stream Era: a Fireside Chat, but the fire was the Santa Monica sun and the chat was on a beautiful rooftop.    As the discussion unravels, we delve into the future of the music industry, shedding light on platforms like Twitch and YouTube's pivotal roles, and the . urgent need to better monetize consumer creation, while acknowledging the industry's highly competitive nature. Explore the industry's expansion, considering fascinating prospects such as derivative content, AI-trained tracks, and branded gear.   We examine how streaming models are reshaping the types of music creators and how AI is rapidly instigating changes in the music industry. Keep listening to hear the gems Tatiana dropped and if you missed out on this year's event. The Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. Visit musictectonics.com to find shownotes and a transcript for this episode, and find us on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram. Let us know what you think!

This episode is all about Pandora Music. In the post-iPhone era, Pandora was the early favorite in music streaming. We break down its decade-long journey to get there, its rise in popularity, IPO, SiriusXM, and how and why it got beat by other competitors.I'm joined by friend of the show, Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. Here's what we discussed:[00:05:50] The Music Genome Project[00:09:37] Rejected by 300 VCs[00:14:44] Pandora's legal battles[00:18:22] Pandora vs Spotify[00:40:50] The SiriusXM era[00:54:15] Changing cultureEnjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by reading Trapital's free memo.

Your hosts Jay Gilbert and Mike Etchart celebrate their third anniversary of the podcast with a very special episode featuring Tatiana Cirisano and Kriss Thakrar from MIDiA. Tatiana and Kriss break down MIDiA's two recently released reports: The MIDiA Research 2023-2030 Global Music Forecasts (Speed Bump) and The State and Future Of Music Fandom - Unleashing Fan Creativity.    Subscribe to the newsletter! YourMorning.Coffee

Napster. The name alone brings back memories of the wild, wild west of the dot-com bubble.We'll take you back to the late 90s and early 2000s. Sean Parker and Shawn Fanning's creation was a game-changer. But was its influence bigger than its actual impact? Who won and lost the most from Napster? Could the situation have been handled differently? We break down all that and moreI'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. Here's everything we covered this episode:[00:002:13] Napster's rise[00:8:25] CD boom, internet growth, Sean and Shawn[00:13:43] Internet culture in the late 90s[00:18:21] Napster's early growth in users.[00:25:07] Artists picked sides on the Napster debate[00:36:55] Legal and business model challenges.[00:42:13] When Napster shut its doors[00:48:32] Asking for permission vs forgiveness[01:00:10] Limewire, BearShare, and KaZaa[01:08:16] Life after Napster for Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker[01:14:41] Where Napster is todayThis episode is sponsored by DICE. Learn more about why artists, venues, and promoters love to partner with DICE for their ticketing needs. Visit dice.fmEnjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by readingTrapital's free memo.

Episode title: The State of the Middle-Class ArtistThe “middle class musician” is a popular talking point in the industry. Several platforms have been built to serve this group. But what exactly is a middle-class musician? How can they get ahead when the major companies are incentivized to support the superstars? How does the 1000 True Fans theory apple here? And which companies do a great job of serving them today? I talked to Tati Cirisano of MIDiA Research to break it all down. Here's everything we covered this episode:0:44 How much money does a middle-class musician take home?9:05 How the 1,000 True Fans theory works in the steaming era 16:06 Why platforms struggling to serve middle class 18:33 What fans actually want from artist-specific subscriptions 21:23 How touring is for the middle class artists23:21 Artists catalogs generating $20k+ from Spotify 26:25 Good data vs bad data28:49 MIDiA's Bandsintown return to live study34:39 Why Pandora struggled to serve the middle class 36:18 Is serving middle-class musicians a viable business model? 48:13 Will middle-class musicians have it easier in 20 years?Listen: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | SoundCloud | Stitcher | Overcast | Amazon | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | RSSHost: Dan Runcie, @RuncieDan, trapital.coGuests: Tati Cirisano, @tatianacirisanoThis episode is sponsored by DICE. Learn more about why artists, venues, and promoters love to partner with DICE for their ticketing needs. Visit dice.fmEnjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by reading Trapital's free memo.TRANSCRIPT [00:00:00] Tati Cirisano: If an artist is trying to sell them something for 300 just so that they make 50 or whatever it is that translates to the fan as them having to spend so much money just to prove that they're a fan of the artist.So we don't want to. harvest people's fandom, we want to cultivate it. And the current industry makes it hard to fulfill that promise.[00:00:17] Dan Runcie Audio Intro: Hey, welcome to the Trapital Podcast. I'm your host and the founder of Trapital, Dan Runcie. This podcast is your place to gain insights from the executives in music, media, entertainment, and more who are taking hip hop culture to the next level.[00:00:44] Dan Runcie Guest Intro: Today's episode is about the state of the middle class artists. It's a very different world than it was 20, 25 years ago. If you talk to artists back then, who are now frustrated with the current model, they'll tell you that the nineties and the eighties were a great time for middle class artists. You could sell a few tens of thousands of CDs per year.You could still bring home enough for you and your band and others to earn a living off of that. But those economics get a lot harder in the streaming era where you need millions of streams, if not more. Just to make that same revenue that you did 25 years ago. But because of the streaming era that we're in now, it's also opened up many more opportunities for different revenue streams, both in real life and through digital communities and online marketplaces and things like that.So with all of that change, all that dynamic. Where does that leave us? So for today's episode, I'm joined by Tati Sirisano. She's dug into this topic specifically with some of her work at Media Research and a lot of the analysis she's done on fandom. So where are we with middle class musicians? What does it mean to be a middle class musicians?And for all of the platforms out there that are aiming to serve middle class musicians, who's actually doing it well? Let's dive in.[00:02:00] Dan Runcie: Today's episode is all about the middle class musician. This is a group of artists that is often talked about in the industry from all of the companies, all of the services that are trying to help artists, but how many of them are actually serving artists and doing it in a meaningful way? And I'm here to talk about it with someone who's talked about and read about this topic herself, Tati Cirisano, welcome back to the pod.[00:02:26] Tati Cirisano: Thanks, Dan. I'm excited. I love a thorny topic and there are many thorns to this one. A lot of contradictions, a lot of really, I don't know, interesting viewpoints. So I'm excited to get into it. [00:02:39] Dan Runcie: So first let's define middle class musician. When you hear the term, when you use the term yourself. What are you referring to? How do you define that group?[00:02:49] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. Well, it's, funny because if you think about a middle class musician as someone who's earning a sustainable living wage from their music, there's very few artists as we know, that actually do that. Like some of the successful, you know, relatively well-known artists that we listen to might not even fit into that description.so I think it is, you know, a pretty small group. but that's what I would define it as, I guess if we're being technical about it, is it's someone who is able to actually, earn a full-time living from their music career. And, when we look at, you know, at media, we do a lot of creator surveys. and when we look at, you know, how many creators fit into that.when we did our last creator survey in the UK and the US, we got, about 19% of everyone who filled out. Our survey was actually doing it full time. That doesn't necessarily mean they're making a living wage, but that means that this is, you know, what they're doing for, you know, their main career and the average income was about $46, 000. So that's kind of what I see when I think of the term, I guess. [00:03:59] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I think the sweet spot. I've thought about that as the floor to 50, 000 that you are earning from your music related activities. And I say that specifically because I think this is where some of the difference of the term and its interpretation is for years, people used to look at that number specifically think about it in terms of what is derived specifically from your music revenue.You being able to sell CDs, sell physical albums. How much of it comes from there today? Obviously, the economics are flipped and it is. Quite challenging for artists, especially if you don't own the rights to your music to be able to earn that level of money stand alone from CD sales, unless you're complimenting it with another revenue source.So that's a bit that's why I mentioned music related things, because artists, at least now do make more from touring and we'll get into that a bit more. They also have merch and other things that they still did have in. The nineties and other eras before, but some of these things have expanded and there's now all of these digital, so you have the IRL experiences, the IRL experiences too, and if that can combine and you're making, let's say at least $50,000 in profit, I would say so take home expenses of, or take home revenue of what you actually have versus up to let's say $150,000.That's how I've defined middle class musician. If you're earning more than that, then you're definitely at that closer to that tip of the spear. I don't know if the numbers would exactly put you in, let's say the 1%. I think there might be even a little bit of gap below that, but that's how I've roughly looked at it.So even though I know that. Every year, Spotify has its breakdown on how many artists catalogs generate this certain amount. And the math there is roughly been okay. You can multiply that number by 4 and that can give you an idea of what the total recorded music revenue is. That's still only 1 source that doesn't include all the other sources that are there.So there's a bunch of ways. And I think a lot of people out there do feel like you should be able to be a middle class musician. If you're earning solely from the music recording itself, but I do like to think of it a bit more broadly and that's how I've defined it[00:06:19] Tati Cirisano: No, definitely. I realized that I answered that question thinking about it that way without even realizing it because it's so common now that I mean, I think earning a full time living from your music alone and not these other things, all these other things around it is nearly impossible for a lot of today's artists. And when we look at, you know, in the research. Most of these artists are learning from a really fragmented mix of income streams, right? There isn't just like one thing that is their main source of income. They tend to have a hand in all these different places from, education to sync to performing, producing for other artists and things like that.So we hear a lot. There's this need to kind of have all the wheels spinning all the time. And usually the sources of income that, are maybe more important are the ones that actually are not about your music itself. So that's a really good, that's a really important distinction to make for sure. [00:07:14] Dan Runcie: Because I think what you're calling out and it's true is that what people enjoyed about the CD era was that there was 1 item that you could purchase in that 10 to 20 dollar range and that benefited. Those artists who could then get at least, let's say, 4 to 5 for every 20 CD that's sold. They then keep that and then that you just do the math on that even if you're splitting that up amongst 4 band members, there's still a lot there and technology has this pattern of making it more advantageous for the people who are already on top, not necessarily the people that are trying to get there. And I think this is some of the challenges that certain startups in the space have had, because several of them have tried to serve this middle class audience with the belief that technology does connect us and technology does do all those things, but we've seen it more likely or not just the way that things have been set up so far and streaming, but also in other aspects of the creator economy and people making a living off of the internet, one way or another, it does tend to benefit those that do happen to be the most successful, so that's why I think you calling out the way things are, whether it's people selling merch or people selling vinyl or people selling unique items, or even back in the NFT phase where people were selling more of those is unique items or concert tickets more broadly that gets you back to the opportunity to compensate the quote unquote, middle class artists more because it's a fan having that 1 to 1 relationship where they're spending the high and they're spending their money on the high end product to get whatever it is in a way.That's very different from getting some pro rata distribution of their 1099 monthly subscription to 1 of the streaming services.[00:09:05] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, no, and I think in music, especially we've really seen this, like the thousand true fans theory, kind of gained popularity over the past year or two years and really have to run up against streaming economics where scale is the only thing that matters. So I think, you know, if you were selling CDs in the nineties and you had a really small, but dedicated fan base, you could earn money off of that.you could make a decent living off of that. but now there aren't that many ways to actually, monetize a core fan base around the music itself. I mean, you're not doing that on streaming. so I think, you know, streaming definitely delivered on the promise of. allowing more artists to be heard, but it the income side of that didn't really catch up by opening the door to everyone. It just gave way to so much oversaturation and so much fragmentation that, it kind of breaks the pro rata streaming model. [00:09:57] Dan Runcie: And I think that most people listening to this probably do generally understand why it's hard to do that with streaming. You literally need millions of streams per month in order to be able to reach those thresholds. And that's just very hard to do. However, if we also look at the platforms that are intended to be more creator friendly or more independent. Artist friendly or more middle class musician friendly, even those still struggle to hit those numbers. One of the highly publicized numbers from Patreon, of course, this is now looking at all creators, not necessarily musicians, but only 2% of the creators that use Patreon are earning more than 50, 000 annually from their Patreon. So again, just to make sure that we're covering all the bases, not all of the money that a middle class musician needs to make needs to come from Patreon in order to be a middle class musician. But it's another highlight where even though now we're taking away the streaming dynamic, you now have this product where most of the people are selling something on Patreon for one, five, 10 per month. It still doesn't quite. Offer that opportunity. So what do you think the disconnect is there? Because I know patrons 1 example, but there's other similar platforms that offer those types of things, but haven't quite been able to get [00:11:23] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. I mean, I think that it all kind of goes back to with all of these platforms that so long as streaming economics are only benefiting superstars. We can't really serve the middle class musician because even if those artists are earning a decent amount of money by, you know, making cameo videos for their fans or having some subscribers on Patreon, they're still forced to monetize everything around the music rather than the music itself.They still aren't really able to fully capitalize on monetizing core fandom. Even as it's been interesting, like even as the industry, I think, has really started to galvanize around this idea of monetizing fandom and how important it is, especially in how fragmented listenership is today to not just focus on building these mass passive audiences, but focus on a core fan base.but again, that's running up directly against streaming economics, which is part of the reason why there's now finally a call, I think, from all sides of the industry to change things. But I think that I really feel like the more I think about it, I just come back to that as long as the ways the solutions that we're giving to these so called middle class musicians are about monetizing things around their music, we're still never really realizing the full potential of what they could do by monetizing their fan base around the music.Maybe that's like a simplistic answer, but I just, I just keepcoming back to that.[00:12:50] Dan Runcie: Yeah. And I think 1 of the challenges with tools like Patreon and others is that. They're still similar to the streaming services selling a monthly subscription product and it's quite incentivized to be able to do that because they are SAS companies. They're trying to sell subscriptions companies that have strong MRR do get better valuations. And these are companies that are ultimately trying to exit. And we saw a company like Patreon, I believe the valuation hit 4 billion in the peak of the pandemic, just when everyone was going wild about the creator economy. And we've since seen that and many others come back down to earth.But the thing is a lot of those platforms it's based on that take rate and the take rate, even though I think the take rate for a platform like a Patreon may have been relatively low. It still incentivizes the power law to take over where those platforms are going to succeed based on having a few of those power users in that 2% that make up over 60, 70% of the revenue, if not more.And then you run into the same dynamic that you have on Spotify, where you see a similar dynamic there in terms of it's that small 1% of the people on top that make up everything. And whenever you have that type of dynamic, it's hard to shake that. And I think, especially given when you add on to it, any of these new platforms that do end up taking venture capital, there are incentives to have certain types of business models and certain types of approaches. So, I do think that that's an aspect. And then also just the fact that it is limiting itself to that 1 type of subscription that 1 time you're paying that artist or person on a regular basis and it's hard to do that compared to, let's say, the way it was when you're buying CDs, when you could go to Sam Gooding, you could buy 10 CDs if you want, you could buy one CD if you want, and I think that's where merch and vinyl and even platforms like Bandcamp and others get a bit more to that thing, where you're not limited on the quantity of how much you can buy from the thing, and it does allow a bit more of that individual transaction, which is what I think that Middle class musicians, artists really need in order to succeed. How can you make it infinite that someone can buy more of your stuff?[00:15:15] Tati Cirisano: Right, right. And I think in addition to all of this, there's just these like underlying dynamics of how fragmented the market is, how competitive, the entertainment landscape is, how, you know, streaming has sort of inadvertently encouraged listeners to be a bit more passive, I think, over the past 10 years.So we're now in this situation where even if you decide as an artist to, you know, build this core fan base and you have all the right tools to monetize it, it's still just really, really hard to break through and, gather, you know, enough people around your music and sustain their attention and get them to be active fans. Like I think, the competitiveness and the fragmented nature of the market is just underlying all of this. [00:16:05] Dan Runcie: So let's actually dig into that with the, Kevin Kelly's a thousand true fans theory that you mentioned. What do you think is the thing that's making that difficult? I know you mentioned the competitive piece, so maybe let's get into some of the specifics because in theory. If you were using a service like a Patreon or whatever, if you combine all of these things, can you have a thousand people paying you eight, nine dollars a month? And then that equals your a hundred thousand dollars like what is making that difficult? Like how big of an artist do you need to be for that to actually be a reality?[00:16:39] Tati Cirisano: Well, right. That's the thing is that there's just so much music out there and people are spreading their listening across more artists, more songs than ever. I think it's really hard to actually get a meaningful number of subscribers for something like that. And also people that are going to stick around. I think another thing with the subscription, like the artists for artists, specific subscriptions, the monthly cycle doesn't really align with the pace of consumption and fandom where, people are. I think it's natural that you're fandom of an artist rises and falls over time as you know, a new artist captures your attention or something else is happening in your life or whatever, but I think that pace is accelerating and it might happen in two weeks.Whereas it used to happen in two months or six months. So I just think it's, really hard to actually galvanize people around a monthly subscription, but something else that's interesting that actually comes from our recent research and we have a report coming out on this. soon. Is that when we ask people what they actually want from artist specific subscriptions, the things that come out on top are not what you expect and aren't what most artists are going for.So I think most artists have been doing, you know, behind the scenes content or I'll hop on and do a Q&A with you or you get access to a community of other fans and those things actually come out towards the bottom. What comes out on top is just exclusive access to music, being able to hear music that nobody else can hear or being able to hear it early and same thing for merchandise and same thing for tickets.So fans already have too much content out there that they have access to. They don't necessarily want to pay for more. And so instead, what they really want is just to get what they're already enjoying faster or before everyone else, or in a way that is exclusive to them. So yeah, I have a lot of thoughts as you can see on like subscriptions specifically. But I think that, you know. It's ironic because the thousand true fans theory model is what a lot of artists need these days because it is in some ways a way to cut through the fragmentation is building a core fan base, making really deep, long lasting connections. But it's also really just really hard to do that in today's landscape. [00:18:57] Dan Runcie: Why do you think there's a disconnect there? I mean, based on the insights that you're sharing, why couldn't an artist be like, okay, well, if that's what the fans want, then why not give them the exclusive access? Why are artists leading towards behind the scenes.[00:19:11] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. I mean, I think that I don't blame them because I think social media has kind of taught artists to just give more content all the time. And there's probably this assumption that that's what you need to capture attention. I think there's also a long history of streaming services and labels being uncomfortable with like exclusive content.I mean, I think that's why we're at a point these days where all streaming services have the same catalogs. So I think in the past, maybe it's been hard to justify that type of like, like windowing like remember when windowing kind of had a moment and then it went away. So I don't know, maybe it's time to reconsider that. And maybe the market would be a bit more open to that idea now. So artists, if you're listening to this try it out.[00:20:00] Dan Runcie: Right? Because you would like to think in theory that if an artist is independent, it's their choice on what they want to do independently versus not. But we also know it's very tough for an independent artist to even reach these levels to be able to get there, right? And I think this gives this is a good segue into another piece of the discussion, which is a lot of the music distribution services that have popped up and got in a lot more funding recently are specifically trying to be a alternative to the financing that record labels offer, whether you look at a company like a beet bread or into fire stem or United masters, these companies are offering advances in exchange for this. And sometimes the advances can start quite small, but still, at least on most of them, I think there's some minimum threshold you need on, let's say, a Spotify to have 10, 000 monthly listeners on the service, and even that, while it may not seem like a lot compared to the 1% of superstar artists, it still could be a lot, especially if you look at that compared to a lot of the artists that are these quote unquote, middle class artists that we're talking about. There's just such a divide where, because there's so much noise out there, you can feel like there is, it can be quite difficult to even take full advantage of those services because of the levels you need to be in order to get there. And I feel with that, it's probably a good chance for us to talk about touring because I think that's the other piece. We know that for a lot of artists now, let's say, whether it's, you know, depending on the artists, it could be, you know, as low as 30, but as high as 70% or even more of their revenue that comes directly from touring and especially since the economics of the current cycle that we're in have flipped where artists no longer, like, not everything is no longer the loss of leader in order to sell more CDs streaming. And other things are the thing that's done to sell more tour tickets. And that's essentially what we're getting back to you, right? How do you get fans to buy that 1 thing? But we're seeing that touring as well just like streaming, just like Patreon, just like any of these other things, even though they have a slightly different business model, it all becomes subject to the power law and how demand looks at it. Because you look at the superstars at the top level, we're talking about how Taylor Swift and maybe Beyonce are going to have the first billion dollar tours ever.And meanwhile, the artists that are in this quote, unquote, middle class artists bucket, many of them are struggling to sell out shows. Even the artists who are stars, but not quite superstars are canceling tours left and right. It's very tough to be able to do that. And that's another piece there because I feel like for years, that was always the retort you would hear. Well, they could make money on tour. Well, they could do this. Well, that's becoming a tougher thing for artists that aren't performing in front of thousands, several thousands of people on a regular basis.[00:22:56] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. I mean, they're struggling to sell out tours and they're also struggling to finance them to begin with. I mean, there've been so many artists that canceled before their tours even really got started selling tickets because they said, I crunched the numbers and I just can't afford this. So even if you are an artist that has demand for your shows, it can be really hard to, actually make touring sustainable for yourself.[00:23:21] Dan Runcie: Agreed, and maybe just to look at some rough numbers here, because I think it would be helpful. I pulled up, Spotify's loud and clear that they have their breakdown on the number of artists that are earning certain things and if we do some ballpark math here, so they said in 2022, there were 91, 000 artists that had catalogs that were generating at least 5, 000 dollars a year. And if you multiply that by 4, accounting for other streaming services, accounting for other recorded revenue streams, that then brings you to 20, 000 dollars. A few things to keep in mind, though, this doesn't include publishing. This doesn't include other things as well. That could also increase the revenue for artists, but it also is just about the artist catalog generated.So it doesn't Account for record label deals and things like that. So if we were to even take a number like this, and let's roughly call it 50%, even at that point, you combine that with the, let's say, they're making the equivalent on the live side, but on live. The percentage that the promoters and others that you're partnered with isn't nearly as high as it is on the recorded revenue side.So just to add some context for this. I mean, we're talking about less than 100, 000 people worldwide. And that number may even be generous there because there's this doesn't account like record label splits and all those things and so it's a tough world out there. [00:24:52] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. Wait. And can you back that up for so it's a 90, 000 are earning what? [00:24:58] Dan Runcie: Yeah, so according to Spotify's loud and clear report, 91, 200 artists, those are the number of recording artists whose catalogs generated recording and publishing royalties over 5, 000 alone on Spotify. Yeah, and then Spotify's ballpark is that if you multiply that number by 4, that gives you all of the revenue streams overall. So you could use that to say 20, 000.[00:25:25] Tati Cirisano: Right. Right. Yeah. No, and as we know, that does, like you said, it does gloss over a lot of nuances. So it's probably a little bit different and very different, in practice. But I think the other thing talking about touring. and the struggle of a lot of these, you know, middle class artists to sell shows is another unintended consequence of streaming is how song focused the music landscape we live in is now where a lot of artists will have a viral song or they'll have, you know, a popular song, but not that many people will actually discover the artists beyond that, or become a fan of their wider catalog to the point where they want to buy a ticket.And I think that that's what's driving a lot of these sort of awkward tour cancellations that we've seen where an artist may think, or their team may think, based on the success of a couple of songs, they have a big enough fan base to sell tour tickets, and they might not. So I think the metrics for touring are getting a lot murkier. [00:26:25] Dan Runcie: This is why what's happening right now with as it relates to socials, streaming and touring data, the more data has actually made people worse at the jobs, I think, to some extent. And I mean, I can't say that factually, I would need to look at some data to truly be able to prove that. But I do question whether or not it is helped in a lot of ways, Because of everyone is programmed to algorithms in the 3rd way.You could think that you're seeing someone everywhere. So let's just use I spice as an example. If you feel like, okay, in the circles of every time you open your phone, you see, I spice this, you see, I spice that you think that I spice could probably sell Madison square garden based on just what you may perceive to be people that are really in the industry.Probably know that that isn't the case. But even for those people in the industry that are making decisions, there could still be that disconnect to your point. And I think just going back again to the point you made earlier about the whole thousand true fans thing. That's what I think makes that tough because you brought up the point earlier about why, yeah, it's hard to have a recurring purchase with anything, especially when it's hard for anyone to capture the attention.I think recurring purchases can make sense for products like Netflix or Spotify, when they are the interface between all of these other products that we see on a regular basis, at least from a mass consumer perspective. And I know that in investing and finance and other circles, or even in music, there definitely trade publications out there that could justify it because it is offering education related information.But I think that again, how can you get back to that a 100 dollars from 1000 people looking more like. An actual 1 time purchase thing, or 1 time purchase things that you're purchasing. But again, even if you're trying to get someone to purchase 1 t shirt, 1 concert ticket, 2 albums, this, that, and all of those things net your earnings become, a hundred dollars per fan, that's still a lot. Like, how can you do all that and capture the attention you have because you could be asking someone to spend $300 just so that nets out to you, to the artist as $100 and at least the last I see, you know, it's even tailoring Beyonce may not, aren't netting that on the average ticket sale for their concerts because of the resellers and because of, you know, various fees and just all the other people involved. It's very tough to get there.[00:28:49] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. No. And the other thing that we don't want to do is just, you know, squeeze every dollar that we can out of the fans. Like when you use that example of the fan doesn't realize like what, you know, how the money trickles or doesn't trickle back down to the artist. If an artist is trying to sell them something for 300 just so that they make 50 or whatever it is that translates to the fan as them having to spend so much money just to prove that they're a fan of the artist.So I think that's the other side to this is we don't want to. harvest people's fandom. we want to cultivate it. And yeah, the current industry makes it hard hard to fulfill that promise. But the other thing I wanted to bring up before we get deeper into that, another interesting data point, that's sort of a counterpoint to some of this, which is, so at media, we just released a report in partnership with bands in town where we surveyed their users about their experiences with live music. It's a great report, I think it's like one of the, most comprehensive of like post pandemic live audiences that we've seen. So just a quick plug, but the data in it, we were interested in understanding, if superstar tours are becoming so expensive, does that mean that audiences are splurging their entire budget for the year for tickets on that, you know, Taylor Swift tour? And then they don't have anything left to go to the smaller shows that they would normally go to. And our hypothesis was that would be the case, but we actually didn't see that in the data. We saw two things, one is that the audiences who are going to smaller shows tend to be different from the ones that are like going to these, you know, arena and, stadium tours anyway.So they're actually less likely to be bothered by things like rising prices and added fees, because the shows that they're going to aren't as impacted by those issues anyway. And then the other, really interesting question we asked was if we gave you a 300 budget for concert tickets for the year, What would you spend it on?And we gave them four options and nearly half said that they would buy tickets of a few tickets for mid tier artist shows and about a quarter said they'd buy many tickets for many smaller shows. So that's already 75% of the audience. And then the rest were split up between splurging on like a Taylor Swift ticket or putting the money towards a festival. So when push comes to shove and people are forced to decide where to spend their limited tickets budget, they actually weren't, the most likely to go for, you know, the superstar shows, which was not what I expected. And I don't know if that has to do. Yeah, I don't know if that has to do partly with the fragmentation that I'm always talking about. And where I was talking about that, you know, people are actually starting to listen more to these sort of cult stars and not just a handful of big names that people are kind of spreading their listening and these mid tier artists are getting larger fan bases. That could be a part of it. it could just be people being a bit more, you know, pragmatic when they are forced to answer this question in this way. But yeah, I thought that was really interesting.[00:31:43] Dan Runcie: That makes me think of two things. Let's go back to the first board, just in terms of the slightly different audience profile of the big splurger versus the several shows. This is anecdotal, but most of the people I know that are frequent concert goers of smaller mid tier, maybe middle class musician artists, or maybe even slightly higher than that. They're not necessarily posting the shows on Instagram. They're not necessarily discussing it. It's almost like part of their regular day or week like, oh, what do you do? Oh yeah. We went to a show on, Thursday at the independent of San Francisco was cool or something like that. Versus if someone's going to a Taylor Swift or Beyonce show, and I'd even put Coachella and some of these other experiences in there.You hear about it. It's as much the experience, the brand of the thing and why taking an international trip to go watch Beyonce's renaissance tour in Paris or in Amsterdam or doing something similar for a Taylor Swift tickets, or even getting all your friends together to go, you know, have the outfits ready for Coachella. I feel like there's that is almost a very different group. So that felt like at least some anecdotal inferences that feel like they line up with what you're saying. And I think that's right. They are 2 very different types of people. The 2nd point, though, I do have to say, I am, I'm a bit surprised by that, because part of me wondered, okay, is there a little bit of potential bias of what someone is projecting of what they want to be versus what they may actually be right? And then just a natural distribution of, you know, how many people in each of those groups from that 1st point, you mentioned. Were the survey group for the 2nd point, but, yeah, it's 1 of those things where, like, you know, I think, let's say a movie example for me.One of the only times I'd went to the movies this past year so far, and I'm someone that normally goes off on one of the only times I went this past year was to, you know, see Barbie and Oppenheimer, you know, like together and stuff. And if you would have asked me in the beginning of the year, oh, how often do I plan to go to the movies this year?I probably wouldn't be. Oh, I'm only going to go for the biggest weekend of the year. But like, that's what I ended up again. I'm just 1 person with an example, but like, that's what that made think of. [00:33:54] Tati Cirisano: You're absolutely right. Every time we ask a question that is like hypothetical like that, we have to remember that, people will always answer with like their most aspirational self. And maybe people see that and say, Oh, I like to think of myself as, you know, a true artist fan. And I would like to go to more smaller shows or I'm not splurging on the superstar of the festival. So I think it does have to be taken with a grain of salt. I think the sample size is big enough. This was like nearly 3000 people and the numbers are pretty. like stark enough that I think it still gives us a sense that the majority of these live music audiences are wanting to go to the, or would prioritize those smaller shows, but you're absolutely right that every time we ask a question like this, we have to take it with a grain of salt.[00:34:39] Dan Runcie: Indeed. And 1 thing I do want to tap into as well. You mentioned this back when we were texting back and forth leading up to this. It's about Pandora. You mentioned how the founder there had built a service, ideally intending to serve the middle class. And I went back and found 1 of the quotes. I'll read it here. He said, this is 10 Western trend. He said, when I found Pandora, the purpose of it was to build a discovery engine for lesser known musicians. I wouldn't say we lost our way, but we got sucked into the music industrial complex vortex, which is quite the quote, but I feel like that music industrial complex vortex is probably a few things. One, I think their rights holders discussions and negotiations back and forth with the record labels were quite public in a way that more recent ones haven't been. So that's 1 thing. But 2, I think a lot of it stems back to. This whole power law dynamic that we've been talking about. So you take the two of those together, you're partnering with companies that want their 1% of music to rise above the ranks. And it's in your platform's best interest from a financial perspective to monetize that piece too, which just adds another layer to it.[00:35:56] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, no, I think that. All of this is the, you know, second order impacts of streaming that all of the platforms are dealing with Westergen was just the first person to admit it. I don't think that, you know, most streaming platforms are not going out there and talking about this in such, honest terms. So I think, you know, that quote just the first one to really say it publicly.[00:36:18] Dan Runcie: Yeah. Yeah. Agreed. And I think with this too, the question I keep coming back to is the sad question that I do ask and wonder is. This a viable business model for a company? There are several companies that have raised money in recent years, on this goal of serving the artist middle class, and I think it is something that often sounds great and compelling as a calling card.You're able to show it and share it and pitch decks about how it is this underserved audience, especially if you talk about where most of the revenue is accrued, and you can talk about the long tail, but do you think that this is a viable business model? Or have we seen examples where this has worked in practice where? Yes, a company and to be clear, not even that a company has to do it solely like they can't serve anyone that is more successful than a middle class musician, but have they done so.[00:37:15] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, it's a really good question. So yeah, I was thinking about that too when we were, texting about this over. Does it actually even make sense to focus on this goal of, like, enabling a class of middle class musicians? Because I think sometimes, the very important conversations about making the music business more fair to creators, what gets lost in that is that the goal is not for everyone to be successful because that's just not the way that any industry works, that anything works, there's still always going to be a bit of a hierarchy. But we just want to make sure that the odds are not so stacked against creators, that things aren't so unfair and that it's not impossible, you know, to make, a living off this.but I think that for it to work, ideally there needs to be a way or probably monetize music fandom rather than just large audiences. And I think that's something that. The music industry as a whole is starting to understand. And I think that we might start to see, I mean, we're already having a lot of conversations about like what the next, streaming business model could look like, like user centric has been tossed out for that.and this idea of maybe active listenership, if you can determine whether someone is an active fan that, you know, listening might get more royalties than the passive fan. We're having these conversations. And I think, to your point earlier. Streaming put a cap on what you can spend as a fan. There isn't any extra thing that you can buy.If you're a super fan, everyone is paying 9.99. And there are examples of streaming services that have monetized fandom like if you look at Tencent and NetEase in China, like they earn more of their annual revenue from a small segment of super fans paying extra for features than they do from a way larger base of subscribers.And that's a whole other, you know, rabbit hole to go down because I don't know how that money is actually shaking out in terms of whether it's still mostly going to the biggest artists or, you know, how much is actually going down to the creators, but I think that, it's possible to build a streaming model that monetizes not just scale, but also fandom and that could be a really big game changer, for this middle class of artists.I also think that to do that, we need to recultivate fandom in the first place, because again, we've spent the past decade teaching people to listen passively. So we can't just, you know, like with user centric. You can't just slap that model on a Spotify because so many of their listeners are passive.It's not a place that breeds fandom or encourages people or gives them ways to be more active fans. So there's a lot of work to do, but I think that these conversations are happening in a way that they haven't, at least in, you know, so long as I've been studying this. So I think that's at least a good thing that we're confronting all of these issues. [00:40:05] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I think a number of those things and it's likely 1 of those things where the individual thing itself may not make the huge bump itself, but the collection or the collective of them do help raise the gap, right? So 10 cent for years, tipping and things like that have worked well. And we've seen the success there. 1 of the pushbacks you've often heard is that, oh, well, western culture isn't as, you know, into that or into this or into that. And I'm like, well, I mean, do we really know that's true until you try it? I feel like the past year, all I've seen is more and more places where physical locations. I've never tipped anyone before turning that square or toast thing over to my direction. And then now they want me to go. Give a 20, 25, 30% tip. And I'm like, excuse me. So granted, I know this is a whole debate now that people have very strong opinions on, but if anything, that shows me that whether or not people may like it or not, there is some aspect of that. So whatever thing like that can be created for artists that taps into that guilt or that shame that gets people to also go along with the tipping, even if they may not want to, I mean, I hate wording it like that because that's probably just my opinion about how I feel about some of the merchant style tipping that has been introduced recently. But I say that to say that shows that there's examples of this that have been introduced.So I think about that on that side and then I think 2 on the, whether it's user centric streaming and things like that. I do think that whether it's sound cloud or title, or some of these other companies have shown some of the results. I think we'll see a few more soon as well. That do show the impact there. And I know that that's been another contentious thing with the record labels and others, but I do think that in the end, there's other things that, you know, can still level the playing field for everyone. The thing that I think a lot about is what the physical purchases look like. And we all know that vinyl and other physical formats have continued to increase, but I also feel like that's a bit subject to the superstar game as well.I don't know the answer to this question I'm about to ask, but if I was a middle class artist right now, I'm about to release my album and I wanted to have. A bunch of vinyl that was made for my fan base. Could I have that ready? The first week that my album comes out, could I have that out there knowing all of the supply chain and logistical issues that may still exist with vinyl?Because last time I checked the record labels and others were getting. Priority and they were more likely to give that priority to the Harry Styles and the Taylor Swift's and others that did have huge first week sales numbers, largely due to the vinyl that they were able to sell. So, is a middle class musician able to participate in that same way, at least upon the initial onset of their album release? I'm not sure, but things like that just make it easier for them to be able to monetize and capture that moment.[00:43:09] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. No, I'm, glad that you brought that up. And that reminds me of another thing, because I think you would also ask, like, as any company doing this or has any company done this? Well, and I feel like band camp is worth mentioning here, you know, I think a lot of artists see that as I've seen bandcamp as sort of a lifeline throughout a lot of these struggles and something else that's interesting about it, speaking of the whole tipping thing is. I think most albums or most, if you're going to band camp and you're buying a digital version of an album, there's nothing more of an expression of fandom because what are most of those people are going to do with that? They're really just doing it to support the artists because they probably already have a streaming subscription.They can listen to the album somewhere else, they don't need band camp for it. And I think a lot of artists as well. Put up their music or whatever. Yeah, yeah, when they put up their music on band camp, it's oftentimes pay what you want. And I remember, back when I was at Billboard, I did a big feature on Bandcamp, and I remember them telling me at the time that, the majority of fans pay more than asking. I don't know if that's still true, but that's a crazy stat! That the majority of fans are willing to pay more than asking when this is a pay what you want to purchase. So, you know, I think that's an example of this working. and people wanting to support their favorite artists purely to support them and maybe not even really getting, a vinyl album in return cause a lot of times it's just a digital download, but yeah, I think bandcamp deserves shouting out here. [00:44:33] Dan Runcie: They're a good 1 dimension to, because they stand a bit different in this dynamic of companies that have been raised or that have been started. They didn't necessarily start. I think that a lot of people have thought of band camp is almost this. Almost a bit of like a public utility or public good for the industry.I don't know if that's always the most fair definition, but I think people say that because it gets into this viability of business model and how long it can scale and things you can do. And I know they've since, I believe it was acquired by Epic games at least a couple years ago that that had happened. But I remember leading up to that people had wondered the same thing about band camp and it's just like you're saying a company, a platform that offer this opportunity, you want to buy the 1 thing. Great. You want to buy it as many times you want to pay even more for it, they make it easy on the website.They have band camp Fridays where they don't take the fee for things like there were things in place to make it happen, but it's 1 of those things where at the end of the day, I feel like the economics of convenience took over in a lot of ways for where the majority of people sat, but could you still do enough on the platform?And there definitely were success stories, which were cool to see, but it definitely wasn't necessarily the norm for all artists. So, when I think about it, collectively, I do think that it's viable to have a platform and have a business that does serve the middle class musician, and I think that it's probably more likely to be a platform that either relied on minimal outside funding or didn't, or was it invested by some of the biggest venture capital firms?And I say that not in any way against venture capital, but more so that the nature of those investments, they're trying to get 10 billion dollar exits from people, or they're trying to get 10Billion dollar exits from the companies they invest in, and they're not going to get that level of exit unless this is a consumer product.We'll talk about a consumer product. This is a consumer product that reaches everyone and can maximize that nth degree, which then makes it subject to the whole power law dynamic that we're then talking about. So I do think it can work for it. Like I said, whether it's bootstrapper and minimal funding company, where the economics work out.And I do think that I forget if, band camp raised or how much they did, but still relatively lean compared to the amount of money that many of the other consumer music, tech companies have raised, [00:47:15] Tati Cirisano: For sure. And another point on the business models, because I remember earlier you were mentioning one of the issues is there's like competing incentives, right? Between streaming platforms and labels and artists. Not everyone wants the same thing, but with Bandcamp's business model, since they're taking, since it's pretty simple, they're taking a cut of your sales. They only make money when the artist makes money. So there's this very clear, if you win, we win situation going on. And I think not every company can make it, you know, be that simple. But I think that's maybe a learning to keep in mind is that. The artists, the artist's goals should align with the business's goals.[00:47:55] Dan Runcie: Right? Agreed agreed and hopefully align with the target artists that is trying to serve and not necessarily. The uber duper 1% that happened to be generating the most money for them, which can often happen with these things. before we close things out, though. Let's fast forward to 20 years from now, and I say 20 years from now, because I think it's clear 20 years ago, a lot of people felt like it was a better time for the middle class musician.Let me actually say 25 years ago, just because he get pre Napster and say, 25 years ago, a lot of people feel like it was a better time then than it is now. Now I alter that. It's different. It probably takes a lot more work and more tentacles involved with everything, but it's still possible. But 20 years from now, do you think it's any easier for the middle class musician?[00:48:43] Tati Cirisano: I love it. When you, end on one of these crazy think 20 years in the future questions, is it any easier? I think it's, I mean, I know this is an annoying answer, but I think it's easier in some ways and harder and others. Like I think that for the same, all these reasons that we've talked about, I think, things are only going to get more and more fragmented. And I think in the 20 years from now, it won't be that there's, you know, this 1% of superstars and then everyone else, it'll increasingly be that there's many, many of these like middle tier or even what we think was smaller tier artists.And in that way, creating this core fan base is going to be even more important, but building it is going to be even harder. So I think, I don't know. I remember, I did an interview a couple months ago where we talked about a lot of similar things about, you know, streaming economics and how hard it is today and all these things.And at the end, they asked me, well, all of this considered, would you rather be an artist today or an artist then? And if I think about that same, like, if I kind of take that lens to your question, think about it now, or even in 20 years, I still think I'd rather be an artist now. Because I think there are many more ways to get in.There's many more, you know, options available to you. And I think before the door was closed to so many, just so many people, and now at least the door is open, like the door is open and you enter an insanely crowded room where, you know, there's obstacles flying at you left and right, but at least the door is open. So yeah, complicated question, complicated answer. What do you think Dan?[00:50:20] Dan Runcie: I think net harder, I would say if I had to pick net harder, like just more difficult in general, but I do agree with you that in general. It's easier to get started and have a chance of having a breakthrough today that it is. Yes, that it was yesterday because of the gatekeepers and things like that. But once you do break through, it's harder to get noticed today than it was yesterday. So I think those dynamics increase further 20, 25 years out, even 5 years out, I would say, and that does make it harder for someone in this 50 to 150 K range to meet their people. It requires even more intentionality of trying to make sure you're talking to the right base that you're truly trying to, let's say, you're taking advantage of the long tail.You're trying to find your pocket and focus on the niche. You're going to take a much more thorough and deep business plan to do everything you want to do, even if you're only bringing in a few percent. 70, 000 from all of the various things you're doing, but you're doing it. And I think that would only get harder.And I think that probably speaks to more broad trends just with the state of the middle class and other areas outside of music. But that's how I see things.[00:51:45] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. No, I think that makes sense like if I really boil it down, I don't think it's going to get easier. So it's either going to get harder or it's going to be about the same. Yeah, because these, you know, positives and negatives will sort of cancel each other out.[00:52:00] Dan Runcie: Agreed. Well, we'll continue to monitor this continue to keep track of the companies that are aiming to solve this. I know it's a problem. That's easier said than done. I think there's plenty of ways that it can work. It can't work. And I think for a lot of the companies that are raising big amounts of money to solve this problem, it could be worth a look to see what that path looks like and other companies that have tried to do this as well and where their shortcomings were but rooting for the middle class musicians, an important group, and hopefully the more and more platforms we have that just increases the likelihood that someone can find the right service that can help them get to where they want to be.[00:52:39] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. And I mean, like I said, we're having these conversations more now there's more, creative thinking about what the future looks like and, what innovation looks like in this area. So I think we're having the conversations and that's a positive thing.[00:52:53] Dan Runcie: Indeed. All right, Tati, before we let you go, anything else coming up from media or from you that we should keep an eye out on?[00:53:01] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, I would say, like I was, mentioning before we have this great new report on live music audiences that is already out on our website. And I will also have a report coming out in early August on the state of fandom, the state of music fandom. So I'm very excited about that one, as you probably guess, one of my favorite things to talk about.So, yeah, look out for that. I'm excited.[00:53:23] Dan Runcie: Will do, awesome. Thanks again. This was fun. Thanks for coming on.[00:53:27] Tati Cirisano: Thanks, Dan.[00:53:28] Dan Runcie Outro Audio: If you enjoyed this podcast, go ahead and share it with a friend, copy the link, text it to a friend, post it in your group chat, post it in your Slack groups, wherever you and your people talk, spread the word. That's how Trapital continues to grow and continues to reach the right people. And while you're at it, if you use Apple podcast. Go ahead, rate the podcast, give it a high rating and leave a review. Tell people why you like the podcast that helps more people discover the show. Thank you in advance. Talk to you next week.

Über eine Million neuer Songs pro Tag, weniger Viralität und mehr (Personal) Branding. Redfield Podcast Stammgast Fabian Schütze gibt ein Update zu seinen c/o pop Panels, dem kommenden Low Budget High Spirit Magazin und was ihn in den letzten Wochen bewegte. Dabei diskutiert er mit Gastgeber Alexander Schröder über die Europa-Expansionspläne von Rough Trade und auf Basis der neuen „Musikindustrie in Zahlen 2022“ Studie vom Bundesverband Musikindustrie (BVMI) über Retail und E-Commerce. Er verrät, ob er einen Plattenläden eröffnen würde und beleuchtet die Situation der deutschen Musikhändler, unter denen JPC nach wie vor als „Hidden Champion“ erscheint. Ob sich 18-jährige überhaupt CDs kaufen? Im Rahmen vom Kulturpass wäre das möglich. Schütze und Schröder sprechen über Sinn und Unsinn des Programms, das ein Budget von 100 Millionen Euro besitzt und ca. 750.000 junge Erwachsene ansprechen soll. Wer kann profitieren, wofür wird es genutzt und taugt die App, die Schröder direkt ausprobiert hat. Darüber hinaus gibt es natürlich ein KI-Update. Schütze erklärt, wie er KI in seinem Büroalltag nutzt. Damit einhergehend prognostizieren Analysten wie Goldman Sachs oder Midia Research in den nächsten Jahren mehr als eine Million neue Songs pro Tag auf Spotify & Co. Aber was bedeutet das nicht nur für das Playlist Game, Artist Promotion und Marketing einzelner Acts? Wird (Personal) Branding wichtiger als die Musik? Und wäre es ein Segen, wenn es weniger Viralität geben würde, wie es das neue LinkedIn Update verkündet? Musikindustrie in Zahlen 2022 vom BVMI https://www.musikindustrie.de/fileadmin/bvmi/upload/06_Publikationen/MiZ_Jahrbuch/2022/BVMI_Musikindustrie_in_Zahlen_2022_ePaper_230420_geschuetzt.pdf Podcast „The Illiac Suite“ https://www.denniskastrup.com/work/the-illiac-suite-new-podcast/ www.lowbudgethighspirit.com www.redfield-podcast.de

What's the role of a music video today? In the 1980s, music videos flipped the industry thanks to MTV. Videos helped artists like Michael Jackson and Madonna become cultural icons. Record labels spent millions on music videos to promote their CD sales. Everyone was winning.Music videos don't hold the same power today in the streaming era. The budgets are smaller, but they still get made. To break it all down, I was joined by MIDiA Research analyst Tati Cirisano. Here's what we covered:0:52 What is the role of a music video today?2:15 MTV's role in music videos7:46 Comparisons to TikTok11:27 Music video budgets peaked in mid-90s14:30 Napster changed everything17:27 Music videos as career launchpads18:50 YouTube revitalizes music videos25:44 Range of video budgets 31:04 Big dollars going to documentaries and short films32:53 Rise of lyric videos41:42Does YouTube have a music video formula?44:09Measuring ROI of music videos in 2023Listen: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | SoundCloud | Stitcher | Overcast | Amazon | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | RSSHost: Dan Runcie, @RuncieDan, trapital.coGuests: Tati Cirisano, @tatianacirisanoThis episode is sponsored by DICE. Learn more about why artists, venues, and promoters love to partner with DICE for their ticketing needs. Visit dice.fmEnjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by reading Trapital's free memo.TRANSCRIPT[00:00:00] Tati Cirisano: There's an argument to be made that MTV like almost invented the music video or almost like made music videos a thing because having that audience there and having that like cultural impact is what led to bigger budgets for music videos so I almost feel like MTV gets credit for like kind of inventing the music video. [00:00:19] Dan Runcie Intro: Hey, welcome to the Trapital Podcast. I'm your host and the founder of Trapital, Dan Runcie. This podcast is your place to gain insights from executives in music, media, entertainment, and more who are taking hip hop culture to the next level.[00:00:47] Dan Runcie Guest Intro: This episode is all about music videos and what their value prop is in the industry today. Back in the MTV era, the role of a music video was clear. This was your four minute opportunity to sell the hell out of your artist and for your label to promote its artist. Yet fans bought into the lifestyle, the identity, the persona of this person, and get them to go to Sam Goody, go to Tower Records and buy the albums.It was a marketing channel and it was a marketing channel that the record labels were continuing to put money into, and as the effectiveness continued to grow, they put more and more. Into that and that budget exploded. By the time we got to the mid to late 90s, we saw music video budgets hitting millions of dollars, and artists were doing out of this world things in these videos.But we slowly started to see those budgets slash. Went at the introduction of Napster and the CD era started to decline and the money was no longer flowing the way that it once was. But we started to see music videos take a new turn in the YouTube era. And now in the TikTok era, what is the ROI of a music video?What role do they serve in today's industry? And to break it down, we're enjoying by Tati Cirisano, an analyst at MIDia Research. He's been on the podcast a bunch of times, and this topic was right up her alley. So we talked a bit about that and more. Hope you enjoy this episode. Here's our breakdown on the role of music videos in today's industry.[00:02:16] Dan Runcie: All right. Today we are going to take a trip down memory lane to the wonderful World of Music videos, how this art form has evolved over the years. And I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research, Tati welcome. [00:02:28] Tati Cirisano: Thank you. Good to beback once again. [00:02:31] Dan Runcie: Yeah, definitely. Can I start with a story? You mind if I start with a story with this one?  So, a couple weeks ago I was catching up with, CEO from one of the major record labels. This is someone that if you're probably listening to this household, if you're probably listening to this podcast, you probably know, and they run a label that is also a household name, and they were telling me about a conversation they had with an artist who is also a household name and how this artist wanted to have a million dollar plus seven plus figure, multi-million dollar music video budget because they wanted to make this big splash with what they were doing. And the CEO was like, no, I'm not giving you that. Like, what do you think this is? And for context, this is a artist who hasn't had a big hit since George Bush's first term. Let me say that roughly, just to give some context here. So,So it's been some time, but I also was a bit surprised because this is someone who seemed like they were up with the times in tech, and I remember asking the label exec, I was like, what's the deal? I thought this artist was with this. You see the movies they're making here, there, and this, that, and the third.And he was like, Hey. You would be surprised sometimes the egos get the best of these people and this is what they want. And that was a big inspiration for this conversation because I know you and I have talked about things like Spotify versus YouTube. YouTube, of course, having such a big focus in music videos and it's role.But that's what made me think it would be a great time to take a trip down memory lane and just revisit music videos themselves and. Going back to 1981, I feel like we could start music videos well before that. That obviously was there, but I think that was the origin place for a lot of what became known as the Modern Music Video and MTV itself.What's your take on how impactful MTV was? Because there was definitely a big shift of any music videos we saw before and any music videos we saw after.[00:04:36] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, I mean, you're right that like we could start this even further. Back in history, there were artists like the Beatles were making music films in like the 60s. David Bowie did the same but there wasn't really a place to showcase them the way that MTV, like, the one that MTV created. So I feel like it's not just that really iconic, amazing music videos, like those of, like Michael Jackson and, others made MTV a thing.I feel like there's an argument to be made that MTV like almost invented the music video or almost like made music videos a thing because having that audience there and having that like cultural impact is what led to bigger budgets for music videos and labels kind of focusing on this as an art form and a promotional piece.And that also led to more interesting creative videos. So I almost feel like MTV gets credit for like kind of inventing the video, the music video. [00:05:30] Dan Runcie: And inventing the video as a distinct art form that can live on its own in distinction from the music itself, because you mentioned The Beatles, you mentioned some of those other artists from that time. Music videos almost felt more like a utility. They were a commodity. Let's put the camera up while you're recording the tune, and maybe we'll add in some things.Maybe they'll add in some B-roll. And that's what it very much existed as for years. But then MTV takes it and makes it this unique thing. And we saw from the early days, whether it was Duran Duran, David Bowie, Michael Jackson, Madonna, they were some of the early people that really made it their own thing.And you saw more of those movies and that's where MTV being able to capture the eyeballs there, the growth of cable as well, and them becoming one of the more popular channels there. You see this platform having this type of impact, you invest more dollars into it, and this becomes a much stronger marketing channel, which then commanded and justified them putting more and more money over time into these videos.[00:06:35] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, and speaking of Madonna, I think it also made music a lot more visual where music videos kind of opened this pathway for artists to become not just music icons, but kind of like style and fashion and cultural icons. there's so many videos that. Are just kind of like etched into everyone's brains and so many iconic outfits like people still dress up as, Britney Spears and the Baby One More Time Video and like all these other iconic ones. I think it, started making music more of a visual thing. And in turn, that also helped drive fandom around artists. Cuz if there's one thing I've learned in all the studying of, fandom that I've done and how it develops, it's pretty much always about context.It's always maybe listening to a song makes you a fan or doesn't make you a fan. It makes you a listener of the artist. But it's only once you know more about, who they are and like what their style is and what their aesthetic is and all these other things that you become a true fan. I think a lot of fandom was formed by sitting around the TV with friends and like watching a video for the first time on MTV.It was just a more captivating way to get to know an artist and have that context around them. [00:07:47] Dan Runcie: It's a big point, and that's something I definitely related with too. Growing up in that era, you were able to see and interact with those artists. If I had just heard these artists on the radio, it would've been a very different relationship. But I know that for a lot of people, that's how they gravitated to music.That's how they captured this, and that wasn't the way that it, I grew up for me, whether it was watching them on MTV, watching them on BET, That was the experience, and especially as things started to take off in the CD era, we saw more artists having success with it. We also started to see more pushback as well.I think it was around the early 90s, even the late eighties, this was around the time MTV was really kicking into gear. And the sales and numbers, everything was just up and to the right from a growth perspective. But we started to hear more critiques, some of the more traditionalists in the music industry started to say things like, these music videos are turning artists into one trick ponies.It's no longer about the music anymore. It's about making, Music video. And that's clearly resonating with some of the critiques. We now hear about TikTok as well. But it makes me think about the patterns that music often follows and when there is a new art form that does allow some type of growth, there's critiques, but those critiques also do stem from bit of this.If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. And we've seen this time and time again where a lot of those artists that had. Had critiques about MTV, whether it was Mariah Carey in the very early days, or even groups like REM, they would go on to make some of the most iconic music videos from the 90s as well.And I think we've seen the same with whether it's streaming or TikTok music videos was one of the things that I remember as having a bit of that cyclical pattern.[00:09:32] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, and there's so many trends in music videos that I feel like now we're play, we're seeing play out on TikTok or have already seen like there was sort of the dance, video craze of like, single ladies and crank that and PSY with Gangnam style.There were all these music videos that were about getting everyone to do a dance. And that was the way, that was like the promotional thing of if you got people to do that, then they would do it at the club when the song came on, they would do it in public. It would sort of become this bigger moment. And then that was kind of the first phase of TikTok when it started to rise in the 2020 when in early 2020 was like all dance videos.and even. I remember there were some videos that people, I know we haven't gotten to YouTube yet, but when YouTube came into the equation, people were uploading their own versions of videos and now that's like a pretty common thing. But yeah, it's interesting how all this stuff is cyclical and I think like video to the stuff about, the criticisms and like being one trick ponies and that kind of thing.I think that video has kind of, with music, always been about creating a cultural moment, aside from it just being another art form that I think artists delight in taking part in. Cause it's just another way to be creative. But I think it's, it's, about creating a cultural moment and creating a cultural moment in this day and age has morphed into this concept of virality, but it's always been about the same thing.Like viral in the 90s was, people wanting to be Britney Spears in that music video I was just talking about, and it kind of like being, this thing everyone was talking about for months. The same thing is happening now on TikTok. It's just happening faster. so yeah, I think that a lot of this stuff is cyclical and those criticisms, the point is that it's a promotional tool, so of course it's gonna lead to kind of like flash in the pan moments.So, Yeah, I have complicated feelings about those criticisms, I guess.[00:11:28] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I do too. I understand and I think that what we saw in the next decade, especially with some of those artists that came around and ended up leaning in, said a lot about where it is. And not every artist needed to do the MTV thing. Not every artist needed to lean into it all the way. Granted, I do think that most artists had music videos to an extent, but there was clearly a wave of where things were going.And right around the mid to late 90s, We saw the peak, at least from a budget perspective, of how much money was being put into music videos. And when you're talking about creating moments and in the pre-internet era, there wasn't necessarily as much virality, but the thing that got people locked in was how visually stunning or something that you've seen that's never been seen before.It's almost this bigger was better era. And then we get to points where in the mid 90s, Both Madonna and Michael and Janet Jackson are having music videos that aren't just one or 2 million. That screen music video was rumored to be around five to 7 million depending on the source you look at, in 1995 dollars, and that's that black and white video.They're shape shifting and all this stuff. And we continued to see this over the next couple of years. Of course, hype Williams and everything that he did from music videos was always unique, is always futuristic and with all of the elements that he had there. But it took a lot of money to make those music videos the same way with NSYNC and all those no strings attached music videos.Those were multimillion dollar music videos too. And it brings me back to even the things that they would spend money on. I'm thinking about, Busta Rhymes and Janet Jackson, they had that once. It's gonna be a music video where you have the silver liquid that's like coming over. Both of them and Busta Rhymes took guitar lessons.Apparently that's what MTV's making the video thing had said in its, little popup that comes to the music video. But all of those things [00:13:24] Tati Cirisano: I missed those popups. [00:13:26] Dan Runcie: I know it was such a fun era, right? It was. It was such a, I guess a lot of that's been now disrupted by what we see on YouTube, which I know we'll get into in a minute, but that was such a moment.I think it spoke to, why people were willing to put in money at the time with just where things were with the era that was the marketing channel. Music videos were seen purely as an expense to be able to sell more CDs the same way that touring at the time was seen as an opportunity to try and sell more CDs.And the artists that sold the most often got the biggest budgets. And at the time, bigger was all often seen as better, especially when it came to the contemporary Pop X and that whole ecosystem of music, video culture, and everything around it made that take off the way it did.[00:14:13] Tati Cirisano: no, absolutely. I think the promotional power was worth it at the time. and like you said, you could justify spending that much on a music video if you were gonna make it back in CD sales if you were one of these superstars. So it made a lot of sense at the time. And then came master.[00:14:31] Dan Runcie: Yeah, that changed everything because and there was a fair amount of overlap there just with the way things were because so much of the industry was still focused where it was, I look at even the music video economy where there was a cyclical nature where because of the demand, The programs themselves or the channels themselves started launching programs dedicated to showcasing music videos, whether it was 106 and Park or TRL.They had different shows throughout the day, but all of them were some unique flavor of just trying to show you more music videos. And that's what was cool about it. You were able to have this whole ecosystem there, but then as you mentioned, Napster comes in, changes everything. The dollars are no longer flowing, and it.Is harder to justify spending millions of dollars on a music video if you can't confirm that that artist is gonna be able to do that. I think in a lot of ways, the peak was, we talked about them before in sync, Britney Spears, Nsync being able to sell, I think it was nearly 3 million units of an album the first week that it comes out.Like people skipping school in order to go buy, no strings attached. That just didn't happen any more to that level. I mean, we eventually saw examples like Adele and even this Taylor Swift album, but it wasn't the same way that it was then, and it shifted everything and I think it eventually Led to lower budgets.We still saw a lot of creativity. I still remember watching tons of music videos, especially in the mid to, especially in the mid two thousands. But it was definitely a different vibe cuz it was this pre and post Napster, but pre YouTube era where the budgets were still somewhat strong, but it wasn't quite what it was before.[00:16:13] Tati Cirisano: and there was this whole ecosystem before that, like, it's, kind of stunning me to remember how many different roles there were. Like music directors I feel like got a lot more shine because there were the VMAs and all these kind of things dedicated to them. But then there were the VJs of the time.and there were kind of like the. dancers and the other like characters in these videos, which kickstarted a lot of actors and actresses careers. Just being in these music videos, there was this idea of like the video vixen, which is a term I absolutely cringe to the n degree at, but like that was a role, like there was such an ecosystem around it. You're totally right and then it really so much since then. [00:16:54] Dan Runcie: When you think of the term video vixen, who's the first person that comes to mind?[00:16:58] Tati Cirisano: I think of people like Eva Mendez in the Miami video with Will Smith, I think of Scarlet Johansen. which one was she in? It was like some, [00:17:09] Dan Runcie: Justin Timberlake, what goes around comes around.[00:17:11] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, there were so many, I don't know. Alicia Silverstone I know was in a couple of music videos. Kim Kardashian was in Fallout boy, thanks for the Memories, which was a bit later and like she was already famous. But like that remembering that blows my mind. Like there were just so many of these examples. I don't know. [00:17:27] Dan Runcie: Yeah, there's a few that comes to mind. I think about someone like Vida Guerrera, like she was always in a bunch of them. Even male video vixen's too. I'm thinking [00:17:37] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. [00:17:38] Dan Runcie: Beckford and, Toni Braxton's Unbreak my heart, in that one. And then Tyrese and, what music video is that was that angel of mine with Monica.So you definitely had 'em back and forth. Even the artists themselves sometimes ended up being vixens and other ones. Terrence Howard was in a bunch of 'em. But I think that this too, it talks about just how music was a launchpad, right? You mentioned the VJs earlier. So many of these VJs started as those types of personalities, but then they went on to go do other things.I mean, Carson Daley is a media personality now doing his own thing. He got his roots in TRL. I feel like, aJ from 106 and Park still does media things suspense. Terrence Jay definitely does as well. So you see those, but you also saw it on the music video side too, where directors like Spike Jones is now doing, you know, Hollywood movies. Look at the Daniels, they directed turn down for what? the little John's music video, and then they just directed and won an Oscar for Best Picture and best Director with everything everywhere, all at once. So music continues to be a launchpad in [00:18:45] Tati Cirisano: What a pivot. Turn Down for What to Everything Everywhere All At Once.[00:18:50] Dan Runcie: Yeah, never would've guessed that one, never would've guessed that one. And I think with that, we should probably start now talking about the YouTube era because things took another turn here. You mentioned a little bit of this earlier where user-generated videos started to take off, but I think the success of YouTube started to tell people that, Hey, The things that are going viral and getting attention.It isn't just using the most amount of money possible to see outta this world stuff. As cool as it was to see Hype Williams creating action figures of Missy Elliot running around in space, we don't necessarily need to see that much out of this world to do it. It can be Soulja boy doing his type of dance and then having all this other user generated content on Crank that Batman, crank, that Spider-Man, crank that whoever, and we saw that time and time again.So I think YouTube, and this was before any of the licensing deals came. The fact that crank that blew up became the number one single in the country stuck out in a way. And I think that led to another evolution of what people were willing to spend money on and how they thought about the promotion of music videos as well.[00:19:59] Tati Cirisano: Totally like remember the okay go music video with the treadmills. Like remember how cool we all thought that was? I mean, I'll speak for myself, but like it's like funny to think about now. That was such a big deal. That they made this like really low budget video, just kind of like running around on treadmills.And I think that's the other thing that's interesting about YouTube is, so pre MTV, there was like not really any place to showcase music videos. Then there was this channel for it, but it was really limited to the major label signed artists. And then you got to YouTube where there wasn't any gatekeeping around music videos anymore.Anything could be uploaded and anything could be played. And there was just less of that gatekeeping. But then the flip side of that is it also means that it's a lot harder to stand out. And so YouTube has, kind of made any one of those videos a bit less impactful for that reason. Over time, I think, and that gets back to like the fragmentation that, you know, I love to talk about.[00:20:57] Dan Runcie: It's fascinating because I think that each time something goes viral or each time something breaks out on YouTube, You do get a lot of copycat behavior. You see a moment where things are happening. It isn't always rational, but that's kind of the beauty of it. And then you go on to something else. I was looking at things talking about the 10 year anniversary of Harlem Shake, of that whole video wave where people were doing all those crazy dances.The music then stops, and then a couple years later we saw Black Beatles and that saw reach a whole nother level because of the freeze challenge thing that people were doing. And that was a whole nother culture with it because again, we started to see less flashiness of them trying to do particular things.But once the licensing came, music videos then became revenue generating tools. On their own and it was no longer necessarily just about trying to have a song get retired on the charts, whether it was on a 106 and Park and TRL there became the subculture of how can we get this music video to hit this?Number of streams or this hit this number of views. And I know we start to see this now more where most of the services are publicly sharing how many streams and views their songs and music videos have. But I feel like we started to see this on YouTube first, and a lot of the chatter that you would once see started to live in the comments section.And you started to see these subcultures of fans that would gravitate and connect to songs in that way. And I felt like that was something that was unique.[00:22:29] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, and there were a lot music videos, over the past, like five years, over the past 10 years, like the single ladies video and like Childish Gambino with this is America. And even like more recently, like the Kendrick Lamar video with like the AI generated faces, I forget which song that [00:22:46] Dan Runcie: Oh yeah, the hard part five.[00:22:47] Tati Cirisano: Yes. But you're totally right that rather than the go, the virality of a music video. Just being about driving streams. they also, those videos also became revenue generated themselves. So going viral on YouTube, having a video that everybody was gonna be anxious to watch, was a big deal for that.And there, I feel like there were kind of less so today, but like pre TikTok in like 2016 to like 2020. It kind of feels like there was a bit of a mini revival of like, Music videos being this bigger promotional tool, like, do you remember all the promotion around the Thank you Next video for Ariana Grande?That was nuts, like, we were all waiting weeks for that video to come out and there was so much, conversation about it and so many clips and so many interviews in the press and I feel like there was kind of a moment before TikTok came around when music videos were once again, kind of this really big promotional tool and way to kind of break through the noise and generate revenue.[00:23:47] Dan Runcie: With Thank you, next. That was the one where they spoofed mean girls, right?[00:23:51] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, and like a bunch of other of those types of movies, like there was like a clueless scene in it. I feel like there [00:23:57] Dan Runcie: Oh yeah, yeah. [00:23:57] Tati Cirisano: I feel like there were a bunch, maybe I'm remembering it wrong, but I think they, they did that with like a bunch of different, like 90s and two thousands movies. And there were so many cameos. There were so many cameos. [00:24:08] Dan Runcie: Oh yeah, that's right. It did. It did. And I think a few of those music videos, you mentioned Salish Gambino as well. He's clearly someone that I think is calculated and knows what he's doing from a communication perspective, but with that video, it wasn't even necessarily about how much money was spent on this or something. It was more so here's this timely thing and there was a shock value that was linked to it, and I know that music videos have always had a bit of, have always had shock value, especially since the MTV area era think specifically about an artist like Madonna and then even Britney later on that leaned into this.But we started to see artists lean, lean into it even more from a. political standpoint, making statements and trying to say things that they wouldn't otherwise have said. And even thinking about artists like Joyner Lucas who had someone that was wearing a Make America Great again hat in their music video to then show that as some type of hypothetical conversation of what it could be like to talk to people that may think differently.I may be misremembering parts of the music video, but we started to see more of that integrate where. That then stems from how flexible this art form can be. You can have a music video like wp, which I do think was one of the more recent, you know, TikTok era music videos that created a moment. You could have them have these standalone things as well. [00:25:29] Tati Cirisano: Mm-hmm. That's exactly what I mean with how music videos give you so much more context like it's just another way for the artist to tell their story and express themselves. It's just another avenue for that, and there's so many different ways to do that. It is such a flexible art form. [00:25:44] Dan Runcie: Yeah, definitely. I have a few stats here that I think would be helpful just for some context setting. As we mentioned earlier, we talked about music video budgets in the late 90s and even the early two thousands where, top artists getting million dollars plus for their music video wasn't uncommon.But here, let me share some numbers. Cardi B had shared some self-reported public numbers of things she spent on music videos just over the years. This was from two years ago, so I'm sure she's done stuff then. But Bodak Yellow, that was the music videos that they had done. That one in Dubai, that was $15,000.Granted, she was much smaller at the time. People likely weren't charging her as much, but she did that for just $15,000 and then, Bar Cardi, that was $150,000. The money music video, which did look like a pretty elaborate and not cheap music video. That was 400,000, please Me. The one that she did with Bruno Mars, that was 900,000 and then WAP was a million dollars.But those are two artists coming together, and that was also another expensive looking music video with a bunch of cameos as well. So even WAP, something that I would consider on the highest degree. Of what, major record label might be willing to spend. Even that was just a million dollars or compared to how much more they were willing to spend a couple decades before.[00:27:02] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, yeah, I mean that, that kind of doesn't surprise me. Like I feel like the ROI for music videos has just gone down a lot and it just doesn't make sense to spend much more than that on a music video. Like you can still make a splash, it can still be, a good promotional tool. And a way to, generate more revenue, but they don't tend to last as long as they used to, and it's just really hard to get people's attention on one thing these days.I think short form is also being prioritized or that's kind of the sense that I'm getting and yeah, it doesn't totally surprise me, does it? What do you think about those numbers? [00:27:44] Dan Runcie: It doesn't surprise me either because of where so much music is consumed and how things go viral. But it is a bit interesting when I think about music videos as a visual art form and what tracks and what resonates compared to other forms of entertainment where I do feel like we've continued to see bigger and bigger com, bigger and better, at least from the money that's put into these productions for major film studios, for instance, what they're putting into superhero films, what they put into Fast and Furious films, or even what James Cameron had put into Avatar. Spending 300 million, not even on the marketing, just on the budget for these movies isn't even unheard of now. So there's clearly an attraction of doing that, even if it is one of these tent pole franchise movies, even for some of the things that have gone straight to video.But that didn't necessarily happen in the same way in music videos. It started to pull. We obviously know that the industry was hit harder than others, so it pulled back. But even as the industry continued to grow, and I think, I mean, I know now the numbers unadjusted for inflation have the highest, at least revenue on the recorded side.Bigger hasn't necessarily translated to better in that perspective. Even if you look at video games, the graphics, all the things that are stunning are the things that we continue to see. And granted in, video games, we've seen a few outliers, like when Nintendo, we blew up. Clearly that wasn't a graphics thing, but they were tapping into something that Xbox and PlayStation weren't at the time.But in music videos, the bigger, better graphics of artists doing crazy things just didn't resonate in the same way, the only music video I can think of is, Ed Sheeran, what's that music video he did? I think he's kind of floating around and stuff and moving. I think it's bad habits. But one of those, I think that's probably the most recent one, but even that one I don't think is like that expensive of a music video, but we just haven't seen better.I'm thinking back to in the 90s. Yeah, I mentioned the Hype Williams music videos or even, you know, Backstreet Boys like moving around in space and larger than life. We just haven't seen that translate in that same way in music videos. [00:29:51] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. Well the other thing that you just that just made me think of when you mentioned film is how do I put this? Like album promo cycles these days are so much less premeditated, right? It's more about putting songs out and seeing how people react, and then deciding which ones to push forward as a single, then deciding what to put music, video resources behind.So I think that the other difference with music versus something like film and TV is things are just getting decided on the fly. Like a song goes viral and then you're like, okay, now we're gonna make a video for this song, but you wouldn't decide that until you saw how the songs were performing. So I think that that's a big, big factor in it as well. But we've also seen some good, like low but lower budget music videos. Like I loved the Ice Spice Pink Panther for boys a Liar. And it was literally just them like hanging out on a fire escape. And I was like, this is perfect. So I think we've also seen like some good lower budget ones come out of this as well.But yeah, definitely doesn't feel like the same, you know, spending all this money on like these crazy graphics and like whatever it is, has as much of an impact or is, as worth it as it might be in film. [00:31:04] Dan Runcie: I feel like we've seen a few outliers here or there in music. Kanye West's music videos, especially in that, let's say 2007 to 2015, 16 range, it seemed like there was still a good amount of money that was being put into those. And even some of the extended ones that, that short form video, the short form film version of Runaway, still felt like a pretty expensive music video.And I'm pretty sure Hype Williams directed that. But I also wonder is. Is the definition of what we consider music video, and the expansion of that. Also shifting what people are putting money into and how it's categorized. And by that I'm talking about some of these documentaries that have come out and what bucket we put those in.I look at something like when Taylor Swift had recorded those pond sessions after the folklore evermore albums had come out. She essentially did an entire visual album of her at this pond or wherever. She wasn't that like Cottage and Sells and sold that to Disney, and then Disney then streams and puts that out and it's an hour or two hours or however long it is.Beyonce is recording her Coachella performance and then sells that to Netflix, and then Netflix puts that out. And you're essentially watching an alternate version of a Beyonce music video that is just over this two hour or two hour 15 minutes, however long it is. But when I think about that, I think about these visual albums and just how so many of them have spanned in, had different forms and ways they've gone about it. Is that where some of these more expensive projects are going? Is that where some of the more expensive dollars are going when looking at video as it relates to music, as opposed to just this music video bucket that we may have put it in?[00:32:53] Tati Cirisano: I think so, and I think I would also put in that category like the more. Like the short films that our music videos. And that's something that artists have been doing forever. But I mean, like, I don't know, like the Taylor Swift All Too Well video and even like, I feel like the SZA Kill Bill video was like longer than the song and like had, a lot of artists are starting to add more of a story and create more of like a short film. And I think part of that is a way to like just stand out from all the other music videos and actually grab people's attention because you are really telling a story, you're taking it to the next level. And even having parts where like the song isn't even playing, and I think you're probably right, that more of the budget that used to go to music videos, Is now going more sparingly to a few of those types of projects for the bigger artists. Whereas, l ike for what was traditionally a music video is now becoming lyric videos or sort of like these animated videos that I've seen come up that are so much cheaper to produce and often also involve AI generation, which is, an area that I feel like we haven't really touched on in all of the discourse about AI and music is like AI for music videos.And maybe that will end up lowering the cost to making these really fantastic crazy concepts that we used to see that used to cost 7 million. And now, well you can click a button. So I don't know, maybe we'll see like a reversal of what, of everything we're talking about, of like music videos kind of shrinking and instead becoming bigger. But yeah, I think you're right.[00:34:28] Dan Runcie: The point that you mentioned about music videos and just the storytelling, adding in the short film piece of it. I don't know if he was the first, but Michael Jackson Thriller is the one that comes to mind there, just with how that became this extended film. But again, not everyone was getting that much budgeter opportunity to do that in that way.Michael Jackson had built up the track record in order to make that happen, and then as you see, we continue to see that now with Taylor and others. I'm glad you mentioned the piece around lyric videos and AI, because lyric videos have long been the low-hanging fruit. Of YouTube, especially for artists.Yes, it's great to have your own music video, but sometimes people don't want that. They just wanna be able to have it there playing and Sure from a purely practical perspective, you could tell yourself. They can go listen to that and Spotify or they can just go listen to the audio version. That's what they want, but not necessarily.There are creative and unique things that you can do with music videos. It doesn't always have to be the text scrolling across the same way it would on a karaoke screen or something like that. Artists have had unique ways to go about it, and AI music videos isn't even necessarily something I necessarily thought of, but what's holding it back? You look at the same way that the images went viral of the Pope in, you know, wearing the bomber jacket or whatever it was. The same thing can happen with the music video. And when I'm thinking about this, I'm thinking again about like how we started this conversation around where some of the critiques are that people have had with music videos when they first came out. Some of the critiques, we hear now about this more user generated era of music, videos and content as well. The path and the journey. It seems that once music gets too derivative in some ways, two things happen. One, it expands and grows the pie for the overall industry, which is good because we wanna be able to see the impact in music.We wanna be able to see it grow. That's always gonna naturally attract detractors that wanna see the thing in the pure form, but nothing stopping them from seeing the thing in the pure form. But we do wanna be able to see the growth in evolution there. And AI is the next version of this where, what is the core piece that you have, whether it's the artist and the music that the rights holders have the control and ownership of, but whether it's music, video, or just other ways to do it, what are the ways that that can be unlocked? And if that can be done in a great way, that's where the potential comes.That's where you unlock all of the opportunity in the industry. And who knows, like you said, it doesn't even need to be as expensive as it was, but you're giving people the opportunity to do something unique. [00:37:06] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, and speaking of the SZA one, I don't know if this is something that she planned or if it's just something she's encouraged, but there's a whole culture on TikTok of fans making their own SZA music videos. Not copying the ones that have already been created, but making their own. And she'll repost them and comments on them and like talk about the ones that are her favorites. And that whole thing is really fascinating to me. And it even like brings me back to the lyric videos because the whole reason that the music industry started to realize, oh, we should release these music videos, was because fans were already making them and it was just revenue that the industry wasn't, and eyeballs that the industry wasn't capturing.So lyric videos were just a way to kind of formalize that, and I think we're seeing that in so many ways on TikTok with sped up songs that fans uploaded and then record labels formalized. So I don't really know where I'm going with this with music videos, but I feel like there's a connection there of like, How, video could potentially enter more of that. I mean, music videos could potentially enter more of that, UGC space. But the other thing I wanted to bring up before I forget, is that I did grab some stats from our research at MIDia about, both of those things. So just for context here. 59% of global consumers use YouTube to watch music videos weekly. And then we had another question where we asked how do you engage with music artists beyond listening to their music? And 35% of consumers said they watch lyric videos. and that's from our Q4 22 consumer survey and our Q1 23 respectively. So, both arepretty high. [00:38:41] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I would say so. I wonder for some artists, the numbers that they've had for the music videos and lyric videos are probably closer than they think, right? And sometimes a lot of it just depends on what you're in the mood for. Sometimes, there's just so many more opportunities to have a passive thing in the background, and sometimes I've done it myself without even thinking, I think what is the user experience that then causes me to go to a lyric video, even when I know the music video is there. And most of the time it's when I wanna have the thing in the background. Maybe I'll go to it, but I don't necessarily wanna stare at the screen for the next few minutes and it makes perfect sense and there's so many more use cases for that.So I wouldn't be surprised if for certain artists, they both serve a purpose, but they might actually be making more from the respective lyric song. And I think when you just think about it overall, the Lyric song does enable you to have your entire album up on the streaming services guy, I guess you could technically have a few versions where I've seen some artists have the music video, they have the lyric video, and then they just have the still with the cover art of the album there.So you have three different options and that could all be, revenue that goes back to the artist and the rights solar.[00:39:53] Tati Cirisano: Mm-hmm. There's also this interesting idea of like how all these things kind of play together. Like going back to the episode that we did on, that was about YouTube and, kind of contrasting these short form video platforms and how YouTube's whole pitch is that they're able to unite long form and short form so that, you know, there isn't that gap where people watch a TikTok video about, and then they don't actually go in and learn more about the artists. So, I don't know. I think there's something interesting there with YouTube being the main place where people watch music videos. The only, like the main place, I won't say the only. And also having the short form video platform. So I think that is a really strong proposition to be able to kind of marry the two. [00:40:35] Dan Runcie: Here's a question for you similar to that I actually don't know the answer to this myself, but thinking about how like audio and music itself, we see how music has adapted over time based on the mode and the medium that it is, whether it's CDs and streaming. And then we see the impact of TikTok and everything else.And music videos we've seen similar where we knew what a an MTV era music video looked like, especially if it was a music video that's trying to be on TRL. There's almost a certain formula that you saw to it. And we also see now what a TikTok video can look like where you see the types of dances and you see the way that the music video is made almost in a way to make it easily be replicated, whether it's a Drake, Lizzo, Doja Cat, Cardi B, plenty people have done this.Do you think this exists as well with YouTube? Was there a certain type of music video that stands out to you, is Yes. This is a YouTube music video. This is a music video that personifies the YouTube era of music videos.[00:41:38] Tati Cirisano: I love that question. that's a really good question.[00:41:42] Dan Runcie: As I'm thinking about it, there's one person that did come to mind. NBA Young Boy is a person that I do think speaks to the YouTube era of music videos because he approaches this the same way that. Someone like Mr. Beast approaches videos. There is a formula there, he has his hook, he has the things.There is a bit of the storytelling dynamic of what he is trying to do, or the challenge that they're trying to overcome, and then they do the thing. But it's definitely told in this way that has the hook and the elements that you naturally see. In YouTube and the way that the font for the name of the music video scrolls up, that is very much the formula.How quick it is for the beat to start. All those types of things, I think speak a lot to the YouTube era.[00:42:27] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, I also think, I'm thinking of artists who have sort of played into meme culture with their videos, like Drake has kind of done that. Remember how meme'd the Hotline Bling video was like. Even like the video for, what's that song you have with Justin Bieber? Pop Star was like, kind of playing into like the stereotypes about them in a way.Like I think artists like them who have sort of played into internet culture in their videos are maybe part of that YouTube era. Charli XCX, the boys video felt very YouTube, Yeah, I would say things like that. And then also videos that invited user participation, like the dance video craze, where it was kind of intended to get you to make your own version.And that was kind of like the early TikTok was being YouTube. So, yeah, that's a great question. [00:43:22] Dan Runcie: Yeah, and I think we saw some of this with Instagram as well, because I think about Drake in my Feelings. That was another one where there was clearly a Instagramable place where he's saying, please repeat this, because TikTok really wasn't blowing up the way that it was then, but he clearly made this video leading into that.And if anything, I think that the video came after we saw the viral instagram clips of, what was that guy? Shaggy that was doing the dances for that music video and then Danny Le as well. So there were a few people that had done that.[00:43:55] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, no, the correlation is so fascinating. I could do a whole nother podcast on how Drake lyrics invented Instagram captions, but we'll save that.[00:44:09] Dan Runcie: And no, we will definitely table that one. And I think as. Yeah. No. I have a few thoughts on that one, but as I think about this, I feel like a good way to, to close this one out is thinking about the ROI of these videos. And there's a number of ways to look at it, but with the way that a video is now, what do you think the best way is to measure the ROI?Because of course there's the hard dollars that the video could generate, the impact, but what's your take on that? [00:44:36] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, aside from the things like, aside from the things that are just like hard views and streams, I think it's also about cultural impact, which is kind of impossible to measure. it's about UGC, like how many videos was. I don't know, how many people kind of created their own version or did the dance in the music video, wherever it is.I guess that kind of depends on the video, but I think there's like some element of like creations related to the video that are part of it. and then did anyone dress up for Halloween as that music video? That's the biggest measure of cultural impact.[00:45:18] Dan Runcie: Like Lil Nas X dressing up as Ice Spice [00:45:21] Tati Cirisano: Yes. Yes. And I'm sure there were people that dressed up as Drake in the hotline bling video. the scene that that came out. So, look at Halloween costume sales, all you label executives. No, I don't know it's a really hard question to answer, but I think it's, mix of those and it's increasingly about, how fans are kind of like recreating their own versions of things. [00:45:42] Dan Runcie: Because there's a clear need to, water creates something that creates shock value, but you can't do those moments automatically cuz sometimes randomly it's gun just being gunna and then, Rihanna dresses up like him for her Halloween costume in like multiple settings and stuff, and it's like, oh, okay.I guess this is a thing. Like I don't think he knew that he was putting a fit out there, but you can't always guarantee that that's what's gonna come out, right? You have artists like Da Baby that I think have always tried to do stunty things to get cloud out there, but I don't know if, I've never necessarily seen people try to dress up like him for Halloween in that way.But that's a good one, and I think at first I was like thinking you're saying it in jest, but it's a hundred percent true. Like how are you able to capture zeitgeist? And I think that checking Instagram tags especially, or hashtags or just trending topics Twitter can tell you. Yeah. definitely. [00:46:36] Tati Cirisano: Well, many gift uses did you get of a clip from the music video?[00:46:41] Dan Runcie: Exactly. Or are people creating gifts of you in some type of way? [00:46:45] Tati Cirisano: Exactly. [00:46:46] Dan Runcie: Definitely. Well, Tati, this was fun. We have a couple of topics that I know we'll dig into eventually on this, but before we let you go, what are some things that you're digging into? What should the travel listeners stay looking out for?[00:46:59] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, that's a good question, let me think. So many things. I mean, we have a new report at MIDia that'll be out next month, for clients that's about live music consumers. We did a big survey, with bands in town asking people about their attitudes towards ticket prices and all sorts of things like that. So if you're listening and you're client of ours, look out for that. If you're not and you're interested in it, feel free to reach out. but yeah, that's the thing that I'm working on a lot right now and very excited about. [00:47:27] Dan Runcie: Nice. All right. We'll stay looking out for that. Thank you. [00:47:31] Tati Cirisano: Awesome. Thanks Dan.[00:47:32] Dan Runcie Outro: If you enjoyed this podcast, go ahead and share it with a friend. Copy the link, text it to a friend. Post it in your group chat. Post it in your Slack groups. Wherever you and your people talk, spread the word. That's how travel continues to grow and continues to reach the right people. While you're at it, if you use Apple Podcast, Go ahead.Rate the podcast, give it a high rating, and leave a review. Tell people why you like the podcast. That helps more people discover the show. Thank you in advance. Talk to you next week.

The first weekend of Coachella is here: Bad Bunny, BLACKPINK, and Frank Ocean will headline for 2023. Coachella is expected to gross well over $100 million with over 100,000+ attendees per day.In this episode, broke it all down withMIDiA Research's Tati Cirisano. Coachella started in 1999 as a niche festival for indie rock and quickly morphed into the biggest brand-name festival in the United States. These days, the Coachella brand is big enough to sell the experience itself, regardless of who's performing — a rarity in the festival business.  Tati and I discuss why that is, the implications, and what the future of Coachella could hold. Here's what we hit on:[1:20] Coachella's brand sells itself[2:19] Festival's origin story[7:09] Advantages and disadvantages of performing at Coachella[9:09] Success by the numbers[11:28] Coachella bump for brands, influencers, and local economy[16:38] Untapped opportunities for future Coachellas[22:02] How individual music show prices influence festival attendance[24:22] Artists that are above playing Coachella[27:08] The festival that's the antithesis of Coachella [31:10] Festival lineups becoming homogeneous [39:36] Predicting Coachella's 2024 headlinersListen: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | SoundCloud | Stitcher | Overcast | Amazon | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | RSSHost: Dan Runcie, @RuncieDan, trapital.coGuests: Tati Cirisano, @tatianacirisanoEnjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of music, media and culture. Learn more by reading Trapital's free memo.TRANSCRIPT[00:00:00] Tati Cirisano: Being a performer at Coachella has become almost like a badge of honor or like something that goes on your one sheet, you know what I mean? Like, it's something that like gives you leverage as an artist and also is just, I don't know, seen as like it has a certain level of prestige.Like I would compare headlining at Coachella to like, in the same way that a lot of artists would love to get like a rolling stone or a billboard cover, even if like, regardless of whether that's selling or regardless of what that does, just that as a concept has, is just something that's like on a bucket list for most artists.I feel like headlining Coachella, if you're someone who's trying to be a superstar, that's like a bucket list item too. So yeah, it's, interesting How entrenched this festival has become in the music industry when you really think about it.[00:00:43] Dan Runcie Intro: Hey, welcome to the Trapital Podcast. I'm your host and the founder of Trapital, Dan Runcie. This podcast is your place to gain insights from executives in music, media, entertainment, and more who are taking hip hop culture to the next level.[00:01:25] Dan Runcie Guest Intro: Today's episode is about the business behind Coachella and the unofficial start to music festival season in 2023. Coachella's history is pretty impressive when you think about it. This festival started in 1999. It was announced the week after Woodstock 99, and the shit show that that festival. With just 60 days' notice to then put on this festival that attracted just 25,000 people and ticket prices cost $50 each, and the headliner was Beck and the festival didn't make it money that year.Didn't even make enough to continue in 2000, and it wasn't until its partnership with Golden Voice in 2001 that it was able to get things back on track and slowly build up to the behemoth of a festival that we see today. It's an event that attracts well over a hundred thousand people per day for the six days of the festival itself.Two straight weekends and it attracts some of the biggest artists in the world. And this year they're especially making its footprint scene on the global scene. The headliners include Bad Bunny, Black Pink, Frank Ocean. There's also artists like Burna Boy, Calvin Harris, and many others that are making up this year's lineup.To break it all down, I'm joined by Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research. We talk about what this festival does well, how it's shaped music culture overall, and its broader impact on music festival culture. Here's our breakdown. Hope you enjoy it.[00:02:55] Dan Runcie: All right. Today's episode is all about festivals and the granddaddy of them all, at least in the US, Coachella. We're here to break it down with Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research.Tati, welcome back to the pod.[00:03:09] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, thanks for having me, excited to dive in. [00:03:12] Dan Runcie: Yeah. One of the reasons I wanted to talk about this with you is because I feel like Coachella reminds me of some of the conversations we've had about, a lot of these platforms that they, in many ways have become the bigger brand and the destination than the actual creators on some of these platforms. And I feel like Coachella, at least from a music festival perspective, has some of that because at least in the US this is the most popular music festival.We've seen it expand over the past two decades. And while most music festivals do rely so heavily on their headliners, Coachella is one of the ones that it's still able to, in many ways, capture the same audience and just get a consistent following and culture around it. That doesn't seem like it's stood as dependent on the headliners, but they still get big headliners.So how do you think that shapes the festival and how fans themselves interact withthat festival?[00:04:10] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. I mean, just to like prove out what you're saying, I think, I'm pretty sure Coachella tends to sell out or at least sell a lot of tickets before their headliners are even announced or before the lineup is announced at all. So you're totally right. I think it's become a big enough brand in itself that people are just kind of, ready to buy into it. And I think it's because Coachella has It's kind of created a culture. I remember kind of the celebrity era of Coachella when like, you know, Vanessa Hudgeons was like the queen of Coachella and you could go and run into Rihanna and Paris Hilton and like they kind of created that aesthetic of like the hippie style and all of these things.And so, when people buy a ticket, it's like they're buying into a lifestyle and a culture more so than the music itself. I think a lot of people go for that experience and to dress up and like buy into that, that lifestyle, maybe even more so than the music. and it does seem like Coachella over time, maybe because of that.The lineups have become a little bit more like crowd pleaser and mainstream to me. Like I was looking, just in preparation for this episode, like kind of looking at the history of Coachella and I didn't realize that when it started, part of what Paul Tollett wanted to do was create like a more niche festival where you would bring together like a lot of niche artists and hope that they all have big enough individual following that, you know, putting all that together. Would be enough for a festival. and it seems like the complete opposite today. In many ways like I think Coachella still sometimes tends to have like more left of center artists that line up this year is like super diverse and interesting. But it does seem like they've maybe become a little bit more mainstream over time.And maybe it is because the people are going not as much for the music as they're going for, like the vibe of it all.[00:06:02] Dan Runcie: Yeah, and dating back to that first festival, it's kind of crazy that this even became what it is today because it starts in 1999. They announced this festival and put tickets on sale. I think it was two months before the actual festival started, so not that much time. They announced it the same week or the week after Woodstock 99, which is just a complete shit show, which said so much about where people viewed a festival like this and their headliner was Beck. They didn't make as much money, I wanna say like 25,000 people showed. So they couldn't even have a festival in 2000. They had to wait until the next year and do the partnership with Golden Voice and make it happen.And then, yeah, fast forward to where we are today, where it is mainstream pop artists that are doing it. And what was once this niche culture of people that just really enjoyed indie rock music. It now is this mainstream thing. It almost reminds me of something like Comic-Con in that same way where it was this nerd thing with people that you know wanna do live action, role play, and Dungeons and Dragons, or dress up like Zelda.And now every mainstream celebrity is there to promote their movie.[00:07:19] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. And in the same way, you're going to dress up, you're going to like, kind of put on a costume, Coachella, it is kind of a costume for most people and like have that experience regardless of who's playing.so yeah, I totally agree. And I think the other thing, like over time Coachella has gotten to a place because of all that we're talking about, where it has such a, power on the festival market, like written into its contracts, like it has a radius clause that they get to release their lineup first.They are the first festival of the season, mid-April is like pretty early, so there's also now like I think built in ways that Coachella tends to be kind of the North Star for all of the festivals, and so it's just the one that people are going to regardless of, yeah, regardless of who's playing.[00:08:09] Dan Runcie: Yeah. I also feel like because it has a bit more of that brand and that audience command, regardless of who the artist is, I almost feel like it has a little bit of that Super Bowl effect where artists want to be able to perform on that stage because sure, they may bring some fans themselves, but they're likely gonna be reaching a new audience and having exposure to people that may not necessarily have tapped in general compared to, and I think Coachella is similar, but if you compare that to some of these other festivals that are so heavily reliant on that headliner themself. There's a case to be made that, okay, well if the headliner pulled those fans into the festival, then they have to then share those tickets essentially, you know, soft tickets with everyone else.How does that compare to actual hard tickets that they could have done themselves? So, I feel like there's a Coachella advantage there. [00:09:01] Tati Cirisano: And there's also a disadvantage in that you don't get, I mean, I know that I'm pretty sure already, like the data that you get on who's in your seats at shows is pretty minimal. But when you go to a festival, you don't really know who's going to see the festival for you and you don't really know who dis how many people discovered you or how many people came to your set. It's not the same as like if you sell out an arena, you know, the number of seats that were there, you know what I mean? So that's also an interesting thing is like you are probably getting a greater audience and this artist might be the whole reason the festival is selling tickets, but nobody's actually able to quantify that.[00:09:34] Dan Runcie: Right. And I feel like for some artists too, there's almost a bit of risk mitigation that can come with doing a festival. Risk mitigation may be the wrong word, but I think that's certain artists that have a lot of buzz or may have a lot of fanfare, it may be a lot harder for them to sell hard tickets.But if they could perform in front of this large festival crowd, they get a big advance or they get a big guarantee with the, promoter and through their agent as well, they can feel much more confident performing in front of, you know, thousands of fans or maybe even tens of thousands of fans on stage, even though they may not be able to sell, you know, sell out a house of Blues for instance.[00:10:14] Tati Cirisano: Totally. Yeah. No, and it also feels like being a performer at Coachella has become almost like a badge of honor or like something that goes on your one sheet, you know what I mean? Like, it's something that like gives you leverage as an artist and also is just, I don't know, seen as like it has a certain level of prestige.Like I would compare headlining at Coachella to like, in the same way that a lot of artists would love to get like a rolling stone or a billboard cover, even if like, regardless of whether that's selling or regardless of what that does, just that as a concept has, is just something that's like on a bucket list for most artists.I feel like Coachella headlining Coachella, if you're someone who's trying to be a superstar, that's like a bucket list item too. So yeah, it's, interesting How entrenched this festival has become in the music industry when you really think about it.[00:11:02] Dan Runcie: Yeah, let's look at some of the numbers here, cuz I think that's another fascinating piece. So we don't have hard numbers for this. A lot of it is based on past things that have been shared. But in 2017, this festival grossed to 114 million. And they had around 125,000 people coming per weekend.So if you roughly do the math thing, you look at ticket sales, I feel like that's like just under $500, like per attendee that ends up coming to the festival. And we likely saw similar, maybe even greater as well, because that doesn't take into account sponsorships that doesn't take into account these brand activations and other things as well.And I know that Coachella is a festival that has taken some shit for not paying artists well, at least the artists that are further down that list, that have much smaller font size, I think it's seen as paying the headliners. Well, at least I was talking to, someone that understands the business well, and their estimates were that the headliners this year, so you have Bad Bunny, Black Pink, and Frank Ocean.Their thought was, Frank Ocean and Black Pink got 4 million per weekend, so 8 million total and that Bad Bunny likely got 5 million per weekend. So then 10 total and then I believe that Calvin Harris's name was, towards the bottom of that list, like returned to the desert, Calvin Harris, I think he got one and per weekend. And then the artists that are on let second row, like Burna Boy and a few others, I think it was around like seven 50K per weekend but then it's a steep drop off after that, right? I mean, I remember hearing from Cardi B, this was, you know, after invasion of privacy, but still before, you know, she blew up, blew up. Or maybe it was the year before that, I forget. But she talked about how she was paid 70K, but she saw it as an investment in her career as an opportunity to pull up and get more. And obviously she's someone that you know, is now getting a million dollars. Private shows where she's doing 35 minute sets, but I feel like that like plays into that.So I don't know if all of those artists are getting paid, but yeah, I think some of them are willing to take that because of the exposure. [00:13:14] Tati Cirisano: Right. Yeah, I think you're probably right. And the number that I would love to know is like how much money that, cuz I know you, you were also talking about the boost of the local economy and that I think it was400 million, in Coachella Valley. I'm also wondering, like, even outside of that, just the whole business of it, like you mentioned the sponsorships, the influencer deals, you know, H & M having a Coachella section in their store.Like all of these things, I'm almost more fascinated by all of these kind of like satellite businesses around Coachella than the business of Coachella itself like I would love to know the total number for how much revenue this festival is just kind of generating for all these things outside of it, if that makes sense like, cuz it seems to go so far, like e every store has a festival section in March and you know that what they're really talking about is Coachella.[00:14:06] Dan Runcie: Definitely. Yeah. Like, could we look at, I'm sure they wouldn't share this, but if Forever 21 and H & M and those types of stores shared, how much more do they get from, you know, their festival and attire, whether that's, you know, the flower headdresses or whatever, you know, the crowns and the stuff that people wear or just shut general outfits as well. And then I forget the name of the brand, but there's one of those brands that I'm sure many of them do, but they pay for all the hotels that are in Palm Springs, that are in Indio in the general area, put all the influencers there, buy all the clothes for them, and then buy all their tickets and just have them work almost the same way a reporterwould work the festival. [00:14:47] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. like what is the influencer economy around Coachella specifically? Like how much money is there? I would love to know.[00:14:56] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I feel like, because if you count that, I wouldn't be surprised if you're over a billion, especiallylike just when you count the overall impact for sure. [00:15:05] Tati Cirisano: did you happen to see the price of the first Coachella ticket? When you were doing your research, [00:15:12] Dan Runcie: I saw this a while ago, but I forget now. How much was it? [00:15:16] Tati Cirisano: Guess, guess, [00:15:17] Dan Runcie: oh, guess. Okay. I'm gonna guess it's like $75.[00:15:20] Tati Cirisano: It was $50[00:15:22] Dan Runcie: Oh, wow. [00:15:23] Tati Cirisano: Was and this year's was $550 and that's before, so [00:15:28] Dan Runcie: Wow. Wow. What a come up 50 bucks to see all those artists and then only 20 other 25,000 other people there. Wow, that's something crazy. Yeah. I mean, so 10X there, everything's grown. And then even just the expansion, right? Because I think it was around like 2007 or so that they first went to multi-day, then they went to multiple weekends. Yeah[00:15:51] Tati Cirisano: I wouldn't be shocked if they added a third. I think anything more than a third weekend would be kind of overkill and maybe wouldn't be special anymore, but I actually would not be shocked if they made it a three weekend thing. [00:16:02] Dan Runcie: Yeah, [00:16:02] Tati Cirisano: One of these days. [00:16:04] Dan Runcie: I feel like it, because if you look at the opportunity, we can talk about this now, but if you look at the livestream play that's been happening, they've only been expanding that. So this was the first year that. So YouTube has been partnering to livestream this show since 2011, I believe, but this is the first year that all six stages are now gonna have a dedicated stream.And I think the pattern that we've seen now is you have a artist like Beyonce, she obviously gets the full recording of her show. She then sells that to Netflix for 20 million dollars or however much that deal is, and then she ends up monetizing that. I assume that there's likely some compensation or some participation that Coachella and more broadly golden voice get from that piece of it.But what could the stepped up livestream look like further. I mean, I've watched it in past years and it's nice, but could there ever be a Super Bowl level production that goes into at least some particular part of these artists sets? Because they're clearly putting more and more into it as it does become a big stage and you do have a little bit more flexibility of Yeah, it's not a 13 minute set, it's a hour long thing and the higher the production value, the more fans are gonna wanna see it, the more YouTube can get more ad dollars for it and the more goes to Coachella too.[00:17:26] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, no, I think there's definitely an opportunity for that and not just higher production quality of filming the show, but also when you mentioned the Super Bowl, like having like commentators and doing interviews and there's like know what I mean like there's like a halftime like conversation.I could see there being like hosts and like interviewing fans and things like that. I feel like that's probably happened at festivals before. before. I haven't watched that many festival live streams but I'm trying to remember, like Glastonbury's was really good, this past year and it was everywhere like, because they did such a good job with the live stream. There were clips on every social media app I looked at. It was all over the news. Like it really became this cultural moment.so I think, yeah, I think there's definitely an opportunity to like have a higher quality live stream that people will pay for.I also think on the other end of things, I wonder how much more. Like UGC Live streams will come into play. I was thinking about this because, bill Wordy, who's the former, billboard, like editor-in-chief, he has a newsletter, you probably know, what is it called? Full Write No Cap [00:18:28] Dan Runcie: Full Rate, No cap. [00:18:30] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, he spoke recently, or he wrote recently about how so many Taylor Swift fans are live streaming the entire. concert for the Eras tour on TikTok and on YouTube and getting tips for it. And these streams are like pretty low quality and they're often like from the nosebleeds and you can't even see Taylor, but they're getting like thousands of viewers and people are paying them to do it, and he kind of suggested, like what could the opportunity be here, whether that's artists partnering with TikTok to livestream it or what I think is more interesting maybe is like partnering with creators to do this. If they're already doing it, why not create an infrastructure around it? But then I also don't wanna advocate for like, everybody to be at the show live streaming the entire show and like have their phones in their faces and like I know artists hate that.I know fans hate that, I hate that. So it's an interesting question and I don't know exactly how it would look, but I feel like UGC live streams could come into play like on the opposite end of these, like more high production shows or live streams. [00:19:34] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I think so too because you, of course, there's always gonna be something for the high production quality camera that you see, and even that I still do believe is under monetized to a lot of extent. I mean, we don't have public numbers, but I could just assume based on what you see from sports and other rights.But the UGC thing is huge because I just feel like you could have some unique angle. You're getting the experience yourself. I'd love to know like what those tipping numbers do look like. But yeah, I think it's huge because while a tour. I think there may feel like a less scarce aspect for that, and just in the fact that, yeah, you know, Taylor is only doing this once, but she's doing roughly 50 shows, right?But there's only gonna be two of these times that, at least right now, that Frank Ocean is gonna be doing this headline set and it's, you know, when we release this podcast, it'll be right in this timeframe but like that's it. Like there's scarcity around that people wanna see that they're gonna wanna go back and watch it time and time again.So I think there's something there. I feel like we start to see some of this where, I'm sure you've seen it. Artists are starting to record one of the shows from their concert and then have that as something that you could watch on Amazon or something you can watch on HBO Max or Hulu. So we're seeing some of that, but I still feel like there's an opportunity to get more fan, like even if you get fan views in there and get them, have some type of participation from when the doc ends up getting sold or whatever that is. I feel like there's a few interesting ways to do it.[00:21:04] Tati Cirisano: I mean, I even think about like YouTube reaction videos and how like that's such a huge space of people. For all sorts of things, like listening to the new Taylor Swift album and live reacting, and people watched that and I could see a similar thing at a festival like live reaction to the Frank Ocean Set.And then afterwards you're like telling everyone what you thought. Like again, I don't wanna advocate for more phones at shows, but I feel like people are already doing this and so maybe it's a question of like how to support it and make it a better experience. I don't know.[00:21:36] Dan Runcie: Yeah, it'll be interesting to explore. I feel like the other unique thing about Coachella, we can talk a bit about pricing. You mentioned itself the price is 10X'd in 24 years since the first Coachella. But as this festival becomes more expensive as touring itself, especially to see these headliner type artists becomes more expensive.You talked a lot about, or you mentioned how does that impact the actual experience and how does that impact what fans may wanna do? Like how do they justify buying separate tickets to see just one artist versus being able to see multiple ones in a festival?What are your thoughts on that?[00:22:13] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, no, I mean, I think there's multiple factors kind of pushing toward festivals. Being a kind of solution for a lot of fans today. One is, as I've, you know, shouted from the rooftops in so many of our conversations, like listenership is really fragmenting and people tend to listen to way a wider spread of artists today, making it kind of hard to have a mainstream or a superstar, or harder to have a superstar.And they're also focusing more on songs often than artists. and then on top of that, costs for pretty much everything are skyrocketing. So yeah, if you're someone who listens to a wide range of artists and you're more likely to be, to kind of center your fandom around songs than artists themselves, and you also are not maybe able to afford going to five different shows anymore, why would you not rather go to see a festival?And not that festivals aren't expensive, cuz their enormously expensive, especially when you factor in travel and the outfits like we've talked about and all of these things. But I just given all the trends with, listenership that we're seeing, I feel like festivals will become even more popular for consumers.[00:23:23] Dan Runcie: I also think some of this may shift genre by genre, and to some extent I do look at it. A bit bittersweet to some extent because I look at festivals like, let's look at two of them rolling Loud and this Lovers and Friends Festival that I know had been canceled and I know they, had recently had one rolling loud, of course, is primarily rappers and hip hop artists, lovers and friends is more of that R and B that I think that a lot of millennials and even some,younger Gen X folks grew up with.Because those festivals exist in that same way. It's great to be able to bring those artists together. I do wonder though, has that dynamic hurt any of those artists impact to be able to generate not just real fans that may definitely wanna see them by buying hard tickets, but how does that help them grow the fan base in a way that doesn't make them just reliant on doing, rolling loud and then just getting an upfront check to do that as opposed to the long-term gains that could come from. Okay, yeah, you may not be performing for as big of an audience relative to your social following, but what could that build up to down the road? And I think even for some of these legacy artists that are doing lovers and friends fest, I remember I was talking with someone, about this recently and they were like, yeah, you know, as much as you like lovers and friends fest like t hose artists are the more indirect way, seeing them all the way they do now. [00:24:48] Tati Cirisano: Right, like the festival makes a lot of like on paper, logical sense for consumers, but does it make sense for fandom? Like is it actually helping artists nurture fan bases or is it just feeding more into what I was saying about, you know, a lot of people just kind of listening to songs and not artists So yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense and a lot of these artists that are playing. Those smaller, more niche festivals are playing a ton of them. And if it's like Megan Thee Stallion is playing at 10 different festivals, why are you going to buy a ticket to her tour? Like, I think it could kind of cannibalize some of those sales or like diminish people's interests in, going to the tour as well, or maybe they go and they're like, oh my God, Megan was incredible during her shorter set. I want to go see her on tour like, I don't know, maybe it, goes both ways, but I do think that we might see more and more of those smaller and more niche festivals for all of the reasons that I've mentioned.Like I think we've seen more and more, there's so many nostalgia festivals now there's so many, like speaking to a very specific scene, like, I forget what it's called, but there was one that was almost like, it was kind of like emo night, but as a festival, like I think we're, I think we're probably gonna see even more of that, and those are gonna be the ones that don't cost you, you know, two grand to go to Coachella. and it's maybe a little bit more accessible. so yeah, I think, I think we're probably gonna see more of those type of niche ones.[00:26:14] Dan Runcie: Do you think that there's certain artists that don't need Coachella? I know we talked about how it's beneficial for headliners, but I thought a lot about the weekend doing Coachella last year, and he was a late edition, Travis Scott was supposed to be the headliner, but after Astroworld and the tragedy there, he didn't do it the weekend does it?The weekend already had this tour planned. He did that tour in Southern California, he had still performed at SoFi Stadium later on that year. I don't know how the radius and the timeframe works out there, but I'm sure there must have been enough time there. But I wonder if, okay, beyond the $8 million, we could assume that he got from that.I mean, that's roughly what he would make from one of these stadium rougnights that he would do on his own tour. Did that benefit him in the same way? I don't know. I mean, I think I can clearly see the benefit for Black Pink or even Bad Buddy and others where, hey, this is a statement. You're here on one of the biggest stages we have in the US and you aren't from this country and you don't live here.There's a big, influence that that can have, but does it make sense for the weekend, right? I know that people have often talked about when would Taylor Swift do it, and whether that's talking about the Super Bowl or even Coachella, but even if we just talk about Coachella even if you paid Taylor 10 million dollars or 12 million dollars, is that going to be more beneficial for her when she can sell out football stadiums herself doing her own thing?So[00:27:47] Tati Cirisano: Right. It's been more important for Coachella than it is for Taylor Swift. to be at Coachella, I guess.[00:27:54] Dan Runcie: I would think so, because I mean, on one hand, yes, we know Coachella is gonna sell out regardless, but they could get more of those fans that may do participate in other, you know, economic, you know, aspects of the festival.[00:28:08] Tati Cirisano: Totally. Yeah. And they have more control over things and everything. Yeah, I think, you're right, for an artist like The Weeknd or Taylor Swift, it's probably more about like checking off that bucket list item or like having that prestige of performing at Coachella than it is like a material benefit.I think you're probably right to question that, but then you're right. for an artist like Black Pink, it means a lot more and is probably a lot more impactful in terms of like revenue and fan building and things like that.[00:28:35] Dan Runcie: Another topic you brought up about festivals right before we had started recording, you're talking about a festival you had went to recently in Knoxville, Tennessee, and it was spread out across different music venues in the city itself. And you also said you're done with festivals on festival grounds.So can you talk a little bit about that? Cuz I think that could be interesting to dig into a bit.[00:29:01] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, no, it was perfect timing to do this episode because I went to the antithesis of Coachella last weekend, which is, a festival called Big Ears in Knoxville, Tennessee it was a 10 year anniversary of this festival and in terms of the types of performers there, it was a lot of kind of like experimental and independent and folk music, instrumental artists, like Sun Ra Arkestra was one of the performers.I also, my favorite performer was a rock band from Niger called Atron Delea, like it was all these kind of like from all over artists and so that was one part of it that was cool. It was very niche and it was very much a scene, kind of like I'm talking about having these like more niche scene oriented festivals and it was held across the venues in Knoxville, of which there are like, 10 or 15, and they're all about a 10 minute walk from each other.And they also had performances in movie theaters and in cathedrals and in these sort of like non-traditional spaces and. It was just such a more enjoyable experience to me than being locked in a pen in like a parking lot and like, you know, having to pay $10 for water and like feeling very Lord of the Flies for 12 hours like, it was such a better experience and it also struck me how much it could be, you know, a big thing for the venues in that area. It's a big thing for the community and for the culture of the city, like, I don't think you could like turn Coachella into a festival, like across the venues in LA or like New York or something like, I don't think it would work for something at that scale, but it did make me think that, there could be more of, I think, and I'm sure that there are, I'm sure others exist, but that there could be more of these types of festivals that are a bit smaller, a bit more niche, and are held in a city.And you're also bringing the music to consumers rather than people having to travel to someplace like LA like just having these festivals in smaller cities. I just think there's a big opportunity there and also just to innovate the festival experience in general. Like, why do we have to be, you know, in a parking lot and, you know, all that kind of stuff.There's been better. Innovations in like, like I know the food at festivals has gotten a lot better over time. It used to be like frozen pizza was like your only option, and now there's like crazy food tents. But yeah, it just got me thinking about like how to innovate the festival experience and what the future of things looks like.[00:31:23] Dan Runcie: That's a good point because it makes me think of the film festival variety that we see where there's different vibes, but a lot of it is based in existing venues, and it does bring a bit more traffic in general activity to that area, but it's a bit of a different experience, right? Whether it's, you know, Tribeca or even here in San Francisco or in Sundance, I mean you could also get a little bit of a different vibe too, where, okay, if you wanna go skiing in Park City, then you can go to Sundance in January, right? If you want to go on the French Riviera afterward, you can go to Cannes like there's so many different vibes, but I feel like in general, when people think of music festivals, it is wearing that Coachella outfit and being somewhere in an open field with not a lot of shade and, you know, like that type of thing. So I feel like it couldn't then, yeah, it could just bring a little bit more variety to some of these things. And the fact that it already exists is good, but it could probably bring a bit more, you know, boom, to some of these other areas that may want something unique and ideally, if they're not overlapping on headliners, which is another thing that I know is an ongoing challenge with these festivals. I feel like when Outkast did their whole festival run where I forgot how many they did in 2014, that was the first year that stuck out to me where I was like, oh, some of these artists are just going boom, boom, boom.Same festival. Same festival. So you have that some artists that would do it in the same years, but then you also have some artists that will just come back and do the same festival time and time again, and it really isn't that much different.What are your thoughts on that? [00:33:02] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. I wanna say one more thing about the big years thing, really quick before that question, which is, how that kind of festival could expand the audience, like the tam of festival goers like I would say about half of the people at Big Year's were 55 plus, these are not people that are going to Coachella, you know, like, I mean, maybe they are, but I, I think there's other demographics and other age groups that would enjoy going to a festival if there was a bit of a different experience.So I feel like there's a lot of groups that were not hitting with the traditional festival market. and like this venue model could be kind of like that. but yeah, in terms of festival lineups getting a lot more homogenous, I kind of can't help but attribute it to the fragmentation trend that we've been talking about and how much harder it is to create a new mainstream superstar today. Like, y eah, I think that a lot of festivals are finding it harder and harder to find these kind of crowd pleasingheadline acts and there aren't as many new ones coming up. And it also seems like, festivals are kind of continuing to dip into these legacy acts from times when the industry was less congested and less fragmented like the Glastonbury lineup, it's Yeah, Arctic Monkeys, Elton John and Guns N' Roses. And it's like this could be the lineup a decade ago. So it does feel like not only are festival lineups becoming more homogenous, but a lot of them are tending to book legacy acts rather than newer, mainstream stars. Maybe because there aren't as many newer mainstream stars, I don't know.[00:34:43] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I think that, that headline spot is probably where some of, I don't even wanna say contention, but some of that decision making can lie in, maybe a lot of this applies to festivals that aren't like Coachella a bit because they are a bit more reliant on the headliners themselves, and because of that, they're more likely to make, what they feel is safer picks and unfortunately, a lot of these safer picks end up being more male, more white, and more legacy acts that have likely been there before. So if they're like, okay, well we knew that Arctic Monkeys were, you know, huge in 2012, then let's bring them back in so we can try to command some of that same audience that is like, well, you also have local stars and others around the world that don't fit into those same categories that could do it. But they feel like that's a risk, unfortunately, and then if they do invite those folks, it's for less money and their name is smaller and they're not presented as a headliner in the same way. So I think that's one of the downsides of it.And the fact, I think fragmentation plays into this, cuz I think, you know, regardless of who you are, it has just become even harder to have artists break out. The artists that do break out, they're more likely to maybe break out within their particular region. It's harder to have that same global appeal in that same way and I think we've seen maybe a few outlier examples of that more recently.Especially when you look at Coachella's lineup this year with Burna Boy and Black Pink and Bad Bunny all having prominent placement in their festival. I'm curious what that looks like in future years. How do you maintain that? Because even from that perspective, yeah, there's other artists that are huge, but they've already kind of gotten some of the biggest ones that we've at least had at this particular moment.But there's others. I'm curious. I forget if Dual Lipa has headlined one of the big, huge festivals in the world, I don't think she has yet, right?[00:36:41] Tati Cirisano: That's a good question. She hasn't headlined Coachella, she definitely had a big set at Glastonbury, but I don't know if she headlined. I don't know. [00:36:48] Dan Runcie: Right. Yeah. I feel like that may have been a few years ago, but I forget if that was like before or after, [00:36:53] Tati Cirisano: Oh yeah. [00:36:53] Dan Runcie: of Nostalgia tour and then after that, just thinking of other artists that have gotten huge in the past recent years, whether you have Billy Eilish or SZA, I mean, there's a few but.I'd be interested to see whether or not those names have become headliners, maybe we're seeing some of these festivals do this now, where outside Lasnier, which is, you know, right here in my backyard of San Francisco, their most recent poster. Instead of having three headliners, one per day, they have 10 artists that have big font size names, and then they have the other 60 or 70 that all have, you know, smaller, but it's all kind of the same.And, you know, you just look at the names of these artists. I'll just say right now for outside Lasnier, Kendrick Lamar, Foo Fighters, Odessa, Lana Del Ray, the 1975, Megan Thee Stallion, Zed, Janelle Monáe, Maggie Rogers, and Fisher. and I mean, I'm, I'm not shy to be mean, I'm not trying to call anyone out, but there's certain artists on that I just mentioned there that would not headline outside lands if it was presented as, oh, these are the three headliners. And they may not even be on that second row either, but. Is that in some way reflective of where things are, where it may make it easier, and of course you could probably guess based on the order of those names, Kendrick Lamar's name is at the top, you know, of this list. But still like, is this some type of reflection of this fragmentation where you have all these different genres, most of these artists, more modern, current artists, except for, you know, Foo Fighters, a bit more legacy that has continued to play on but I wonder how often we'll see that with other festivals that are maybe closer to outside lands and Coachella where, you know, still a major huge festival, but they're not getting the same headliners that Coachella is.[00:38:42] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. No, I think, you're absolutely right and I think we're gonna see that type of lineup more, at the same time as we're seeing that, there are fewer of these like Beyonce level mainstream stars, we're seeing a growth in the middle tier. We're seeing a lot more of these like, cult stars and also artists on that list who are huge but aren't really at the level of, you know, some of like Madonna or you know, these artists of the past, these icons of the past.So I think it makes more sense rather than having, you know, three headliners to have like six, not as huge artists still have a really big following. I think that makes a lot more sense, for the festival, the people going, and I think we will start to see more of that just because of the way that fragmentation is playing out.Yeah. I also wonder, when we're gonna start to see like the millennial version of legacy artists start to perform, like, was funny when I saw like the lovers and friends line up, I was like, oh my God. when you start getting an nostalgia festival marketed to you, that's when you know you're getting old.That's when you know you're no longer like the youngest And like, I wonder, when we'll start to maybe tap into like 90s and 2000s era. Sort of icons, like I would love to see like Missy Elliot headline, Coachella, like that type of thing. And I wonder if that's gonna be like the next step once we've exhausted all the times that like Foo Fighters can possibly headline a festival [00:40:09] Dan Runcie: I know, right? Like [00:40:10] Tati Cirisano: Who are also that era but, you know, what I mean, like. [00:40:13] Dan Runcie: For sure. For sure. Yeah, because I feel like we saw. Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg were headliners maybe around 10 years ago, and then they had brought, the Tupac hologram out infamously. You remember that? So, we did have that. And of course, you know, that kind of reminds me of the Super Bowl that, from a couple years ago.But I do feel like there's a sweet spot there, given. Where Usher is right now, the popularity of his residency, I wouldn't be surprised if he jumps back on this circuit and he's doing less of the lovers and friends and he's doing more of the headlining major music festivals [00:40:49] Tati Cirisano: He would be amazing. [00:40:50] Dan Runcie: There's a huge opportunity there.Yeah. Great performer. I think he still does great stuff. I wanted to see if I can go make it to Vegas to go catch this, residency before it ends. But yeah, I I think that there is a sweet spot there for that. I mean, you think about other artists, I think Justin Timberlake has probably done some of these already, so we've seen him do them.I don't know if Britney Spears would probably perform in that same way. But we'll see. I feel like there's a number of artists that they can tap into from that era.[00:41:18] Tati Cirisano: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. [00:41:21] Dan Runcie: And yeah. I guess before we wrap things up, are there any predictions you have then for let's predict what 2024 would look like? Three headliners. Who would you think would most likely be a headliner for Coachella 2024? [00:41:37] Tati Cirisano: I would say SZA, probably, I would say Dua Lipa I think she makes a lot of sense as a headliner too, just in terms of like how, I hate like, I don't wanna say like crowd pleasing or mainstream, but like, cause I feel like that sounds like I'm giving her shade and I'm not. I think she's incredibly talented, but like she would please a, a big swath of people with her music and she's a cool performer and she has some time now, I think, since she's not touring. but, okay. So Du Lipa, SZA, This is about to be an all female headliners. This is a bit of wishful thinking, but I would love to see, cause I don't know if she's ready for this yet, but I would love to see Rosalia, headline Coachella.I think she's getting there and I actually saw her in 2019 at Coachella. She was playing the tiniest stage ever and she treated it like she was in a stadium. Like the production quality and the dancers and just like everything she put into it was incredible. And she's risen a lot over the past few years.So, yeah, that's my trio.[00:42:35] Dan Runcie: Nice. Nice. All right. We have one in common. We have SZA, so I'm gonna go SZA, Madonna, and Usher. I think that's gonna be my prediction, I feel like, Madonna has this tour coming up. Maybe she'll cap things off with a Coachella performance. But I feel like yeah, if you're gonna have this tour, I forget the name of it, you're gonna go back through all her eras.I feel like there's something unique there, so, so, yeah. I know, I know. And we'll have to revisit this. We still have a number of festival lineups to get announced this year, so we'll have to check back in and see how do these continue to develop, what continues to shape in how these festivals continue to evolve over time.So tati, this was great. Thanks for coming on.[00:43:17] Tati Cirisano: Yeah, Thanks for having me. Oh, it's a pleasure.[00:43:19] Dan Runcie: Yeah.[00:43:20] Dan Runcie Outro: If you enjoyed this podcast, go ahead and share it with a friend. Copy the link, text it to a friend, post it in your group chat. Post it in your Slack groups. Wherever you and your people talk, spread the word. That's how capital continues to grow and continues to reach the right people. And while you're at it, if you use Apple Podcast, Go ahead.Rate the podcast, give it a high rating, and leave a review. Tell people why you like the podcast. That helps more people discover the show. Thank you in advance. Talk to you next week.

Episode seven of the Playable Futures podcast turns its attention to the future of game consumption, and the shift in the dynamic between user, creator and platform. The result was a wide-ranging, insightful conversation between two brilliant guests – Stephanie King, Chief Administrative and Legal Officer and Playco, and Karol Severin, Senior analyst, VP of data, and Co-Founder at MIDiA Research. Both brought robust analysis and fascinating data – and a lot of vibrancy and infectious  Through their conversation, what becomes clear is that today's gamers are bombarded with more choices than ever – and yet we all only have 24 hours in one day. The attention economy is a place of more movement than ever before. Publishers and developers will increasingly need to have agile tactics in order to take their games to players, rather than work to bring users to platforms. Their episode's conversation also covers themes that are commonly preoccupying the sector at the moment – saturation and discoverability, for example – but with a realistic and enthusiastic outlook on how things will develop in the future. King and Severin discuss games as collected shared experiences; games as identifiers for tribes; and escape versus connection.  The Playable Futures Podcast accompanies Playable Futures, a collection of insights, interviews and articles from global games leaders sharing their visions of where the industry and medium will go next. A series of ten articles so far have been published on GamesIndustry.biz, with more planned. Playable Futures is a collaborative project brought to you in partnership with GI.biz, UKIE and Diva. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's episode is a two-parter. Part 1 is on Spotify and YouTube's billion streams and views playlists. After reviewing both lists, there's a lot to learn about the streaming era and the strategy for both platforms respectively. I broke it all down with Tati Cirsiano, a music analyst at MIDiA Research.Spotify's list is more reflective of passive consumption. Spotify's top-performing songs are more correlated with radio hits than YouTube, which is a more active consumption experience.YouTube's Billion Views Club has more international stars than Spotify. With streaming continuing to grow across the world and plateauing in the United States, YouTube's list more reflects future music consumption. Part 2 is with Glenn Peoples from Billboard. We talk about its new Global Music Index that takes the publicly traded stocks from the biggest music companies in music to give an overall picture of stock performance for the industry. Here's everything Tati, Glenn, and I covered on the show:[3:03] Immediate takeaways from each Billions Club playlists[5:15] How “meme traffic” impacted both platforms[9:37] Passive consumption vs. active consumption[12:11] International differences between Spotify and YouTube[14:57] The Justin Bieber conundrum [16:36] How Spotify and YouTube enable fragmentation of fandom[21:26] Gym-going and seasonality's impact on streaming numbers[26:14] Short-form videos eventual effect on YouTube streaming[27:55] YouTube vs. Spotify competition intensifying [35:58] MIDiA's upcoming predictions report[38:33] What % of the Global Music index Spotify takes up[39:23] Why music industry stocks fell further than the overall market[46:25] Streaming platforms increasing prices[50:22] What goes into calculating Average Revenue Per User for Spotify[55:23] Spotify's podcast strategy & acquisitions[59:18] How much of Trapital's audience comes from Spotify[1:02:53] Why TikTok should launch it's own streaming service[1:09:39] What Glenn expects 2023 to look likeListen: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | SoundCloud | Stitcher | Overcast | Amazon | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | RSSHost: Dan Runcie, @RuncieDan, trapital.coGuests: Tati Cirisano, @tatianacirisano, Glenn Peoples, @theglennpeoples Download The Culture Report here: https://trapital.ck.page/a23b7a6a4aSponsors:MoonPay is the leader in web3 infrastructure. They have partnered with Timbaland, Snoop Dogg, and many more. To learn more, visit moonpay.com/trapitalEnjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapitalTrapital is home for the business of hip-hop. Gain the latest insights from hip-hop's biggest players by reading Trapital's free weekly memo.TRANSCRIPTION[00:00:00] Tatiana Cirisano: Spotify's list is more of an accurate reflection of what the passive majority listens to, whereas YouTube is more of a reflection of what people are actively fans of and actively engaging, which is interesting because that was a question that we asked in our last episode where we were like, how do we measure, like, what are new ways to measure consumption? And I said, well, it'd be interesting if we could actually measure, you know, active consumption versus passive. And now here I'm looking at these two lists, I was like, oh, this is actually potentially an example of that.[00:00:37] Dan Runcie: Hey, welcome to The Trapital podcast. I'm your host and the founder of Trapital, Dan Runcie. This podcast is your place to gain insights from executives in music, media, entertainment, and more, who are taking hip-hop culture to the next level. [00:00:57] Dan Runcie: Today's episode is a two-parter. We normally don't do two-parters, but these topics were so closely linked, it made perfect sense, so we had to do it. The first part of this episode is a conversation I had with Tati Cirisano from MIDiA Research, and we talked about the Billions Clubs. Spotify and YouTube both have their respective playlists that have over a billion streams and views respectively. So we talked about what can we learn from both of these playlists together. What does it tell us about the most popular songs that do well on streaming, but also what can it tell us about these two platforms individually? What are the differences between the two playlists? Are there certain songs that perform better on others versus that and why? And what that means more broadly for the sector, Just given how big these companies are. Second part of the conversation, I talked to Glen Peoples who works for Billboard, and he recently released this Global Music Index, which is a value-based index that takes the publicly traded stocks from many of the biggest companies in music, combines them, and gives us an overall picture of how we can look at the performance of the music industry, at least in the publicly traded companies. Hint, it's been a down year for stocks overall, so nothing too surprising there. But we talk specifically about Spotify, who stock is noticeably in a tougher place, at least from, where it was year to date compared to some of the other companies. So we talked about why that is, what to expect, and more. Really great conversations. Let's start things off with Tati. Hope you enjoy it. [00:02:31] Dan Runcie: All right. Today we have Tati Cirisano back with us from MIDiA Research and we're going to dive into the Billions playlists that are both from Spotify and YouTube. What a fascinating list that's like a tripped-out memory lane, telling you what songs are popular, but also how these lists are different. I feel like they both have somewhere between like 3 to 400 songs, but there's a whole bunch of different trends here. I know that we both have a bunch of notes here, but Tati, I'll start with you. What stuck out to you most when you were looking through these lists? [00:03:03] Tatiana Cirisano: Oh my gosh. So there's so many things. I guess I'll start with the things that stuck out to me that don't have to do with differences, but just stuck out to me in terms of just looking at both. And one was that I felt like there was definitely a dominance of songs and artists from the last decade and maybe even just the last five years, which was interesting to me because there's been such a debate recently about is old music or what we call catalog, which is often not actually old music. But is it sort of cannibalizing new music? Does new music have more to compete with? And that whole argument. So it was interesting to see that there actually weren't that many or weren't relatively as many older songs. I believe the YouTube Billion Views Club had, like, one song from the 70s. It makes more sense with YouTube. And I think YouTube had even more dominance with more recent songs. And that kind of makes sense because if it's visual-based, maybe some of these songs we don't have the music videos, or maybe they're not as good. But I thought that that was interesting just off the bat from both ways. [00:04:03] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I would agree. I think that YouTube's list did trend much younger, and there's a whole MTV effect of just what music videos look like then and now. But I also feel like what's important is with both Spotify and YouTube, that when these platforms accelerated in growth, a lot of the artists that were releasing music around those times accelerated and growth too. And I feel like I saw some trends there. If I think about YouTube and its rapid growth phase more so in the early 2010s. There were a few songs there that I saw, whether it was like a party rock anthem or songs like that, that streamed really well on YouTube. Still nowhere near a billion streams on Spotify. And I think on the flip side of that, on Spotify, there were a few songs that were in that late 2010s era when Spotify was in its rapid growth phase that weren't on YouTube's playlist. So that was one of those interesting things. Like, for example, I think Drake's song Nice for What, a billion streams on Spotify. It's in the Billions Club, but it wasn't on YouTube's list. And I remember that music video, I think it's at the skating rink and he has, like, Issa Rae and all these people in it. So there was definitely some influence of the platforms too. [00:05:15] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah. And that reminds me, too, of with the influence of platforms, it felt like, there were, so okay on both platforms. I felt like there were a lot of songs that were driven by, like, a viral hit or a novelty, which kind of just goes to show how embedded music has become in, like, meme culture and social media and just like online culture in general. But it also, like, looking at the differences within that, it felt like, this is like, I mean, you'd need to do more of a real, like, study and look at the actual numbers on this, but just from scrolling over the list, it seemed like, more of the TikTok traffic is going to Spotify. Like, there were a lot of songs that had a billion streams that I just remember being moments on TikTok, like Dreams and the Roses, Imanbek remix, like those songs and many others had passed a billion streams on Spotify, but had not cracked the YouTube list. And then on the flip side, YouTube had a lot of stuff that was more, like, just these, memes about, I'm trying to think of an example, like the Dame tu Cosita song and video, like that. There were actually an abundance of songs on the Billion Views Club for YouTube that were linked to these videos, including Crazy Frog. [00:06:24] Dan Runcie: I saw that. [00:06:25] Tatiana Cirisano: It like that was just, like, that was a moment in time in meme culture that kind of preceded TikTok humor. I don't know, like you can almost track meme culture's impact based on these two platforms lists as well with TikTok driving more traffic to Spotify and sort of the old, almost like Vine humor going more to YouTube. [00:06:45] Dan Runcie: That point makes me think of two things I also saw as well. So I believe the first YouTube video that hit a billion streams was Psy's Gangnam Style. I don't think that song has a billion streams or anywhere close to that on Spotify's list, which I think speaks to your point about just the visual nature of that. And that of course is a pre-TikTok era. The other song I think that lines up with this a bit, and this is because of memes within the music video itself is Nelly and Kelly Rowland's Dilemma music video. That is the most popular YouTube video that Nelly has, and I'm pretty sure that Kelly Rowland likely has too. And it's because of this one scene in the music video where Kelly is texting on this 2002's phone and she has Microsoft Excel open, and that's what she's actually using to text. So they're both, you know, generating money. And Kelly was even talking about an interview semi-recently talking about, I didn't even know what Microsoft Excel was. They just told me to type. But over time, and now we obviously have a different relationship with texting. That type of event can blow up on YouTube in a way that not necessarily going to Spotify. [00:07:54] Tatiana Cirisano: Right. Like, there's an inherent difference in just what you're going to do on these platforms. Like, there's a number of reasons why you might look up a music video on YouTube. Maybe you like the song, maybe there's a celebrity cameo, maybe somebody told you that. It's a crazy, wild video and you're just curious. Like, there's a lot more reasons I think than there are reasons why you would stream a song. So that just by definition kind of opens up a lot of differences in these lists. [00:08:18] Dan Runcie: The other thing, too, that you mentioned earlier was the decades and how YouTube's list only had one song that I think that was before 1980 and there was only a handful even from the 80s and the 90s as well. And while Spotify had a bit more, I still think it was quite less. Last time I looked at Spotify's list, it was less than 10% of the 300-plus songs that were more than 20 years old. And I have to assume YouTube may be even closer to 94-96%. Part of that, I think, as you mentioned, is music videos, but I also wonder is part of it with Spotify having a bit more of a close link to radio play and just things that were popular on the radio at the time. Like for instance, a song like Goo Goo Doll's, Iris, that was on Spotify's list is not on YouTube's list. I don't necessarily think the song had like a memorable music video necessarily, but I think it's the audio of it, it makes people think of, you know, what was that movie that it was in? I'm trying to remember the movie that it was in. It'll come to me, but there was some 90s movie that was in, I'm drawing a blank on it right now. Oh, City of Angels. So it was in that, and then, but I just don't think that people, like, recognized the music video they would like, it wasn't necessarily this big, like TRL hit the way that like a boy band song was. [00:09:37] Tatiana Cirisano: I noticed the same thing where looking over Spotify's list, it felt very much like just a list of every radio hit of the past 10 or 20 years that it was really, really tied to that. And I wonder, like, this kind of brings me to another thing that I wanted to talk to you about with this, which is how my sort of theory with another reason that these are different is that Spotify's list is more of an accurate reflection of what the passive majority listens to, whereas YouTube is more of a reflection of what people are actively fans of and actively engaging, which is interesting because that was a question that we asked in our last episode where we were like, how do we measure, like, what are new ways to measure consumption? And I said, well, it'd be interesting if we could actually measure, you know, active consumption versus passive. And now here I'm looking at these two lists, I was like, oh, this is actually potentially an example of that. And the other reason that came to me is because at MIDiA, we've recently done a report on looking at different types of entertainment and how much of consumption is in the background of another activity versus focused. And YouTube, like, people that watch music videos on YouTube are much more likely to be doing that as a focused activity in the foreground rather than something in the background, which makes sense because it's visual, there's, you know, social features to it, et cetera whereas they're a lot more likely to just put on their Spotify music in the background of something else. So I wonder if that's also part of the reason that Spotify seems to have more of a tie to radio and those songs that were just kind of popular for everyone whereas YouTube is more what are the songs and artists and videos that people are like engaging with.[00:11:09] Dan Runcie: That's a good point. It makes me think, well, on the YouTube side, I'm much more likely to listen to a YouTube playlist run, right? Like, I normally don't do that when I'm watching YouTube. I know YouTube has playlist, but I'm more likely to put a Spotify playlist on, which speaks to that. And I know some of the stuff that you've researched and the team has researched on MIDiA as well, is just this whole nature of probably a bit more on the digital stream provider side, but how to measure active versus passive engagement of, or actually listening to a song. And maybe this is a closer way to get a gauge for that because, you know, especially when these artists have these big week sales that'll come out and we'll see the numbers come through, it would be great to know, okay, how many people said yes, I want to listen to this Taylor Swift song from the Midnights album as opposed to people being like, oh, it just happened to be what's dominating today's top hits or if I'm listening to, you know, the number 50 or the top 50 songs in the US. These are the ones that happen to play. [00:12:11] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, yeah. That makes total sense. And I think the other reason why Spotify's list probably is more tied to radio is because it's a lot more, like the user base is less international than YouTube 'cause that was the biggest difference, looking at the two lists was just how few internet, like non-Western artists there were on Spotify's Billions Club versus YouTube's. [00:12:36] Dan Runcie: That stuck out too. And I think YouTube as well also had a list of artists that had the most Billion Views Club songs were and artists like Ozuna were high up on that list. I want to say he had at least 10 videos on YouTube that hit a billion. But on Spotify, it's far less. I think J Balvin was another one too, where there was a big discrepancy there. And yeah, I think the fact that YouTube has had much more of a market share and in general listenership in these regions outside of, you know, US and Western Europe as opposed to YouTube. So maybe part of that, where it's a signal of like, okay, this is where Spotify's clearly trying to grow and has been trying to get more share in. So, like, if Spotify achieved its goal, then it likely would have more of that and vice versa.[00:13:28] Tatiana Cirisano: Right. And then it is YouTube's sort of a more accurate representation of, like, what the music landscape of the future looks like in that way where it will be less dominated probably by Western artists. As you know, streaming sort of infiltrates all these other places. And that is so interesting for, like, the fragmentation conversation that we've been having because it means things are just further fractured and, you know, there's going to be lots of artists and songs on these lists that we've probably never heard of. Like, it was so interesting to me because part of the, like, excitement that I had to do this little project of, like, opening the two and comparing them was, I was excited to be surprised. I was like, I want to see what things are on the list that I'm like, I have never heard of that. Or what is that? How did that end up here? And I did not have that moment once looking at Spotify's playlist. But looking at YouTube's, there were so many videos and so many artists that I just had never heard of, and that was exciting to me. So I wonder how much that's a product of YouTube specifically versus that being what will happen inevitably when streaming is more widespread.[00:14:34] Dan Runcie: And were most of the surprises that you had, were most of them from an international perspective, or were there any Western-based music surprises? [00:14:43] Tatiana Cirisano: That's a good question. There were definitely a handful of Western ones that I can't think of right now, but the majority were probably just artists I'd never heard of or songs, yeah, artists I didn't know anything about that had billions and billions of views. Yeah, I don't know. Let me think about that. [00:14:57] Dan Runcie: Yeah. While you're thinking about that, one thing that stuck out to me was there were certain artists that I think surprised me both in a way of, oh, I thought there would've been more here, or there were actually a bit less here. One artist is Justin Bieber. So I know that Justin Bieber is very popular, but if you would've asked me who were the biggest artists of the 2010s, I probably would name four names, maybe even five names before I named his name. But if you look at, even if you're just looking at Western artists, the artist that is the one with the most songs on Spotify and the one that I believe has the most songs on YouTube as well, Justin Bieber is in the top three of both of those lists. I believe it's at least nine songs on Spotify and at least maybe 10 or so on YouTube. And there's something about that fandom that I didn't necessarily, I mean, I knew that he was huge. I knew that there were so many songs that were quite popular, especially the album that had, like, Sorry, and Love Yourself. Like, that one was huge, but I thought that there were other artists, like for instance, an artist like Beyoncé or even someone like Taylor Swift, who, I don't believe that Beyoncé had a song on the YouTube list at all, or a song that's really close to that. And at least up to now, I don't think that Taylor Swift has a song on Spotify's Billions List. I think that Blank Space will probably get there eventually, but I don't think she has a song this moment that's on that list. So to see the two of them who I think a lot of people largely think are two of the largest musicians in of the past decade, but to see someone like Bieber just have hit after hit on both of these lists, I was like, wow.[00:16:36]Tatiana Cirisano:That's so interesting, the Justin Bieber conundrum of all of this. Okay, I have a couple of thoughts on that. I think, so he was sort of Made on YouTube, right? That's where he started posting clips. That's where he was discovered. And I think something else that this ties into that I wanted to bring up is how, with YouTube, the artists that reach these Billion Views Club, I think probably are more likely to have sort of built a community on YouTube which Justin Bieber did, and that was kind of like the roots of his fandom. So when I was reading YouTube's, like, blog about the Billion Views Club, and there were a bunch of artists' quotes, and a lot of them had to do with the artist saying, you know, like, YouTube was a place to build a community. And Alan Walker was one of the artists who said that. And he was someone who, he's an electronic music artist who when I was looking at the YouTube Billions Views Club, he came up again and again and I was like, it seemed random to me because he's a great artist. He has a big community of fans, but I just didn't think that he would have billions of views. But he seems to credit the community aspect for that. So I think that could be part of it. But then as soon as you said, oh but he's also one of the top artists on Spotify, I'm like, okay, but that's a completely different story because there's no community building on Spotify. So is it just that the fans are, that obsessed with the music that they're, you know, maybe migrating over and streaming there as well, or are we just misremembering, you know, how big of an impact Justin Bieber had? And then that brought me to thinking about how, I mean I think this relates to Taylor as well, but they both built their fan bases at a time when things were just kind of a lot less congested. So I think it was in many ways, easier to get a billion views or billion streams on something a couple of years ago than it is now, now that people's tastes are so fragmented. So maybe that's also part of the reason why, like, I wonder how many of those streams came from, you know, pre-2015 or something versus from then on. I wonder when they were accumulated. So yeah, that's sort of my rant of thoughts. [00:18:41] Dan Runcie: That one about Bieber is a good one because I didn't think about that, but I think it's absolutely right. He was doing all those cover songs of all these other artists when he's like a teenager. He's growing the base there. And to the point that you had brought up in an article a couple of months ago, we talked about the last time we're on the podcast, he is in a different category than someone like a Beyoncé or Taylor Swift. Like, when Taylor made Teardrops On My G uitar. I don't even like, that was probably around the same time that YouTube started. Like in some ways her fandom predated so much of what people know as music. And of course, Beyonce became a solo artist from Destiny's Child well before YouTube even started. So I think that's a good point there with some of it. The Spotify thing though is interesting, yeah. I mean, I think those songs did get a lot of radio play as well. Like everything off of that album, that Bieber's album that Sorry came on as well. Like, they got a ton of radio plays. So that ties into the Spotify piece of it, too, and maybe a little bit of misremembering of certain things of, well, and you know, like I'm a little bit older than the custom Bieber demo, so there could be some of it there where they may not hit me in the same circles that, the same way that, you know, someone did with Beyoncé for instance.[00:19:53]Tatiana Cirisano:Yeah. I have another thought related to this that I feel like I'm struggling to articulate, but I'm going to try, which is that on the Spotify list and the YouTube list, I thought there was more overlap when it came to which older artists were on the list than there was when it comes to newer artists. And I wonder if that is also sort of further proof of this fragmentation that's happening because it would make sense that if a decade ago, two decades ago, people kind of had less to choose from to listen to. Everybody kind of has the same favorite artists from those decades that they've listened to enough to reach a billion streams. Yet now that people have more choice and things are fragmented more, their favorite artists and songs today are more varied. [00:20:39] Dan Runcie: Yeah. Yeah, no, I think there's something there because if you think about it, the lists are quite similar. And I think even if you look at YouTube's list, which I think even though YouTube's list is less reliant on radio, the biggest songs they have from the 80s and 90s are still the same songs that people have heard in bars and in stadiums and in TV commercials for decades now. So there's consistency there. Things do start to get a bit segmented to your point of where things are right now. So both of these platforms, in many ways enable the fragmentation of fandom. Their algorithms made it easy for people to have their own circles. So I do think that that piece of it is true. So I think that's a good point. [00:21:18] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah. Okay. I'm glad I could put that into words 'cause it was one of those things where I had this thought and was like, does this make sense? [00:21:24] Dan Runcie: Yeah. Oh, yeah. [00:21:25] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah. Fascinating.[00:21:26] Dan Runcie: Another thing too, that stuck out, this stuck out a bit more on Spotify's playlist than others, but how certain songs have shifted from when radio, for instance, was more playing songs that I think people more often wanted to hear in their cars. But Spotify, it's on-demand, it's everywhere. I think, for instance, workout music is something that we've seen a pretty large uptick on with Spotify. A song like Eminem's Till I Collapse, which is in the billions playlist for Spotify, I don't think I heard that song once on the radio. Maybe I'm misremembering things just relative to how big Eminem's hits were in the early 2000s. But that song is one of his most played songs. And I think it's because it's a song that a lot of guys listen to when they want to work out. Maybe it's something that they also will play, like, I don't think they to like LA Fitness necessarily like on the speakers, but I think it's more so of like a, no, let me go listen to this while I try to, you know, set PR on the bench press or whatever. So I feel like there's things like that, also seasonal music, right? Of course, just Mariah Carey and some of the records and accolades that All I Want For Christmas Is You has continued to reach and all of the remixes and versions she's done of that song, like that doesn't happen without streaming, right?[00:22:41] Tatiana Cirisano: I was going to say September was also on there, which, you know, every September everybody starts to sing. That is a seasonal song. So, yeah, no, I totally agree with you. And I also noticed that both lists had a lot of, like, upbeat music, like what you're saying, like stuff that people work out to. And I feel like it's for different reasons. Like I'm Spotify, maybe those types of songs dominate because like you're saying, they're the things that people put on in the background of something. Whereas on YouTube, the reason might be because those tend to have more vibrant videos. Like, I feel like more people are likely to watch videos for, you know, an upbeat reggaeton song than like some acoustic, I don't know, Taylor Swift song, even though she's a massive star. Like, overall, you know? And on that note, I don't know if this is just my, you know, anecdotal takeaway, you'd have to, again, like actually go through all the songs and do some data crunching. But I felt like Spotify had actually more varied in terms of like upbeat songs were on there. But also a lot of, Coldplay, a lot of like earlier Ed Sheeran, like, those more like, not so upbeat, more acoustic songs, whereas YouTube barely had any of those because again, I think there may be less likely to be something people watch the video of. I don't know. But that was interesting just how uptempo the two lists were. [00:23:59] Dan Runcie: Yeah. I would need to go back and check to see if like a song like Coldplay's Yellow. Is that on YouTube's list? [00:24:08] Tatiana Cirisano: It's on Spotify's, but I don't think it's on Youtube's.[00:24:10] Dan Runcie: And that would speak to that, right? It's a more somber video. I'm pretty sure Chris Martin's head is laying like sideways on the pavement in that video, right, or on the bed, if I remember correctly. So yeah, it's just not going to be as, I think, yes. Like, if you have five minutes, like, this is the thing that I want to be able to get to. So yeah, it's such a fascinating distinction. And I think with it, it's clear that with both of these platforms, the two of them are really trying to compete more and more with each other, with both Spotify trying to get more and more international, YouTube trying to have more and more influence just in terms of the overall revenue that they generate for the industry. So I do want to talk about the two of them as companies distinctly, but before we get there, I think that the international piece and just how revenue is generated for each of these streams or each of these views will be an interesting distinction over time because, especially with Spotify, these streams that the artists are generating don't necessarily get weighted the same in terms of the pro rata and the pools that they get put into and then getting separated. So if one artist has a bunch of streams from a bunch of their fans, but a lot of their fans are in places where the subscriptions cost $2 per month to subscribe to Spotify, or there's a over index of free accounts versus paid, like these numbers don't necessarily reflect that, which is fine. I think we're just trying to get a gauge for what listening looks like. But the revenue may actually look very different for, let's say, thinking about like one of these, you know, 80s or 90s radio hits. The person that's listening to that account may be more likely to be paying 10 or maybe soon $11 a month for Spotify subscription if I'm just thinking about what that consumer may be like and therefore essentially getting more revenue per stream than some of the newer artists that may have a younger aboard international fan base. So that was another point that I thought was interesting. We won't have that data, but just based on inference, I feel like that's a trend in terms of where it's going. [00:26:14] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, that makes sense. And I also wonder, like, if short form video becomes the more dominant form of consuming video, and the people that are watching music videos on YouTube shift to watching 32nd videos that use music on shorts, like, what will that do to the revenue mix? And it'll also depend on if the way that UGC platforms payout to the music industry changes where it's no longer this, you know, blanket payment for uses and is more per use. I think there's a lot that could get shifted around there. And I wonder if, like, does that mean YouTube is sort of cannibalizing its own, one of its own sources where people that are watching music videos are now going to shorts instead? Or is there an opportunity? Like, I think there's an opportunity for both. But I guess these are just questions that come up in my mind when I think about it. [00:27:02] Dan Runcie: Yeah, it's like in some ways it's similar to when Instagram adds stories, right? You're trying to get a sense, is this additive or is this going to take away, And I think YouTube's goal is that would be additive, but you're bringing up, I think, a valid thing where it's a little different with music and how you're registering streams. And I do think that there's a certain number of people that the better and better that shorts get, there's going to be less desire to go check out the actual video. And if these songs aren't registering, I think at least for a stream or a view, it's 30 seconds of listening needs to be registered, at least to be counted as a stream. Then if that doesn't happen on a short end, you're just getting these clips, then how does that impact the actual artist themselves, right? [00:27:47] Tatiana Cirisano: No, you put it really well. Like, the better that shorts gets, the more it might actually threaten people going to YouTube to watch the video.[00:27:55] Dan Runcie: Yeah. So many interesting, I think, things to just dive into with this. But I think it's a good point to just talk more broadly about Spotify and YouTube in general, just in terms of where they are, how both of them want the other one. And I think based on these blog posts and based on a number of the letters that, the emails that you'll see from Lyor Cohen when he's describing where things are with YouTube. There's clearly a goal to, you know, establish itself as the leader in the market. And I think the growth has been pretty strong, but of course Spotify, I think still with nearly 200 million paid subscribers is definitely, you know, I think leading on that front. But where do you see this play out in terms of whether or not the trends and clearly what these playlists tell us about the tendencies of these two companies and also where things are going and who we think will be more or less dominant, let's say five years from now? Let's not say 10 years. I think that's a bit too far out, but let's say five years from now. [00:28:51] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah. Well, I've written about this, I've written a couple of blogs about this, but I think that YouTube does have a lot of advantages, especially for just where the music landscape is going. So one is that, in the streaming world, there's so little differentiation, right? All the DSPs kind of offer the same experience, the same catalog, the same price. But YouTube actually has a differentiating factor in that it's an audio-visual platform, and that they also have shorts, and they kind of have this ecosystem of apps that feed into each other. And that's sort of the second advantage, is that ecosystem aspect where, you know, based on our data, new generations of fans are really looking for more ways to actively participate in fandom and, you know, not just listen to a song, but create content around it. And YouTube has that it has this, you know, creator proposition. In many ways, YouTube was the first, arguably the first, you know, creator platform. The first place that you could post video content online and build a career around it. So, fans want this, but also artists need more ways to directly engage with their fans and monetize and actually not just be discovered, but sustain fandom and build communities. And that's the thing that I think so many social platforms lack, is they can help artists get discovered, but it's still really hard for them to connect the dots. So when you have YouTube, if you think about like the journey of, a fan through the ecosystem, you know, maybe they discover a song on shorts, and they can actually just click it and go straight, you know, go straight to the artist's YouTube page where maybe they watch the video that just came out and then they can go to YouTube music and stream the song, and it kind of creates this more frictionless experience. So I think we're already seeing a lot of consumers spend more of their music time on platforms that let them play around with the music, like the TikToks of the world and the shorts of the world. So if you have an ecosystem that combines that with streaming and the ability to just go seamlessly from one to the other, I think that's really powerful. And that's also why, you know, ByteDance launching a streaming service could really change the game. I think ByteDance and YouTube have a lot of the same advantages in that space. So I think YouTube is well positioned for the current era and what both artists are looking for and what fans are looking for, I guess is how I would frame that.[00:31:22] Dan Runcie: Yeah. I think that YouTube's biggest advantage with this is that A, it still is under a much larger company that prints money from search, which is Google, right? So the fact that it in itself is the second largest search engine, largely because of Google, I think that piece of it will serve well. And I think secondly, the fact that when there's so many more things competing for your attention, whatever can make that have less friction, it can make it easier for people to access that platform as we've seen based on the rise of TikTok, I think those platforms do tend to win out in this area where you're ultimately trying to either capture or monetize attention. And the way that streaming is going, even though I know it can be lucrative for artists that own their assets or have favorable terms, it is a bit more of a measure of capturing attention for a lot of artists and being able to essentially market and position themselves out there to share what they have so that they can monetize elsewhere. And I do think that, I know I've talked about this previously, but just Spotify may be in a little bit more of a difficult position just given the fact that its ultimate goal is still to try to get more monetization from its non-music audio, whether it's your podcast or your audiobooks and stuff like that.[00:32:41] Dan Runcie: And I think that is a little bit of a tougher bet relative to YouTube, China. going with shorts and essentially try to compete more directly with TikTok or just other things in general that are making it easier. That said, I still think that Spotify is more strong from a product perspective of actually being able to, you know, ease of use of listening, being able to find and skip to the song, and being able to listen to a song on my phone you know, turning off the screen and then putting it in my pocket. And I know that YouTube does now allow you essentially to do that if you pay for subscription, but I think the friction, at least in the consumer's mind, is a little different than it is with doing that with Spotify, even because you do that with Spotify for free account especially. So I do think that there are some pros and cons there, but to your point, I do think that because YouTube is moving more in the direction of creating less friction for people to use its product and just the fact that it's visual, it's engaged, and to your other point, it's a bit more directly connected to fans being able to actively choose what they want to listen to, like the data and all those things are going to be more impactful and insightful there.[00:33:48] Tatiana Cirisano: Right, Right. So I think artists will kind of go to wherever the fans and the remuneration opportunities are, and I think YouTube is right now, providing more of that than Spotify is. Like, Spotify is a place where you can monetize scale, but you can't monetize niche. And YouTube is an ecosystem where you can monetize both. And I think there's no reason why streaming services in general shouldn't be a place where you can monetize both. But we haven't really seen that happen yet, and I think YouTube is moving in that direction. So I guess I come at this question because of the work that I do from such a perspective of what do the artists and the fans want. But of course, that doesn't necessarily mean that alone isn't going to, you know, make YouTube overtake Spotify. So I guess I'm a little bit biased just based on the work that I do. [00:34:38] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I could see that. Because there's just so many other, there's just so many factors at play here. It's such a dominant position and at the end of the day, nearly 200 million people in the world are paying for the service and that is much higher than a lot of these other services. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out though. I feel like to some of the points you brought up earlier. Just going back to the Billions Club, if we had this conversation two years from now, I'd be interested to see, one, which old songs creep back up and which songs that have come up recently end up rising up and hitting those places, and does it line up with a lot of the points that we brought up here? So I'm excited to see what that looks like. [00:35:15] Tatiana Cirisano: No, me too. And also what the pace will be like? Will there be just way more songs that have hit a billion streams in a shorter amount of time, or will the opposite trend happen because of fragmentation? Like, I'm not, I'm not really sure. So yeah, as always, excited to see definitely what comes next. [00:35:30] Dan Runcie: Well, Tati, this is great. Thanks for coming to share these insights. And I think now I got to go back and count how many Crazy Frog videos there were on YouTube's list because when I saw that, I'm glad you brought that up. I was just like, my goodness, I forgot all about this trend. [00:35:45] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, at least in that ratio, you know, we have confirmed YouTube wins. [00:35:49] Dan Runcie: All right. Before we let you go, what do you have coming down the pipeline? Are there any upcoming research or any recent things that you've put out that listeners should keep an eye out for?[00:35:58] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, I would say coming up one of my favorite things that we do at MIDiA Research is our predictions report where every year, at the end of the year, we put out predictions for the coming year. And we also rate ourselves in terms of how much we got right from the past year. I believe our success rate is somewhere above 80%.[00:36:16] Dan Runcie: That's legit. [00:36:17] Tatiana Cirisano: That's great. But yeah, so we always do I believe we always do a free webinar on that. It was free last year. So look out for that because it's a great chance to interact with us even if you're not a client. And it's a lot of fun. [00:36:30] Dan Runcie: Awesome, we'll look out for that and, yeah.[00:36:33] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah.[00:36:33] Dan Runcie: We'll have to see. I'm curious about what the hit rate will be this year. So definitely let us know what the success rate is...[00:36:39] Tatiana Cirisano: We will.[00:36:40] Dan Runcie: from the ones you made last year, heading into this year. [00:36:42] Tatiana Cirisano: Awesome. Thanks, Dan. [00:36:43] Dan Runcie: Awesome. Well, thank you. This is great. [00:36:45] Dan Runcie: All right. Hope you enjoyed that first part with Tati breaking down the Billions Clubs. Here's my chat with Glenn Peoples.[00:36:53] Dan Runcie: All right. Today we have Glenn Peoples with us who is from Billboard, and he just released this Global Music Index, which has stated that music stocks are down 44% this year, twice as much as the market. And Glenn, it'd be great to start here. What's going on? Why are socks down in the music industry?[00:37:13] Glenn Peoples: Hey, thanks for having me. Well, stocks are down in general. So it's not that just music that's having a tough time at the stock market. You know, a big component of the Global Music Index, which I created for Billboard is Spotify. And Spotify has had a tough year, just like Netflix has had a tough year. There's, I think, enthusiasm for streaming stocks was high at the beginning of the pandemic and dropped quite a bit since then. And investors are not looking at growth so much as looking at margins, looking at profits, and so they're expecting a lot more from streaming services right now. So it's a tough time to be a streaming service, whether you're Netflix, whether you're Spotify. You could say, well, the investors got carried away. They were overvalued. Yeah, maybe so. It's just been a tough year for streaming services and when Spotify is that big of a component of the index, it's down, well, as of yesterday, it's down 60% for the year. And so that's a lot of market cap that's gone and that's dragging down the index. And that's the short version. [00:38:17] Dan Runcie: Right. So of course, it's a value-based index. Market cap is what defines it. And just so listeners know, how big of a factor is Spotify? Like, how much is their stock and their market cap weighted in terms of the overall index?[00:38:33] Glenn Peoples: I would say it's probably, again, this is just ballpark. It's probably about 15% of the value of the index. It was a lot more obviously. I would say right now at its current price, it's 10 to 15%. Universal Music Group is the biggest component of the index, and there's some other companies just a handful that really stand out above everybody else. Live Nation, Warner Music Group, Sirius XM are some of the big ones. [00:39:02] Dan Runcie: The thing that stuck out to me about it is that, of course, Spotify stock is a huge piece of it, but even if you were to take out Spotify, the non-Spotify stocks in that index still are down more than the overall market has been this past year. So it also makes me think that there may be something going on that's a bit deeper than just streaming. [00:39:23] Glenn Peoples: Yeah, it's not just streaming. You know, a lot of music companies had a great 2021 and I think that they just had further to fall. So there were some really high valuations and it just sets these companies up for a pretty big fall when investor sentiment turns and the market turns. And ever since the Fed announced in, I believe, December, that it was going to start raising interest rates. You know, stocks have started to fall and Spotify definitely started to fall then. And it's been a long, what is that, roughly 10 months since then. Things have calmed down a bit, but stocks are, boy, they're really having a tough time. It's really volatile a lot there. I think there's two ways to look at it. One is what's the value of the stock? What's the value of the company as valued by investors? And what's the potential of the company based on the company itself and the intellectual property it has? And those two don't always line up. You know, Spotify I still think is a very good company. I think it has a lot of work to do, but it's growing at a good clip and I think they have good people there. But when you are a streaming stock and you're facing really a once-in-a-generation kind of environment with very bad inflation you know, crazy, I was about to say unemployment, but unemployment is not that bad. It's just a very strange time in the market and a very strange macroeconomic climate. And you're seeing good companies have very difficult times with their stock prices. You know, Universal Music Group is down. But the market is down overall and Universal's not going to escape the just general downturn of the market. That's saying something because Universal is the biggest music company out there holding up market share very well has a big share of the top 10, any given time, big artists. But you can't correlate stock market performance with company performance just perfectly. It's a very strange time in the macroeconomic climate right now. [00:41:23] Dan Runcie: Yeah. The interesting thing with the major record label stocks, and even some of these other companies that, yeah, even though they may not be streaming services themselves, when streaming makes up such a high percentage of the overall revenue for this entire industry, then Spotify's stock is in many ways going to be at least somewhat correlated to what we see with Universal given the fact that these companies have equity in each other, they're so dependent on each other, so a lot of that is given. You mentioned Live Nation earlier, and I think that their stock is interesting, too, because even though it isn't directly tied to streaming, that stock had hit record highs in the middle of the pandemic when there were no shows going on. So that just spoke to how much of a disconnect there was if you looked at how the company was actually doing in 2020 and even in 2021 when there were nowhere near as many shows as they had had in 2019, but they now are actually being able to realize more of that revenue. But the stock has adjusted in a lot of ways since. So there is a bit of this disconnect. I think there was just a good amount of excitement as well about what's happening in music as an investment class. Specifically, you looked at all of the catalog sales and the booms that happen thanks to the low-interest rates, and they're no longer low anymore. So you're also seeing that play a factor in, and you've also heard some of the acquirers of those catalogs expressing a bit of disappointment that the returns aren't quite what they thought the returns were going to be as well. So some of those things, I think, Brought some of the temperament and a lot of the companies that are in your index down to, I don't want to say necessarily down to earth, because I think there's still plenty of room for growth for a lot of them, but it's clear that we've moved past that era of the pandemic when things were just high for the pure speculation of where it could be in a few years.[00:43:15] Glenn Peoples: Yeah, I think the honeymoon is over for a lot of music stocks. You know, music as an asset class was really attractive. And, you know, look, just the fact that Universal is public and Warner is public once again, and there are numerous streaming services from Tencent Music and Cloud Music in China to Anghami and Spotify and Deezer. There's a lot of music companies that are publicly traded right now and that says a lot about music as an asset, as a segment, set aside the problems it's had in the last year. So music companies had a great 2020 and 2021, and it's been downhill since then. But the fact that there are a lot of publicly traded music companies right now, and so much investor interest in music catalogs like you mentioned, I think says a lot about music as an asset class, music as an investment in general. Look, five years ago, how many publicly traded music companies were there? I mean, Spotify has been public for about five years. Pandora was before it was bought by Sirius. You know, but you didn't have Tencent, you didn't have Cloud Music, you didn't have Anghami, you didn't have Deezer, you didn't have Reservoir Media, or Believe. Warner was private. Universal was private. So the fact that Wall Street has taken a liking to music, I think says a lot despite what the stock prices say right now. [00:44:40] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I agree. The fact that this wasn't even possible, just shows what's happened. And a lot of companies, even outside of music, are starting to have money at least level back off now that the pandemic is over, now that the quarantine highs for a lot of these stocks are over. I'm interested to see where did things go from here, because I still believe that there's a ton of potential in each of these companies if the expectations and if the investors expectations of the market are where they need to be. I still think that music is a hot and a popular asset class, especially for investors. But is it 30 x value? Is it 30 x multiples for some of these catalogs that just bring 'em to certain valuations, or does it need to be more level? Because I do think that there's still plenty of value if those multiples and a lot of those things are where they should be. And even thinking about whether it's live entertainment or streaming in general, I think there's still plenty of room for growth. There's still a lot of opportunities there, but it's just being able to get a clear idea on, what is the actual TAM? What is the actual total addressable market for these areas? And I think if anything, you saw that challenge happen with a lot of the discourse around Netflix and what the future is there, you started to saw things drop right around they had, you know, around 220 million subscribers. I think Spotify was likely asking similar questions, too, and I still think there's growth, you know, for the right price there's always going to be something, but what that price would be and how many people are willing to pay for it, knowing that, of course, if it's a paid product, you're not going to hit all 8 billion people in the world. But there is some actual number out there. So I think the more clarity that there is on that, and of course that's part of the game to figure that out, but the closer that you can get to what that actually is, the more that investors can make sound decisions. [00:46:25] Glenn Peoples: Yeah. You know, as we're talking now, there's a lot going on. We're a couple of hours away from Spotify releasing third-quarter earnings, which will, I'm not sure how much that'll say, look, that's backward-looking, but the company will take the opportunity to talk about a lot of things investors and analysts are curious about. Yesterday Apple announced it was raising prices for Apple Music and Apple TV Plus, and the Apple bundle. And YouTube premium prices went up as well, I believe, for the family plan only. And what do we see today? What we see Universal shares went up almost 12% and closed. They're trading the Netherlands, so that's already closed. In the middle of the day, Warner Music was up 7% to 8% at its best. Believe was up. Hipgnosis shares were up about, and those closed, that trades in London. That closed up about 8% I think. So investors, I think, get the news that they've really been waiting for, that prices are finally going to go up. You know, Netflix has raised prices. Pricing in streaming video on demand is a lot more flexible than it is for music and music prices have barely budged in over a decade, and executives have been saying for months and for years that prices will go up. But they haven't. [00:47:45] Dan Runcie: Why do think it took this long? [00:47:47] Glenn Peoples: Well, I think, companies were much more concerned about growing the market than maximizing revenue per customer. Is it more important to get the customer in the door or to charge more per customers is the question, and I think that they've been much more concerned about building the customer base and building relationships. And then at some point, it's a timing issue. When do you raise price? When can you do it without turning people off? And I think what we see these days with inflation is what it is, is companies might feel a little more emboldened to just raise price and think they can get away with it. Name one price that's not up in the last year. Except music streaming, it seems like everything else is up. And so somebody had to be, you know, first to do it and YouTube and Apple did it, which could embolden Spotify to do it finally. And I think my impression of Universal's shares going up almost 12% is that they think Spotify's going to raise prices as well. That doesn't seem like a bump just from Apple. That seems like a bump from broad price increases across the board.[00:48:51] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I would agree. I think that it's going to happen and the reason why I think it probably hasn't happened until this point I was talking to Will Page about this, who is a former chief economist at Spotify. And his perspective on it was that the difference, and it was mine as well, the difference between why a company like Netflix would continue to increase prices but Spotify hasn't a bit in line with the type of content that you're getting. In a lot of ways, Spotify and Apple are offering a lot of the same thing. Sure. I know Spotify has its podcasting, Apple has its podcasting and non-music audio, and we'll talk about that in a second. But I think when they're all offering the same thing, then there's a bit more pressure to try to offer price discounts and bundles and stuff like that as opposed to Netflix or some of those companies offering differentiated content. So you're more buying into something that you're going to get on Netflix that you can't get on Hulu or on Disney Plus, or on HBO Max or one of the other services. So I feel like there's a factor of it there. And I remember a few years ago there was some tests about it and some discussions where in Europe they were exploring what. 12.99 would look like, or maybe it was 13.99. But I didn't hear anything necessarily come definitive from that. Maybe it was 11.99, but there was some price increase that they were exploring in Europe. So it feels like it's inevitable that Spotify will join in and yeah, if your price is going to increase 10%, then your stock price will likely increase around 10% as well.[00:50:22] Glenn Peoples: Yeah, that makes sense. Most people look at how much revenue a company takes in every month. ARPU, average revenue per user, Spotify considers a metric lifetime value. And so it's not focused solely on price. Price plays into lifetime value, but so does churn rate, and the family plan is something that is reduced churn rate. As churn goes down, lifetime value goes up. I mean, for a subscription business, what you don't want are people coming in and out and churning in and churning out and taking time off or just leaving the subscription service for good. So if you cut down churn rate, the value goes up, and that's more value to creators. That's more value to publishers, to record labels, and to Spotify without raising price. If you can work on lifetime value without having to raise price, that might be the low-hanging fruit that you do in the meantime before you consider raising prices. And now it appears like everybody's to the point where they say, okay, now we can raise prices.[00:51:22] Dan Runcie: Right. Yeah. I think the fact that we're here says a lot. So we'll continue to see, and I'm sure that the next price increase after this probably won't take this long if this is the one that got us here. The thing with Spotify though, is I'm sure we'll see what investors feel more broadly about the company's strategy because non-music, audio and podcasting specifically has been part of its big bet on how it can have better margins, how it can just essentially make more money and have something that they can continue to grow. But there's been a lot of pushback. There's been a lot of canceled shows and studios, and some of that's standard for the industry. But some of it also feels like there's more and more question marks on, okay, they've spent billions on this. Is this going to work? Is this going to take off the way that they expect it to? What's your current take on the future outlook for Spotify's non-music audio strategy? [00:52:16] Glenn Peoples: I think it's a good strategy. You build up a platform starting with music. You attract hundreds of thousands of users and then you turn it into an audio platform that's not just music and you introduce spoken word content. I think it's going to take quite a few years. So I think expecting changes, you know, we're only two years into some of their acquisitions for podcast studios and for platforms such as Megaphone. I know investors might not want to wait five years, but it's going to take a while. And, you know, long-term Spotify thinks that they can get some pretty good margins out of podcasts, margins that exceed what they get from music. They think that they can get the math when I look at audiobook margins, they bought an audiobook distributor called Findaway. And I think as retailer and distributor, Spotify gets about 60% of sales. Audiobook download margins are pretty good and that's about double what they're going to get for music. How much business is out there for audiobooks? Yeah, I mean, right now probably not that much, but over time I'm sure they can build it into something much more considerable. And, you know, if it's 60% gross margin, that's really good. You're not going to get that in music. You can build a platform based on music, but then eventually you got to go looking elsewhere for margins. And so I think it can work out for Spotify, it's just going to take a while and some people might not have much patience. I get that. But it's going to take a while. [00:53:41] Dan Runcie: It's something I've thought a lot about because I understand that podcasting itself is something where the audience takes time to build. You want to be able to see these shows grow over time. But I also think that so much of their biggest growth has come from acquiring shows that are already popular. And I know they've made big acquisitions, whether as with Gimlet or with The Ringer, or they have the exclusive deal with, or the licensing deal with Joe Rogan. But how many others of those are out there that they haven't necessarily had? Are there going to be more in-house ones that can build up? Because I feel like one of the challenges I've seen with the strategy is that they've had a lot of money spent on getting these big-name celebrities to then have shows where they have other big-name celebrities as guests and things like that. And a lot of that is antithetical to what's made so much of podcasting be effective for a lot of folks. And sometimes it works well, but a lot of times it doesn't. And it's content. You do have to make some bets, but I'm interested to see how many more of those wins that are going to be out there for them, because that's the piece that at least gives you some bump 'cause at least we've seen the numbers and successes from the popular acquisitions, the shows that they've had. It's the in-house development where I think by nature there is a natural, whether it's just the likelihood of success of you're starting anything new, not everything is going to take off, but the real success metric will be, okay, two, three years from now, we're there Spotify originals that are at the top of the charts and are creating and demanding that audience the same way that some of these other shows, whether it's outside of the network or some of the ones that they've acquired are able to do?[00:55:23] Glenn Peoples: Yeah, it looks to me like they have kind of a three-prong attack where they spend mightily for somebody like Joe Rogan and that's not going to last forever. That licensing deal will be up, I don't know, maybe next year. And what do they renew or do they go spend a lot of money on somebody else? I mean, Joe Rogan brings 'em a lot of a lot of listeners I'd wager. So they have a very small number of really big shows, and then they have a lot of in-house shows with Parcast, The Ringer, Gimlet, and they can go acquire some other ones. And then they have a lot of DIY stuff. And then you get into the long tail. And this is where I think there's a lot of potential to monetize listening just like there would be in music. They bought a platform called Anchor. That's a podcast creation and distribution. Megaphone rather, is more the distribution tool. And so they have the infrastructure in place to let people create shows, distribute shows, and now they can monetize those shows. Now, do advertisers want to monetize or advertise against, you know, podcasts nobody's heard of. Not sure exactly how that's going to work. You might be not getting good advertising dollars on some of the shows, but to the extent that you can monetize the long tail podcast, Spotify is building that. And if anybody ca

Televisionation: Friday Fireside, the #1 television industry Webcast, features Rick Howe, The iTV Doctor, in conversation with prominent figures from the advanced-TV/video industry.Today's Friday Fireside welcomes Tim Mulligan, EVP and Research Director for UK-based MIDiA Research. Tim tells us what are the real hot buttons that streamers need to pay attention to, to get their arms around and not lose their shirts with everybody buying for a month and then going to the competition!!

It's never been easier for artists to release music and find an audience in any corner of the world. Likewise, it's never been more difficult for artists to break through the noise. The Internet and streaming services have created a double-edged sword for rising artists. To discuss this, Tatiano Cirisano joined me on the show. Tati is a music analyst at MIDiA Research and a former reporter at Billboard.Tati released a research piece a few weeks ago that argues the music industry is oversaturated and fragmented — more than ever before. This shift has created a new class system for artists.In Group 1 are artists that reached prominence pre-streaming in a less cluttered marketplace (e.g. Beyonce or AC/DC). Class 2 consists of artists who rose in parallel with the proliferation of streaming. Drake and Taylor Swift fall into this category. And then there's the Class 3, that includes newer artists, who try to cultivate audiences in today's hyper-competitive landscape against the other two groups. Tati believes the trend line for the music industry's fragmentation is clearly pointing up. To understand how we got here, why it matters, and how it redefines success, you'll want to listen to our interview. Here's our biggest talking points: [3:11] Why consumption is now fragmented[8:41] Music superstars losing their reach[10:55] Modern artists valuing fame less than prior generations[13:24] Benefits to fragmentation[14:48] Updated benchmark for artist success[16:50] Active vs. passive listening[18:53] Music industry is still tied to album sales[25:34] Artists segmenting audiences by platform[30:18] Trap of taking users off native platforms[32:59] Content is becoming more important than the creator[37:35] YouTube and other potential outlier platforms for audience-building You can read Tati's full report here: https://midiaresearch.com/blog/music-is-not-a-level-playing-field-it-is-a-field-of-all-levelsListen: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | SoundCloud | Stitcher | Overcast | Amazon | Google Podcasts | Pocket Casts | RSSHost: Dan Runcie, @RuncieDan, trapital.coGuests: Tatiana Cirisano, @tatianacirisano  Sponsors: MoonPay is the leader in web3 infrastructure. They have partnered with Timbaland, Snoop Dogg, and many more. To learn more, visit moonpay.com/trapital Enjoy this podcast? Rate and review the podcast here! ratethispodcast.com/trapital Trapital is home for the business of hip-hop. Gain the latest insights from hip-hop's biggest players by reading Trapital's free weekly memo. TRANSCRIPTION[00:00:00] Tatiana Cirisano: Fame is actually really low on the list of priorities of artists today. And whether that's because they don't really want it or because they just don't think it's achievable is kind of another layer to that, but the top two things are earning a sustainable income and achieving recognition within their scene. Artists' definitions of success are changing, but I don't know if the music industry is really catching onto that or really supporting that because the music business is a hits business and record labels are trying to create superstars and drive culture.[00:00:38] Dan Runcie: Hey, welcome to The Trapital podcast. I'm your host and the founder of Trapital, Dan Runcie. This podcast is your place to gain insights from executives in music, media, entertainment, and more, who are taking hip-hop culture to the next level. [00:00:58] Dan Runcie: Today's conversation is all about why the stars of today cannot be compared to the stars of yesterday in the music industry. And when I'm talking about yesterday, I'm not talking about 20, 30 years ago. I'm talking about three, four, even five years ago. The era that Drake and even a Post Malone and some of these other artists came up in cannot be compared to what's happening with the artist today and that's as it relates to streaming, as it relates to TikTok, and all the ways that things are fragmented in the creator economy. And it was great to be joined by Tatiana Cirisano. She is a music industry analyst at MIDiA Research, where she has written some insightful pieces and breakdowns on this topic in a whole lot more. We talked about the impacts and the current landscape of the streaming era, what it looks like for artists that are prioritizing their growth and perfecting what they can do on one platform as opposed to spreading it on others. We also talked about some of the trade-offs and some of the challenges for artists in the creator economy and a whole lot more. She does some great research on this topic. So definitely check out the work she does at MIDiA Research if you haven't yet, here's our conversation. Hope you enjoy it. All right, today, we are joined by music industry analyst, Tati Cirisano, who is going to help us solve all of the music industry problems today. Are you ready? [00:02:22] Tatiana Cirisano: One can hope. I'll do my best. [00:02:25] Dan Runcie: So what sparked this conversation was a really insightful piece that you had put out recently through MIDiA Research, and this was about the different levels of artists and where they are specifically in the streaming era. And you had this really good breakdown on how you had the artists that were already established in the streaming era such as your AC/DCs or your Beyoncés, they were established before streaming became a thing. You had the artists that were, folks like your Drakes or even your Taylor Swifts that rose while streaming was really huge. And then you have your artists today. Could you talk a little bit about how that differentiation between those groups impacts success and what achieving success looks like today?[00:03:11] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, no, absolutely. And I'll kind of back up a little bit to what is underlying all of that, which is just the fragmentation of consumption. And that's something that we study a lot at MIDiA, and it basically means that, you know, with people able to, through streaming, access all the music they could ever want to and listen at any time that they want to, and also with these increasingly sophisticated algorithms kind of pushing people to niches. It follows that there's kind of less mainstream moments or mainstream stars and more of these stars just for individuals and their communities or their niches. And I think that's something that we've all kind of experienced at some point, like, maybe there's an artist that you're obsessed with and all of your friends love, and you mention it to a friend that is in another circle and they're like, who's that? I mean, I get that reaction. I've gotten that reaction talking about Bad Bunny before, and he is the top streamed artist in the world. So I think we've all had like this anecdotal experience of you think that something is mainstream, but it's not as mainstream as you think it is and that is the fragmentation at work. So this is happening on a really, really accelerated scale now. Just because of how everything is online and on demand and because of these algorithms. So we're in this situation where the artists that are competing today are in a much more oversaturated and fragmented landscape where it's a lot harder to have a mainstream impact than the artists that were even chasing success three years ago, five years ago, ten years ago. So the way that I had kind of broken it down, and I think you could actually break it down way further, which I think we're going to talk about is yeah, the artists that came up before all of this, pre-streaming, really, which are the AC/DCs, even a little bit of like the Beyoncés, and because they built their fan bases at a time before everything was so fragmented and cluttered, they're still, like, building on that today. They're still kind of riding that wave. And then you have the artists who came up kind of in the beginning of streaming and before all the second-order impacts happened. So basically streaming did democratize the playing field. It did make it so that way more artists could find their audiences. And there were all these benefits at the beginning, and artists like Drake, and Taylor Swift, and Ed Sheeran really benefited from that. But now we're at a point where streaming has also contributed to this really oversaturated landscape, this really fragmented landscape. And it's only getting more and more so every year. And so the artists that are competing in that landscape now face really, really unique challenges, yet they're still competing in the same field as the Drakes, as the Beyoncés, as the AC/DCs. So because so much of this change has happened in just, like, 5 or 10 years, we're in a situation where the artists of today have very, very different challenges than, I think, even the artists of 2020, like, the pace of fragmentation is just insane. And I have data on that too, that I can share. [00:06:00]Dan Runcie: Yeah. It would be great to dig more into that 'cause you've mentioned in 2020. I look back on that year, especially, maybe the year leading into that, Billie Eilish was someone that was being talked about more and more, and she, of course, ended up sweeping the Grammys that year. But even when she came up, things are even more different now than back then, to your point. [00:06:20] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah. I really like the data that BPI pulls on this in their, I think it's called All About the Music. They have this annual report, and they look at, this is only in the UK, but they look at what percentage of total annual audio streams go towards the top 100 tracks? So, like, how much the hits are dominating basically? And that percentage has halved, more than halved, in the past 5 years. So you see that, like, we still have superstars, but their impact is just kind of lessening. And more, more consumption is going towards sort of like the mid-tier of artists, but it's spread across them. So it's just harder and harder to kind of have an impact. So, yeah, I think Billie Eilish is, it's funny, I feel like she's such a tough one because I try to use her as examples all the time, and I'm always like, but she is the exception to every rule because she is, like, such a talent. And, you know, I feel like it's hard to use her as an example in things, but I do think that she even came up in a much less cluttered space. I think that was like, more like 2017, 2018 pre- TikTok. And that's actually another division that I would make, like yes, because of TikTok, the app itself, but also because of the fragmentation that it kind of has fostered and that other platforms are now following the footsteps of.[00:07:38] Dan Runcie: It's interesting because the BPI data is essentially telling us that a superstar has around half the reach that they may be once did, or half of that footprint that they did. And it's one of those things where, of course, there's that cultural aspect of wanting to feel like something is big enough, so that, yeah, you're not asking your friends about Bad Bunny. And even though he's a global superstar, people still don't know who he is, but is this necessarily an issue as it relates to artists? Because a lot of it does reflect on the expectations that someone may have for their career, so I wonder has the industry itself adapted to the expectations, right? I think a lot of folks understand that no one is necessarily going to have that 1960s Beatlemania level of fame, or even 1980s, Michael Jackson level of fame. But do you feel like people have come around to the fact that no one is going to have 2015 Drake or 2014 Taylor Swift level of fame? Do you feel like that has sunk in yet? [00:08:41] Tatiana Cirisano: That's a really good question. That's a really, really good question because so much of this is about, like, how we define success in the first place, right? So at MIDiA, we do these surveys of creators where one of the questions we ask every year is what is your definition of success? And we're finding that, while in the past, the music industry was very much associated with, like, fame and fortune, and like, that was kind of, like, what you're going after as an artist. Fame is actually really low on the list of priorities of artists today. It's the last thing. And whether that's because they don't really want it or because they just don't think it's achievable is kind of another layer to that that I'm not sure the answer to, but the top two things that they choose are earning a sustainable income and achieving recognition within their scene. And I think that's why so many artists are sort of enticed by the creator economy model because that's what you're doing, right? You're earning a sustainable living from, you know, your biggest fans or the people that are recognizing you within your scene. There's a lot of problematic things about the creator economy and maybe that's for another episode, but like, I think that what I'm trying to say is I think that artists' definitions of success are changing, but I don't know if the music industry is really catching onto that or really supporting that because the music business is a hits business and record labels are trying to create superstars and drive culture. And if the mainstream is almost nonexistent these days, like how do you do that? I do think that the sort of silver lining to it is that these sort of like more niche communities behind these, like, smaller stars are more engaged anyways. So it's like, do you want this, like, are you trying to go after this passive majority that, you know, maybe isn't ever going to be that engaged with your music, or would you rather go from a bottom-up approach and kind of find your audience, your niche, and builds from there. And I think that that can be really, really powerful, and we're kind of entering this age of like cult stars rather than superstars in that sense. I forget what you even. Ask me that launch beyond this rant. [00:10:52] Dan Runcie: That was good though. [00:10:54] Tatiana Cirisano: Those are my thoughts on success.[00:10:55] Dan Runcie: Yeah. I feel like that was relevant though that, 'cause cult stars is a great way to capture this because I think shadowing back to the first thing that you said fab and fortune were so linked from the legacy of the music industry. And in many ways, they were linked that you couldn't really achieve one without the other. There was no one that was making 10 million a year from music as an artist that people really didn't know about to a certain level in terms of their take-home pay, not in terms of, you know, the money that they're generating, but today it's completely different. And of course, yeah, we mentioned how someone like Bad Bunny may be unknown to those outside of the circles. But I think we see this even more so because it's easier to achieve some of those fortunes without that same level of fame. I look at someone like Russ who, you know, he shares his TuneCore receipts and how, I forget whatever number he is pulling in, whether it's 6 figures a week or a month, or however much he's getting there, but he's clearly showing that he can pull in millions. And I mean, Russ, his music doesn't hit my circles, and if anything, the more news I hear about Russ is more related to his earnings and how he manages as an independent artist, not necessarily his music itself. And I think that speaks to me not necessarily being in that cult itself, right? But I still think that there is a space and opportunity for those artists that clearly want the fame and the fortune. You know, if you want to be able to perform in an arena and sell it out and gross, however many millions or, you know, doing the same thing in stadiums, you do have to likely follow a lot of the same traditional things from that path level, but still, even fame from that perspective doesn't hit the same way that it did. So it's a really fascinating time, and yeah, I think a lot of it does go back to both artists' expectations and the industry expectations, if the industry and the artists still have these dreams of thinking that artists can reach the levels of fame that artists did even 6, 7 years ago, then that's where people should probably be taking, 'cause I've had this conversation with so many people and they'll mention examples like, oh, well look at BTS. Oh, well look at Bad Bunny. Oh, well look at so and so, and I do think that there's something to be said for just the global aspect of the fame is just how music is reaching in different areas, and maybe that probably reflects that the people that are closest to that global superstar level, maybe just because of how saturated the US is, they're more likely to come from elsewhere, but who knows? [00:13:24] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, no. And there's also, like, a lot of benefits to this fragmentation, right? Like I feel like I, the way I'm talking about this is very like doom and gloom. but it's also very beneficial to, like, the middle tier and long tail of artists that, you know, they're actually able to have audiences. The tricky thing though is that it's still so hard to break through. It's such a fascinating conversation to have because whenever we present this data on fragmentation and our thinking around it, the question from labels is always like, okay, but how do we drive culture? How do we create those moments? How do we make something mainstream? And I think there's an opportunity to kind of, like, labels are really top heavy, right? They're focusing on like the top three artists in their roster, making them superstars, and I feel like there's maybe an opportunity to spread resources more evenly across the middle and create those kind of cult stars that we were just talking about. So I think it is about changing your definition of success. I just don't know, you know, if the music industry wants to. But I might have to, I don't know. [00:14:22] Dan Runcie: Yeah, because to your point, it could be potentially even more profitable to reflect the current playing field and invest in the people that have these niches, and knowing that even though it's not going to reach everyone if this person is reaching their tribe of people, then they can double down on that. And it could probably end up being even more successful, you investing all your resources to sell you know, three artists on your roster telling that they can be the next Drake.[00:14:48] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, no, and talking about this is reminding me too of I think we both wrote about the Gunna and The Weeknd album release week, like, whenever that was, time is flying. I think that was like earlier in the year. And how, even though the weekend is like objectively a household name, a bigger star, Gunna had this more engaged niche fan base that, you know, latched onto this P phenomenon and it ended up vaulting him maybe into the mainstream. 'cause the album debuted at number one. So it's like, which of those scenarios is success? You know, like the P phenomenon that happened, so many people didn't even know that that was going on. It totally bypassed, like, the majority of the population, right? But for the target audience, it felt mainstream. And I think that that's like, what's so different about this current moment is that something can feel mainstream to that circle, but totally bypass the rest of the population. [00:15:42] Dan Runcie: Yeah. And there's so many factors at play in that that gets into this broader question that I've been thinking a lot about in terms of what does the closest thing we have to a benchmark for success look like, right? Because someone could easily look at that weekend that The Weeknd releases Dawn FM, and Gunna releases his album and Gunna outsells him, and then someone can think, oh, well, look at Gunna, you know, already selling more than the guy that performed at the Super Bowl. But if you look at it another way, The Weeknd is selling out stadiums right now and one of a handful of artists that can do that. And I love Gunna, I think he's had a great rise in everything, but he's nowhere near being able to sell out that much, at least in terms of where he is in his career right now. He could get there someday, but he's not there right now. So I feel like even that makes me wonder, okay, is streaming itself as a predictor for concert tickets or other things becoming harder to inform what it is really reflecting, or is that just its own individual metric that we are looking at? [00:16:50] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, I think it is becoming harder to use stream counts as a metric for fandom and for culture because I think those things are building off of streaming platforms. Like, fandom is building on, you know, TikTok or Twitch or wherever, whereas streaming is a lot more of a passive activity. So that's another thing is like, I feel like we need new metrics and one of them is, like, active versus passive listening, which is something that's kind of hard to track. How do you do that as a streaming platform? So yeah, I think streams don't always equal fans and that's becoming more and more true. It's just, it's a lot harder to discern. [00:17:31] Dan Runcie: Yeah. And that goes back into this broader question of the Billboard 200 and how it's trying to both combine streams, and pure album sales, and all these things to get to these numbers that we have. And it's becoming tougher and tougher to use that as a metric of what success is. If anything, these things are more reflecting, marketing budgets than they are popularity of the actual underlying music. And although the marketing was always tied with it, this is another thing that's separating further and further. And it reminds me of something that I know that MIDiA has talked about often in terms of measuring the success for these superstars when they do release albums. Remember Mark had that breakdown about Adele and how it should be, how her album for 30, we can't even compare what she had done when 25 came out in 2015, different era. She did pure CD sales and you could do that in 2015. You can't do that now. Although I think that vinyls have brought back an interesting conversation with some of this, but still it's difficult to do that, and it's making me think again because you had something similar when we looked at Beyoncé and I don't think you can necessarily compare Renaissance's numbers to Lemonade or the self-titled album before that. And we're going to have this conversation again when Taylor Swift's Midnight album comes out in a couple of months.[00:18:53]Tatiana Cirisano: No, it's so true. And I actually, I had that exact conversation with someone recently about, you know, the Billboard 200 and the Hot 100 and how it's not necessarily measuring, there's a lot of places that get left out from that count in terms of how people are consuming music. Like, I think so much of listening is happening and the fandom around it is happening off platform these days or off DSPs. It's happening like on TikTok and all these other spaces, in games, you know, wherever. And I don't know if we're accurately measuring that. I also don't think that, like I said, we're measuring so much, you know, active versus passive listening and these sort of segments of fans on streaming. Like, streaming kind of equates everyone as the same consumer, right, whether you're a super fan or whether you just press play on a playlist and sit back, you're still paying the same. You're still kind of equated as the same thing. So the question is how should we measure success today? Or how should we measure cultural impact? It's so hard 'cause I think in a lot of ways it goes beyond music. Like, if you're an artist who has really had a cultural impact, that impact is transcending music anyway, and that's kind of what it means to be like an icon or to be a cultural icon in that way. So I don't know. It's a really tough not to crack. Like, a lot of these things are qualitative, right? Like, how do you measure the cultural impact that something has? And I don't think that it necessarily parallels with commercial success. Like, you can have something that had a, a huge cultural impact for a certain group, but didn't really hit the charts or change the way that people think about making music, but didn't really hit consumers the same way. So now I'm just ranting and rambling.[00:20:34] Dan Runcie: Let's explore this a bit though. [00:20:36] Tatiana Cirisano: It's tough. [00:20:37] Dan Runcie: Let's explore a bit though because you brought up this point about active versus passive listening. So if I'm understanding you correctly, even if we started there, active listening is Gunna's album's coming out, I'm a Gunna fan, it's midnight. I want to press play and hear this album on Friday morning. [00:20:55] Tatiana Cirisano: That would be a great metric to know is, right, and I guess we have first-day streams as kind of an indicator. [00:21:01] Dan Runcie: But I guess you're saying, that's different from passive listening, which may be it's Friday. I just want to put RapCaviar on and then boom, RapCaviar has eight tracks that are going to be in the first 20 tracks that I just play as I'm going to work or something.[00:21:17] Tatiana Cirisano: Right. Exactly. And I think that's where it's more and more difficult to know, and it would be really helpful information for artists to have as well because if you're going to go this route that we've been talking about of, you know, finding your niche and finding your biggest fans and sort of going from a bottom-up approach in this fragmented environment, trying to become a cult star, you need to know who your most active listeners are, and I think that's really hard for artists to know today. [00:21:43] Dan Runcie: I think part of the other challenge, too, with any type of metric is that the music industry itself is still tied to album sales. So anything that can translate back to that will always be there. So even if streams is how majority of music consumption is happening, as it relates to chart performance, it's always going to be challenging from that perspective because I feel like the resurgence of vinyl brings back an opportunity to push these things. I look at how well Harry Styles' album had performed, but a majority of the sales from that album was because of the vinyl that he had that was sold with it. But given all the shortages, how much of Harry Styles' performance is based on the pure demand that he had, which I know, obviously, he sold them. But because of how high his number is relative to, let's say some other artists that are signed to Sony and Columbia, what if they had the same type of inventory? I think that I had similar questions thinking about whether it was a Beyoncé or even a Kendrick Lamar. If they had the amount of vinyl inventory that he had, would it be a completely different discussion? I feel like the two of them maybe had around 300,000 or so first-week album sales, Harry Styles was over half a million. But if we were to still give them all the same inventory on that perspective, what that would look like? So there's all these ways that when you look at the data, it's telling you completely different things, but people are still just responding to the top line revenue number, and it brings us back into this whole thing that we just talked about with Gunna versus The Weeknd where it's like, okay. Yep, these numbers may tell you something, but when you really dig in, it's something completely different. So it becomes a mess to try to quantify. [00:23:37]Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, exactly. You hit the nail on the head.[00:23:39] Dan Runcie: Yeah, because the comparison I've always had as a joke is like let's say that the music industry was still stuck on trying to measure everything by DVD and VHS sales, right? So they had some amalgamation of some calculation that had whatever percentage of streams that you had on Netflix that was weighted with this, plus how many VHS sales you had, plus how many DVD sales, and this gives you a DVD equivalent unit. If you presented that metric to someone, someone would be like, that is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard in my life. [00:24:13] Tatiana Cirisano: Right, right. [00:24:13] Dan Runcie: They would laugh at you out of the door, but that's what we've normalized in the music at this time.[00:24:19] Tatiana Cirisano: That's what we're doing. Isn't that just a metaphor for so much? Yeah, it's true. I also think it goes back to exactly what you're saying about, maybe these charts are more indicating the marketing budget and you know, how they decided about bundles or we're going to sell vinyl or whatever we're going to do to try to make it to the top of the charts. And I wonder what these charts would look like weighted differently, or we are talking about fragmentation. It's so fascinating to look at, you know, the charts across different platforms and see that they're totally different. So I do wonder a lot, like what are we actually measuring when we're looking at, you know, the Hot 100 or the Billboard 200.[00:24:57] Dan Runcie: Great question and great segue, too, 'cause I wanted to chat with you about this, how you look at a lot of these platform charts, especially the non-digital streaming providers and the artists who are on the top look completely different. You even see this a little bit with some of the DSPs as well, where some of the artists on top of your Amazon and Apple music may look a little different from what you see on Spotify. What's your take on that overall and do you think that artists themselves should be keeping this in mind when they are focusing or when they are thinking about how best to build an audience? [00:25:34] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, no. I mean, I think that it's just another really apparent reflection of the fragmentation that's happening. And I think it does make sense knowing all this as an artist to rather than try and dominate every platform, which is next to impossible, trying to kind of find where you fit in and dominate there. And that is sort of like that bottom-up approach, but from a platform perspective, and also might, like, reduce the feeling from artists that they need to be, you know, popular everywhere and they need to be churning out content on every platform and all that. I think the risk though, is that, especially when we're talking about non-DSP, there's artists that maybe have the most followers on TikTok, but they're not being followed for their music. They're being followed 'cause they make funny videos or their song has the most uses because it's become a joke that people are sharing around and not as many people are streaming it offline. So I think it is a good idea as an artist to maybe figure out what platform fits you best, but you also need to understand, like, the particular sort of idiosyncrasies of each of those platforms. I also think, I think you've written about this a lot like segmenting your audience across platforms as a strategy. And I think that's another way that you can kind of use this information as an artist if you know that you have an audience on one platform that is looking for this specific thing and another, that's looking for another, why not, you know, release your full album on Spotify, but you know, the deluxe edition only on Patreon for your biggest supporters or something like that. Or even, there's this indie artist mxmtoon, who I think is a really interesting example of like a modern-day sort of artist slash creator where she has a presence on pretty much every platform. YouTube, she has a podcast, she's on TikTok, she has like a Discord, I think. But every single one of those is used for something totally different. And she has audiences that kind of funnel through all of them. But YouTube is where she does ukulele tutorials and, like, TikTok is where she does Q and As, and the Discord is where the true fans go to congregate. And that's also a path that may be unsustainable for a lot of artists, and I don't like, I'm not trying to suggest that everyone should be on every platform, you know, there are eight octopus arms, like doing all the things. I think that's one of the, like, things that's problematic about the creator economy, but, but yeah, I do think that it's really valuable for artists to understand this fragmentation and how it plays out on different platforms because I do think there are ways to navigate that and kind of use it to your advantage. [00:28:07] Dan Runcie: There's definitely a benefit to focus here. And this, as you mentioned, spans beyond artists. It does look at everyone that is a creator. And maybe just for clarity for the folks listening, when we're talking about DSPs, we're specifically talking about the ones that a lot of people are paying monthly subscriptions to, so your Spotify, Amazon, Apple music. When we're talking about non- DSPs, we're talking about the place where you could still hear music and artists can still build platforms, but they're not in the same type of way as the other. So we're talking about TikTok, we're also talking about YouTube and maybe some of the other platforms there, although YouTube does have some hybrid tendencies there, but to level set that piece of it. I do think that focus helps a lot because I look at someone like an NBA YoungBoy and how he's been able to just blow up and dominate on YouTube. That takes time of really understanding the algorithm, understanding what works here, and just given how big the platform is that did help him grow and have traction on Apple music, on Spotify, and on other places. So I've heard a lot of people refer to this 80-20 rule. That's a lot of content creators, which I think could be helpful for artists as well, where if there was a platform that you're focusing 80% of your time to try to focus on and just understand, especially if there's an advantage there where others that are in your niche, maybe aren't necessarily doing as much. And then you're still having your feet in the others to just understand what those opportunities could look like. I feel like that type of approach could work well because that's how you get to the levels of, you mentioned the independent artists who essentially tailored so much of the content for each area. And while there's a lot that benefits there, obviously, it isn't completely scalable, but I feel like that's how you get to these things. And we've seen other examples of how people have just focused on a particular platform or just doubled down the risk of that. Of course, when we can talk about this in a minute, is that you do relinquish a lot of your power to any decision that that platform does make, especially if you're relying on so much of it for your business when you necessarily own anything underneath that. So there's definitely trade-offs, but there's benefits too. [00:30:18] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, no, that's a huge issue there. Which we'll get, yeah, we'll get into more of that, that stuff in a minute, but this approach of like focusing on a platform also means that you're seeing these non- DSP platforms as a form of consumption in their own right, rather than just using them as a funnel to streaming, which I think is like a trap that the music industry has kind of fallen into is, oh, make something go viral on TikTok and then push everybody to Spotify. And it's like, if the fandom and the culture and a lot of consumption is happening on TikTok, you're leaving that on the table when you're pushing people to Spotify. And you know, I think that there's a lot to be gleaned there, and we should start thinking about these platforms as their own consumption platforms in their own right.[00:30:58] Dan Runcie: Yeah. As a content creator myself, I've heard a lot of people use that analogy of give, give, give, give, give, and then ask. So it's not like you're just going there and asking and trying to transport folks over. You're still making some enough effort to make sure that you're connecting authentically with the folks on the platform, but you still know that when there was time for an ask, you're thoughtful about how you're doing, and you're not doing it all the time because trying to take people off the platform, especially TikTok, which has grown in so many ways because of passive engagement, it's even harder. [00:31:31] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, yeah, no, I think this is something that you wanted to get into anyway, but just, like, the objectives of the platform and the creator are totally different because the platform has the best-case scenario when there is all this passive viewing and people are just scrolling endlessly and they're spending a lot of time on the platform, but that's not the best case scenario for the creator. So the audience and the platform get all the benefit. And the creator kind of falls to the wayside. And I think that's a big issue that we're seeing in the creator economy. [00:31:57] Dan Runcie: Yeah. And this is a big issue that I know that people have had about Web 2.0 more broadly and just how this can be improved. The challenge I've seen though is that any type of platform I've seen that does try to be more creator-focused and doesn't try to do the same things that marginalize the content that the creators make, a lot of those platforms struggle to gain traction, or they're only used in these niche type of ways. So it creates a bit of this double-edged sword where the creators themselves feel like, well, if I focus on the platforms that are solely built to cater to me and prioritize me over the content, then it's going to be hard to get the users there because it isn't designed in a way to keep the users engaged, just thinking about the extent that the more popular platforms do and more popular platforms are the ones that prioritize the content over the creators. So it's one of these unfortunate situations that has continued on and on, and that's why we're at the point we are now.[00:32:59] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, I think that we do see that happen more often than not. And before we even got to this point where content is becoming more important that the creator, which I could talk about in a minute the objectives are just totally, like I said, misaligned, like the platforms need scale. They need to monetize. All of the combined audiences of these individual creators. But the creators are looking more so for fan bases and engaged followers than they are looking for, you know, these passive audiences. So it actually, I think a lot of the struggles that creators are having with these platforms sort of echo issues that artists have had with streaming platforms in really interesting ways. Because it's similar to how like rights holders, like labels are monetizing scale of being able to own all of the songs and therefore all of the audiences of dozens, if not hundreds of artists, but those artists individually will never have enough scale to earn a meaningful income from streaming. And I think the same sort of thing is playing out with creators now where the platform is getting all the benefit because they get the combination of all these audiences and it's best for them. If people are just mindlessly scrolling, whereas creators have just totally different objectives and a different way of earning money. And then the current algorithm, or like the one that everyone's trying to kind of copy, which is TikTok, is making matters worse because there's no need to even actually follow anyone or, you know, really engage that much with the platform because you're going to be served content that is tailor-made for you regardless. So we're kind of teaching people with that kind of discovery-focused feed, not to actually follow individuals and more to just expect this constant flow of content. And again, going back to the parallels with streaming, it's interesting how we went from a few years ago, talking about TikTok as this amazing democratizing force to now talking about how well, yeah, it's democratized 'cause everybody can post anything, but it's impossible for anyone to get heard. We've gone through the same trajectory with streaming where, 5 years ago, we were all saying, oh, my God, streaming is great. It's democratized the industry. And in many ways it has, but now we're seeing all these second-order impacts where it's really, really hard for anyone to break through the noise, and it's really, really hard for anyone to earn meaningful income, so, yeah. [00:35:14] Dan Runcie: The pattern is clear. You laid it out perfectly. [00:35:17] Tatiana Cirisano: It's crazy. [00:35:17] Dan Runcie: And one thing about TikTok, everyone talks about how quick it is to grow a following, how favorable the algorithm is when you start off, and all those things are intentional. It is the easiest platform to be able to gain tens of thousands of followers and even more, but it's the hardest to be able to translate those followers into actual fans because it's more likely that they are going to be passive folks that are engaging versus active ones. And we're going to see more and more of that, especially given to goals to try to expand into so many other places, and then additionally, every other app trying to copy what TikTok is doing, because they see that being the norm. And now that that's what they see as the standard operating procedure for how to keep people's attention and engagement, everyone is trying to have their own version of that.[00:36:09] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah, you know, and I think that people do have an appetite for, like, wanting to follow individuals. I mean, that's what everything has been based on up until now. And people were annoyed when Meta changed its algorithm and said, it's all going to be discovery-focused now because you go to Instagram to see updates from your friends and people that you follow, not to just get this feed of things that you've people you've never heard of. So I think that there is still, like, an appetite for that. And there's sort of a chance to recalibrate and allow more ways to actually follow creators and not just make it all about each individual piece of content. But I think that we're kind of in a critical window right now to preserve that. And I don't know if we're talking about this enough. Yeah, it's just the situation, like to kind of bring it back to artists is really difficult because you need every individual thing that you post to do well. It's not enough to just have one thing, draw someone in because they might not even follow you from there. And they're just consistently scrolling and getting more and more content. So there's just this endless churn of content happening. And it's just, yeah, it's benefiting audiences and it's benefiting platforms, but it's not benefiting creators. [00:37:18] Dan Runcie: The need to preserve is there, as you mentioned, and we talked a lot about some of the platforms that have made it challenging. Are there ready that stand out to you that you're like, okay, they are at least making an effort or do you feel like there's more opportunity there relative to some of the other platforms that exist?[00:37:35] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah. I do think that YouTube could be an exception to the rule with this. I think that it's a really interesting company because when you think about it, they kind of were the original creator economy company and kind of are seemingly doubling down on that now. I think that it's great how there's sort of this network between YouTube shorts, YouTube music, YouTube, and that's sort of what I think is missing, but won't be for long from TikTok is that you have to switch to a different platform to listen to the music, which is why if ByteDance, you know, release Resso worldwide or make this TikTok music app, it might become crazy powerful, but, yeah, I think YouTube does have this focus on channels and following people. And I think a lot of creators have been able to build sustainable incomes there. But I do worry that the impact of all these other platforms kind of teaching people not to follow and not to follow individuals and channels is going to have an impact, but I think YouTube has a lot of potential. [00:38:35] Dan Runcie: Yeah, I think so, too. It definitely is the platform, bad thing has the most ability to offer this just given the full complexity of whether or not you're an artist, you're someone that's creating any type of thing that has video, you're probably going to be on there. I also do think about platforms like SoundCloud, Audiomack, and Tidal as well because...[00:38:55] Tatiana Cirisano: A hundred percent.[00:38:56] Dan Runcie: ... even though they may not necessarily fit into the same buckets as some of the others we mentioned, I do think that the things they've tried to do, whether it's with SoundCloud's fan-powered royalties or with Tidal's user-centric base model, which is similar, or even what Audiomack has done with its supporters program, allowing people to say, Hey, this is the person that I want to give my money to. If there's extra money at the end of the year, this is the person I want to have a badge on and want to be able to share that with the profile, they keep the connection there. They're willing to share who are particular artists' followers and fans are, which is something that most of the other DSPs don't allow to happen. So I do think that they are more unique opportunities. And also, I would say tracing back to the last thing we talked about, a place where a lot of artists, if they are trying to build up a fan base on a particular platform could be an interesting angle to prove, because I do think there is a certain type of fan and artist that thrives on each of those platforms individually, just given the brand there, everything else. So those are the ones that I keep an eye out for, the same way that we saw NBA YoungBoy and others rise up. SoundCloud, of course, had its SoundCloud rap era and there's still artists coming out there. And of course, Tidal, I think, just given its origins will always have deep roots within hip-hop culture. So I'm always keeping an eye out for those.[00:40:18] Tatiana Cirisano: A hundred percent. No, I'm glad you brought up Audiomack and SoundCloud. Those are two companies that, I mean, we worked with SoundCloud on a user-centric royalties white paper that was really just eye-opening with all of this. And I do think that there are opportunities to, going back to what we were saying about being able to actually segment your fans on streaming and see who are your biggest supporters and not have everyone just equated into the same bucket. I think what Audiomack is doing is really smart because those support badges are also a way for people to express themselves. If you have that in your profile, you know, it says something about who you are. And I think there's a lot more opportunities to bring music and self-expression closer together 'cause I think that streaming has kind of pulled them apart a little bit by sort of equating everyone. So yeah, I think those are really good examples and really promising.[00:41:04] Dan Runcie: So there you have it. We solved it. I think in this conversation, we solved it all. [00:41:10] Tatiana Cirisano: There we go. We can all go home. Class is dismissed. [00:41:13] Dan Runcie: This is great. Tati, thanks for sharing your insights and some of the highlights of the research you've done on this space. Excited to see what you have coming up next, especially now that things are ramping back up for the industry. So for the folks listening, where can they stay tuned to keep up with the latest research that you have coming out? [00:41:32] Tatiana Cirisano: Yeah. You can go to MIDiAResearch.com, where we have a blog that I write on often. Those posts are free. So even if you're not a client, you can read them. And I also wanted to mention that I'll be talking more about this exact topic at Stan Con in New York on October 5th, which is Denisha, who I think she had an episode with you recently, right, Dan. If you heard that episode, it's her conference, so I'll be there talking more about fandom and fragmentation. So looking forward to that and thank you so much for having me. [00:41:59] Dan Runcie: Of course, great minds coming together. I'm glad you're going to that. That's awesome. Thank you.[00:42:03] Dan Runcie: If you enjoyed this podcast, go ahead and share it with a friend. Copy the link, text it to a friend, post it in your group chat, post it in your Slack groups, wherever you and your people talk, spread the word. That's how Trapital continues to grow and continues to reach the right people. And while you're at it, if you use Apple podcast, go ahead, rate the podcast. Give it a high rating and leave a review. Tell people why you liked the podcast. That helps more people discover the show. Thank you in advance. Talk to you next week.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Breaking news! This week, join Dmitri Vietze, Eleanor Rust, and Shayli Ankenbruck for a news roundup of current events and emerging trends across the music industry. Dive into the latest MIDiA Research article exploring content consumption. How has the pandemic continued to influence content consumption habits? How do background and social consumption impact engagement and marketing strategies? Learn more about the current state of the NFT marketplace and investments in web3. Find out how event tech and consumer demand have fueled an unprecedented year in live music. Get the latest updates on the 4th Annual Music Tectonics Conference. What's next for the music industry? Find out on this week's episode.   The Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. Visit MusicTectonics.com to learn more, and find us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Let us know what you think!

Gamescom, the biggest video game trade show in the world, has come and gone. Of course, we were there to check out a whole range of games and to discuss the status quo of video game culture with experts. Here is our report!Shownotes00:05:42 One P I E C E Odyssey (Our hoster does not allow the word to be written normally here, sorry. It is that famous manga/anime series about the guy in the straw hat.)00:09:24 Floodland (with Kacper Kwiatkowski, Co-Boss and Creative Advisor at Vile Monarch)00:21:10 Goat Simulator 3 (with Sebastian Erikkson, CEO at Coffee Stain)00:37:32 Video Games vs Social Media (with Karol Severin, Senior Analyst at MIDiA Research)00:49:55 Blockchains and the Metaverse (with Michelle Kang, Head of Growth at Nervos Network)01:01:59 Vikings on Trampolines01:08:46 Lies of P01:11:20 Using Games for Citizen Science (with Attila Szantner, CEO & Co-Founder of Massively Multiplayer Online Science)01:23:21 ConclusionGet Studying Pixels PlusWebsite | Twitter | Instagram Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The artist-to-fan relationship is constantly evolving. In the old days, middlemen at the record label used radio, TV and other marketing channels to promote an artist. Then, new tools and technologies emerged which enabled artists a direct relationship with their fans - or a ‘direct–to-fan' model. Now things are advancing again towards a ‘fan-to-fan' model - where the fans themselves become the key to reaching and engaging new fans. Our guide today to this evolution is Tatiana Cirisano. Tatiana is an award-winning music industry journalist, analyst and consultant based in Brooklyn by way of Miami. As an analyst and consultant at MIDiA Research, she identifies the risks and opportunities in the rapidly-changing music market for leading global entertainment and tech companies. Before this, she was a music business reporter at Billboard, where she wrote cover stories on influential artists like Tame Impala, Travis Scott and Alicia Keys. Learn about MIDiA research at: midiaresearch.com/ and check out their blog, featuring Tatiana's weekly musings. Learn more about Tatiana at: tatianacirisano.com/ and follow her on Twitter: @tatianacirisano ... Beatseeker has been selected by Feedspot as one of the Top Music Technology Podcasts on the web: https://blog.feedspot.com/music_technology_podcasts/ Learn more: beatseeker.fm Insta: @beatseekerpod Twitter: @beatseekerpod Facebook: facebook.com/beatseekerpod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/beatseeker Beatseeker is sponsored by the Boombox Music League: boomboxsoftware.com

Music industry analyst, consultant, and reporter, Tatiana Cirisano joins the podcast this week to discuss current industry trends found at MIDia research. Formerly an award winning music journalist at Billboard, Tatiana wrote cover stories on influential artists like Tame Impala, Travis Scott, and Alicia Keys. On the show, Tatiana gets into a deep discussion with Brian and Nick on the future of the music industry and the opportunities posed by the Metaverse. Show Notes: [1:23] - How Tatiana got her start in music journalism. [5:08] - A deep dive discussion of the various applications of music in the Metaverse. [10:50] - What a virtual concert could provide vs. IRL. [25:33] - Incentives for artists to do virtual concerts. [26:45] - A discussion of social media and the difficulties it poses for introverted artists. [31:44] - What brought Tatiana to MiDia research and a look at how they approach entertainment industry analysis. [32:57] - MIDia has found data to back up a shift in goals among most artists. [35:43] - A shift in how younger generations want to interact with music vs passive listening. Follow Tatiana on Twitter and check out her website.

French and American energy giants TotalEnergies and Chevron are pulling out of Myanmar. They've cited deteriorating human rights in the wake of last year's coup in the country. We find out more from Gareth Leather, who is on the emerging markets team at Capital Economics. Also in the programme, an investment of more than $400 million by the mining firm Rio Tinto on a potential lithium venture in Serbia appears to have come to nothing. The BBC's Guy Delaunay explains why. After the British culture secretary warned that the way the BBC is funded may be coming to an end in the next few years, the BBC's Rob Young explores the way public service broadcasters are funded around the world. Plus, the singer Adele has been forced to cancel a series of gigs, or residency, in Las Vegas at the last minute. Mark Mulligan of entertainment analysis company MIDiA Research tells us about the attraction to artists of the residency format. Today's edition is presented by Fergus Nicoll, and produced by Will Bain, Sara Parry and Philippa Goodrich.

The creator economy is exploding as artists are looking for more ways to break through the massive amount of content available. With streaming platforms on the rise, artists are no longer going the traditional route, they are taking their music straight to the people. Everything has multiplied...new content formats, how content is produced and promoted and much more. In this episode we talk to Mark Mulligan, Managing Director and Analyst at MIDiA Research and Katy Templeman-Holmes, Director Global Markets for HARMAN Professional to discuss the rise of the creator economy, where it might take the music industry, what potential it brings for artists and how audio companies can support by providing the right equipment.

Welcome to the latest episode of Talking Trends, the weekly podcast from Music Business Worldwide – where we go deep behind the headlines of two major news stories affecting the entertainment industry.This week, host Louise Porter and MBW founder Tim Ingham discuss the music industry's "quiet giant" – the DIY distribution and tools sector.One leading player, UnitedMasters, recently secured a valuation of $550 million, via a new $50 million fundraise. That news came shortly after another key DIY company, DistroKid, secured a $1.3 billion valuation.According to Midia Research, self-releasing artists using these and other platforms generated $1.2 billion in royalties last year – making up over 5% of the total global recorded music industry.On the Talking Trends podcast, Ingham suggests that UnitedMasters founder, Steve Stoute, could now be considering a potential sale of some or all of the company – or an IPO on the stock market.Says Ingham: "The [IPO] narrative for UnitedMasters is an easy and obvious one: we are a major player in this DIY space [which is] statistically growing faster as a sector than the major record companies. The other part of it is that the DIY industry is actually an active threat to Warner and Universal. So if you wanted to sell the sort of 'alternative investment' argument – 'bring your money over here, rather than putting it into Universal or Warner' – that would be a good line."Porter and Ingham also discuss Universal Music Group's latest quarterly results, as Ingham analyzes a Q3 earnings call presentation given by Sir Lucian Grainge, UMG's Chairman and CEO.Ingham suggests that, by committing to long-term investment in artists while also projecting bulky profits for its investors, Universal is navigating "the age-old business dilemma of what to save and what to spend".Talking Trends is supported by Voly Music, the new bespoke financial management platform for people in the music business.

Jay discovered the yet-to-be-watched Tom Dowd & the Language of Music in his collection recently and decided to give it a shot. A documentary made in 2003, the film is about the gifted and charismatic multi-instrumentalist and physicist turned legendary recording engineer & producer, Tom Dowd. Jay couldn't say enough about the film and Greg recalls seeing it shortly after it's release and concurs. We're definitely adding this the YSCIO movie list!Songs:Tragically Hip - "New Orleans Is Sinking" (Hi Susan!)Wilson Pickett - "Something You Got"Nick saw the news that The National is releasing its entire catalog on BandCamp, a few weeks following a similar announcement from Radiohead. Alongside an article by Mark Mulligan on by Midia Research back in June titled “How Bandcamp could really fix the music business” [link], the topic seemed ripe for the picking. So today we discuss BandCamp and how it does (and could) fit in an artist's strategy to achieving a livable wage creating and performing music.Song: Thee Sacred Souls - “It's Our Love”Shortly before recording, we learned that legendary jazz guitarist & composer Pat Martino passed away at the age of 77. Greg grew up idolizing Mr. Martino, who retained his incredible skills well into his 70s, and shares some really personal stories, including meeting and even receiving a lesson from the legend. It's another tough loss, but this one seemed to hit deeper. He will be missedSongs:Pat Martino - “Just Friends”Pat Martino - “Minority”

On June 1st, 2008, a fire broke out on the backlot of Universal Studios in Hollywood, CA, destroying nearly 175,000 audio master tapes belonging to some of the most well-known artists worldwide, including Peter Frampton, Beck, Sheryl Crow, Elton John, Les Paul, and thousands of others lost forever.  John Kohl, the CEO, and co-founder of TuneGO, is our guest on this episode to discuss the music industry's biggest challenge: the digitization and secure storage of creative content, preventing such things from happening in the future. TuneGO is pretty much like having a record label in a box. The company offers the first digital end-to-end platform empowering artists to manage their music careers by developing a secure and unified digital ecosystem where independent artists can take control over the management, storage, promotion, and distribution of their music—as well as intellectual property rights. In this episode, we also discuss: The music industry used to be controlled by a handful of powerful gatekeepers, but digital technology upended all of that. Gone are the days where a handful of record labels control which artists are on the radio and are sold in stores. The doors have been open to millions of independent music creators. Even though digitization has transformed the production and distribution of music, artists' back catalogs remain antiquated—and in many cases, are not correctly stored or archived. This leaves artists' intellectual property dangerously vulnerable to destruction—look at the 2008 Universal Studios fire.  Music from independent artists accounts for $6.9 billion in revenue or 39.9% of the recorded music industry's market share (according to Worldwide Independent Network and MIDiA Research). Theft of content and the intellectual property rights to it remain key challenges. About TuneGO TuneGO serves as a secure, fully integrated digital ecosystem where independent artists control the management, storage, promotion, and distribution of their music –and intellectual property rights to their music. The TuneGO Vault is a patented cloud-based platform for securely storing and sharing music in digital form, including audio files and the project and stem files (bass, drums, vocals, and melody of a track) from recording sessions. The TuneGO Vault is not only for individual artists but for record labels as well. Hidden Beach Recordings recently tapped the Vault as a way to digitally secure its entire back catalog of music, videos, and exclusive digital artwork—as well as all future assets. Their patented technology allows artists to securely manage their digital content and metadata on the same platform they distribute their music—ensuring they are paid all of their royalties. TuneGO is a first-of-its-kind solution that gives artists and labels complete control over the entire creative process, providing the ability to establish a chain of custody for a song before the minting of a non-fungible token (NFT). www.tunego.com The Business Side of Music ™ Lotta Dogs Productions LLC   Co-Produced and Hosted (by the guy who has a face for podcasting):  Bob Bender Co-Producer, Creator, and Technical Advisor (the man behind the curtain):  Tom Sabella Director of Video and Continuity (the brains of the entire operation): Deborah Halle Audio/Video Editor Mark Sabella Midnight Express Studio  Olian, NY Marketing and Social Media: Kaitlin Fritts Executive Assistant to Bob and Tom (the one who keeps us on track and our schedules straight) Tammy Kowalski All Around Problem Solver: Connie Ribas Recorded at: The Bunker in Franklin, TN (except during the Covid 19 pandemic, then it's pretty much done VIA Skype or over the phone, with the exception for those fearless enough to come to Bob Bender's living room… and there are a few). Mixed and Mastered at Music Dog Studios in Nashville, TN Production Sound Design: Keith Stark Voice Over and Promo: Lisa Fuson Special Thanks to Tom Sabella and Traci Snow for producing and hosting over 100 episodes of the original “Business Side of Music” podcast, and trusting us to carry on their legacy.   Website: Sponsorship information  Interview submission

Spotify (SPOT) continues to dominate the global subscription music streaming market. According to a research firm, Midia Research, it is losing 2% of its market share to faster-growing competitors in the first quarter of this year. Apple (AAPL) was in second place with a 16 percent share of the market for Apple Music. Amazon Music (AMZN) and China's Tencent Music (TME) tied for third place with a 13 percent share each. Alphabet's (GOOGL) YouTube Music came in fifth place with an 8 percent market share. Spotify stock fell on the news, bringing the company's year-to-date loss to 17.1 percent as of Monday's close.

 Lo nuevo en la newsletter de @ViaPodcast: ✅ El uso de Instagram, Tik Tok y Twitter crecen; Facebook y You Tube caen en España. ✅ Twitter lanza un pódcast. ✅ Fewcents, un servicio para monetizar a los que no se subscriben, recauda $1,6 millones.   ✅ Cinco categorías de pódcast tuvieron un crecimiento de dos dígitos en descargas.  ➽ Diario argentino lanza Jornada Podcast.  ➽ Fundador de MIDiA Research, cree que aunque los efectos del aumento de precios de Spotify es algo bueno para el avance de la industria.   ➽ Los premios Peabody anuncian 7 nominados al mejor pódcast.  Herramientas y servicios  ➽ SimpleCast lanza «Ad-Free Feeds».   ➽ Sybel lanza nueva aplicación intuitiva para la web.  ➽ Pódcast recomendado El Estallido de las Cosas. Es una serie sonora en la que se cuentan historias desde el punto de vista de los objetos que se volvieron protagonistas y emblemáticos durante el estallido social ocurrido en Chile en 2019. Este pódcast, de 6 capítulos, forma parte de la plataforma Border Podcast y es producido por Mucha Media con el apoyo de la Universidad de Bristol, Invisibles Coop, Goethe Institute y Centro NAVE.

Music Tech analyst Mark Mulligan of MIDiA Research explores what comes next after streaming saturation in this talk recorded at Music Tectonics’ conference teaser event, The Shock Before the Quake. As the streaming market reaches saturation, where will new growth drivers arise? Which unlikely platforms are poised to take the lead in converting free users to subscribers? Why are we still mistaking quantity for quality when it comes to music discovery? How do you socially distance a mosh pit? Where is livestreaming in the hype cycle, and how is the music industry repeating past mistakes with livestreaming? Conference attendees can watch video of this talk- and more from the conference- in the Music Tectonics community app. If you missed out, there’s a chance to catch up at https://pages.musictectonics.com/noFOMO! The Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. Visit MusicTectonics.com to learn more, and find us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Let us know what you think!

podcast de "Tecnología Artística" por Fede Gaumet . MIDiA Research es una empresa que se dedica a realizar estadísticas de los movimientos artísticos globales, tanto industria como independientes, y realiza informes. En éste podcast resumo alguno de sus puntos más importantes sobre la música, su industria, lxs independientes y las redes sociales futuras para músicxs. . Desde el 2018 vengo realizando columnas de música y tecnología para el programa #SintoníaFinaRadio que se emite por 102.3FM "Más que Música" de la Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Además de seguir saliendo semanalmente por la radio también comenzaré a publicarlos en formato podcast de regularmente por Youtube, otras redes y la web de divulgación http://tecnologiaartistica.com . #tecnologiaartistica #podcast #sintoniafinaradio #industriamusical #musicosindependientes #fedegaumet

Pandemic lockdowns revolutionized how people consume music overnight. After gathering and analysing the resulting data, Mark Mulligan of MIDiA Research offers his insights and predictions for the future of streaming, live events, and the unexpected blooming of new use cases for music. How have music fans’ need states changed, and how does the industry need to change to meet them? How will live streaming have to mature to become a significant revenue generator? Will the coming recession result in bouncebacks or carve outs? What can music tech companies do now to weather these seismic shifts?  Find out from Mark in a presentation recorded at our Isolate or Innovate forum. You don’t want to miss Mark Mulligan’s illuminating infographics. Find his slide deck in the Music Tectonics community app: https://app.musictectonics.com/ The Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. Visit MusicTectonics.com to learn more, and find us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Let us know what you think!

Explore fault lines in the recorded music industry from Teddy Boys to TikTok with Mark Mulligan of MIDiA Research. When Mark opened the first annual Music Tectonics Conference in October in Los Angeles, he lobbed visions from the future into the audience. We captured the audio of his unique mix of trendspotting, economic analysis, and prediction so you can hear what you missed. What does “peak attention” mean for the music biz? Why are mobile games the canary in the digital coalmine? Which approaching seismic shift does Mark think will be even bigger than streaming? How is the digital music market like the gold rush, and who is holding the picks and shovels? The Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. Stay tuned for more audio from the first Music Tectonics Conference! Visit MusicTectonics.com to learn more, and find us on twitter, facebook, and Instagram. Let us know what you think!

Dans cet épisode de « Business Of Music » par « La Story », Jean-Philippe Louis revient sur le business d’un format musical privilégié à la fin des années 90 et au début des années 2000 : la compilation. Entre NRJ Hits, M6 hits jusqu’aux playlists, ces albums englobants divers artistes sur divers labels a permis de booster le marché du CD... avant l’arrivée du streaming. Business of Music est un podcast présenté et réalisé par Jean-Philippe Louis avec Nicolas Jean. Cet épisode a été enregistré en octobre 2019 dans les locaux des Echos. Invités : Mark Mulligan ( analyste pour Midia Research sur la musique ) et Antoine Monin (chargé des relations labels chez Spotify). Voix traduction (Yann Duvert) Musique : Purple Planet. Voir Acast.com/privacy pour les informations sur la vie privée et l'opt-out. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

We talk a lot about seismic shifts in the music industry, and Mark Mulligan is a true music tech seismologist. If you’ve read his Music Industry Blog, followed his work with MIDiA Research, or seen him speak, you know that his data-powered approach is unparalleled for understanding, explaining, and predicting upheavals in the music tech landscape. This week Mark takes Dmitri and Tristra on a whirlwind tour of the seismic shifts he’s tracking. Find out why Mark believes that this is “The Age of the Empowered Artist.” Who has the resources to navigate a music industry that’s increasingly fluid? What are streaming services in Europe and North America getting wrong about social listening and fandom? Why isn’t music the teenage cultural touchstone that it used to be? How can you get a Mark Mulligan trading card? Mark delves into it all, with mind-blowing truth bombs around every turn. If you like this episode, don’t miss Mark’s keynote at the Music Tectonics Conference, Oct 28-29 in LA! The Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. Visit MusicTectonics.com to learn more, and find us on twitter and facebook. What do you think? Connect with Dmitri Vietze on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

Listen to Mark Mulligan’s electric Midem keynote address, recorded earlier today in Cannes! Mark, a long term music industry analyst and the managing director of MIDiA Research, presents the 10 trends that will reshape the Music industry based on MIDiA’s rigorous analysis. What he has to say about the global music streaming marketplace, audience engagement, and music discovery may surprise you! Music Tectonics is at Midem! Stay tuned for a wave of #MidemTectonics coverage. Podcast host Dmitri Vietze is recording interviews with Midemlab competitors and international music tech superstars, on the spot in Cannes. The Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. Weekly episodes include news roundups, interviews with music tech movers & shakers, and more.     Music Tectonics podcast goes beneath the surface of the music industry to explore how technology is changing the way business gets done. The podcast includes news roundups, interviews, and more. Find the episode on iTunes or wherever you listen to podcasts. We're now on Stitcher, Spotify, and Google Play!

NotiPod Hoy con Aracely Rivera y Melvin Rivera Velázquez - ¿Quienes serán los vencedores en la batalla por el futuro de la distribución del audio bajo demanda? - Según Midia Research, basados en datos de Australia, Estados Unidos, Reino Unido, Canadá, Brasil, México, Alemania y Suecia, el 18% de los usuarios de streaming de música escuchan podcasts, mientras solo un 15% escucha listas de reproducción curadas. - Aseguran que el futuro del podcasting será la suscripción. - Mike Pesca celebra el quinto aniversario del podcast The Gist (Slate) compartiendo lo que ha aprendido al hacer un podcast diario de noticias. - Razones para comenzar un podcast de negocios. - ¿Qué pueden aprender los podcasts de la radio? - Según Edison Research, el 51% de las personas que escuchan podcasts aseguran que lo utilizan como una forma de relajarse antes de irse a dormir. - Poco a poco más personas van conociendo los podcasts en Uruguay y según Podcasteros se ha abierto un gran abanico de opciones. - James Cridland de Podnews investigó como se muestran las notas en las apps para escuchar podcasts. - Spreaker, popular alojador de podcasts, se integra con el software de grabación y edición de audio Hindenburg y ahora puedes publicar tu podcast en Spreaker desde Hindenburg. - Podcast recomendado: 'Cuentos infantiles'. Es un podcast basado en capítulos de minicuentos para niños. Andrés Escobar García, su creador, lo define como cuentos ‘narrados para mi hijo y los demás que quieran escucharme’.

Hi Podcast listeners! Thanks for downloading. Be sure to get a copy of the Break the Business audiobook, now available on Amazon, Audible, and iTunes! This week, Ryan discusses findings from a recent study released by Midia Research which noted that unsigned artists only make up 2.7% of global recorded music revenue. Does this mean that it is a bad idea to go indie? Heck no! Ryan breaks down the study and discusses why there has been no better time to take control of your own music career. Music business consultant and radio host Bree Noble stops by in the second segment to talk about her upcoming Profitable Musician Summit and goes over the finer points of cooperative marketing. Find out more about the Summit by visiting www.profitablemusiciansummit.com. Great resources for indie musicians like you! Rate/review/subscribe to the Podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud, Stitcher, and Google Play. Follow Ryan @ryankair. Like Break the Business on Facebook and tell a friend about the show! And visit www.breakthebusiness.com to get a copy of Ryan’s Book “Break the Business: Declaring Your Independence and Achieving True Success in the Music Industry.”

In the latest crackdown on the media, the Turkish government has blocked access to Wikipedia citing a law that allows it to ban websites for the protection of the public. Andrea Catherwood is joined by Yaman Akdeniz, a lawyer challenging the Wikipedia ban and by Can Dündar, a Turkish journalist now in exile in Berlin. Reuters has launched a new initiative called Backstory as part of a plan to bolster trust in its journalism. Stephen Adler is Reuters Editor-in-Chief. Fix Radio is a new digital station aimed exclusively at builders and tradespeople. Is it viable? Louis Timpany is Fix Radio CEO, Mark Mulligan is Managing Director of MIDiA Research, and Andy Stevens runs Eclipse Property Solutions. Presenter: Andrea Catherwood Producer: Richard Hooper Assistant Producer: Helen Fitzhenry.