Month 1
Ash releases a 12 song album on Spotify. 11 songs are streamed 125 times each. 1 song is streamed 950 times. Spotify pays: $0.00
Month 2
The most popular song gains more streams at a higher rate due to the algorithm and design biases of Spotify. It gets 300 streams while the other tracks continue to accrue 75 streams each. For the one song that passed the 1000 stream threshold, Spotify pays Ash for only 300 of 1250 accrued streams (300 x $0.003): $0.90
Year 1
In the first year one track gets 4250 streams, and eleven get 950 each, for a total of 14700 streams. Only 3300 streams are eligible for royalty payment under the threshold rules. $34.20 is funneled to “working artists”, with 95% going to the top 2% of artists on Spotify. Spotify pays Ash (3300 x $0.003): $9.90
Year 2
Ash understandably changes focus to release only singles. One per month. Out of the 12 songs, one gets 5,000 streams, another gets 10,000 but like the debut album songs, the singles accrue 75 streams per month. For the two songs that passed the threshold Spotify pays for 14,100 of them. The remaining 10 singles collect 7500 streams by the end of the year. Lastly songs from Ash’s first album continue to get 75 streams a month for a total of 10,800 streams. Out of 32,400 total streams 14,100, or 43% are eligible for royalties. $34.90 is funneled to “working artists”, with 95% going to the top 2% of artists on Spotify. Spotify pays Ash (10,800 x $0.003): $32.40
Year 5
Ash was discouraged that only 3 songs out of 24 ever earned “amounted to anything” on Spotify and became disinterested in making music for a while. Those 24 songs continued to be streamed 75 times a month each. by year 5, out of 64,800 total streams now 0 were eligible for royalties, because tracks can go in and out of eligibility. $194.40 is funneled to “working artists”, with 95% going to the top 2% of artists on Spotify. Spotify pays Ash nothing.
Year 6
Ash starts playing music again, and eventually builds up the courage to release another 12 song album. By the end of the year 1 track makes it on a playlist and is streamed 50,000 times but the rest are streamed 900 times each. The 24 songs in Ash’s catalog are streamed 900 times each as well. Out of 81,500 total streams 50,000, or 61% are eligible for royalties. $94.50 is funneled to “working artists”, with 95% going to the top 2% of artists on Spotify. Spotify pays Ash (50,800 x $0.003): $150
Year 10
Ash gave up music. But fans didn’t give up on Ash. They continued to stream. By year 10, 100 subscribers were informed by their Spotify Unwrapped that Ash was in their top 5. All of Ash’s songs continued to get 75 streams per month. Between year 6 and 10 Ash’s songs were streamed 129,600 times. 0 streams were eligible for royalties $388.80 is funneled to “working artists”, with 95% going to the top 2% of artists on Spotify. Spotify pays Ash nothing.
After a decade Spotify paid Ash $183.30 while it funneled $712.6 of Ash’s streams to “working artists”, with 95% going to the top 2% of artists on Spotify.
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