Spotify and Apple Music are two longtime rivals in the competition between music streaming services that have millions of fans. Each of these services has its own payroll policies for artists, and each wants to attract artists in some way. Many music producers have recently called companies such as Spotify and Amazon bullies, calling their policies money-making out of artists' pockets, while describing Apple policies as more friendly. To be fair, Spotify is paying more to the music industry right now because of the fact that it's far more user-friendly than Apple Music.
In fact, Spotify has 345 million users, 155 million of whom are premium users who pay for the program, and the rest have to listen to the various ads of the program. At present, analysts say that the number of Apple Music users is about 72 million.
Apple insists that artists' fees should be specified for each broadcast, but Spotify does not use this method of payment, and believes that this method is wrong, although many people have opposed the policy.
Spotify has made its payment policies very clear to the public on its website, while Apple has sent its policies to artists in an open letter, which was recently discovered by 9to5 Mac reporters and sent to Overall, it shows that Apple plans to simply pay an average of $ 0.01 per player for each play of their music. Spotify also pays artists $ 0.005 per broadcast, which is half Apple's salary. The text of the Apple letter states that
We believe in the value of music and the fair payment of the creators for their work. Since launching the iTunes Store in 2003, we have helped millions of artists and songwriters make a living through music. As we continue to discuss streaming rights, we think it is important to share our values. We believe that we should pay the same price to each producer, we think every player is worth it and the creators never have to pay to put their music on our service.
Apple has made it clear that it does not charge artists to place their work on the service's playlists, which is interesting because Apple Music has more than 30,000 handmade playlists.
At Apple Music, we focus on songwriters and artists to create a space for them to make money from their interests.
According to the letter, Apple Music paid 5 million artists last year, which is one million more than in 2019. Since 2017, the number of artists earning more than $ 1 million has increased by about 120 percent, and the number of artists earning more than $ 50,000 a year has also doubled.