Mario Paredes

Geography 310

The business of streaming services in the music industry has created a culture without

physical landscape, altered the roles and perceptions of necessary labor, and has impacted the

ability for both artists and consumer to participate in an eclectic cultural environment. Music has

long been regarded as a symbol of cultural expression. The rise of streaming services like

Pandora, Spotify, and Beats Radio have all engaged that theory in order to markets themselves as

the preferred downloadable music service to consumers. The idea is these services provide

listeners with musical referrals based on a consumer’s preferred musical taste. This is something

that P2P, file sharing, and illegally downloading pieces of music does not offer. Streaming music

is justified as an alternative to illegal downloads with the advantage of having the opportunity to

listen to radio stations that play music catered to a consumer’s personal taste.1 The consequence

of the popularity of music streaming is that it has reshaped an entire industry and altered its

already eclectic cultural landscape by substituting a physical geography for a digital one.

Ethnographer Denis Cosgrove stated, “Landscape is . . . intimately linked with a new way

of seeing the world as a rationally ordered, designed and harmonious creation whose structure

and mechanism are accessible to the human mind.”2 He would go on to conclude that landscape

includes the perception of humans to manipulate and control the elements that make up the

world.3 Without a specific physical object of study it is difficult to imagine streaming as being

able to produce a notion of landscape or culture, but it has created just that. Richard Warr and

Mark M.H. Goode explained this phenomenon as a byproduct of the effectiveness of marketing

1Tim Paul Thomes, "An Economic Analysis of Online Streaming Music Services," Information Economics and Policy, 25 (2013): 81-91.2 The Cultural Geo Reader-Denis Cosgrove. 3 Cosgrove,.

in an online setting.4 “Goods effectively become service appliances, which would suggest that

music, as a good, should be tied in with service branding.”5 The significance of this idea, in

relation to suppliers, is that the money is not in the music, but in the service they can provide.

As such, “The music as a brand concept can be extended further when using the ability of

the Internet to create online groupings of like-minded individuals.”6 The more people Pandora or

Spotify can bring together in a virtual reality the greater the profit. In consequence, the

consumers allow themselves to fall into structured digital communities where they can interact

with and manipulate the environment. They do this as they click the “like” or “dislike” functions

of the Pandora application or use commentary features to participate in online

discussions.Enabling users to comment and give feedback on particular musical creations allows

them to interact directly.7 Lastly, the creation of the cultural landscape is completed using a

digital webpage. Those official webpages of musical artist and genres create space for like-

minded individuals to interact in a more formal setting. “Brand communities tend to exhibit three

traditional markers of community, these being: (1) shared consciousness. (2) rituals and

traditions, and (3) a sense of moral responsibility.”8 A digital community creates an environment

similar to what one would see in a physical landscape like a college, marketplace, or city hall.

Streaming services promote activity on their digital pages in order to maintain consumer interest

and it produces a culture of its own.

This is a fundamental change in, not only the music industry, but in the idea of cultural

geography. It expands the area of cultural landscape. Streaming has done this bybreeding a

4Richard Warr, and Mark Goode, "Is the Music Industry Stuck Between Rock and a Hard Place?," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 18 (2011): 126-131.5Warr et al, 128. 6Warr et al, 128.7Warr et al, 128.8Warr et al, 128.

relationship between online marketing and culture. “The explicit goal of the music Web site is to

market an identity linked to a particular movement music scene-a strategy also common among

mainstream music companies.”9Futrell et al. are referring to the use of online music marketing by

the white power movement. The brand communities created initially to serve as portals for

consumers to participate in the music market are being recreated by cultural groups like the

white power movement. The function of creating streaming services by sub-cultural groups

enhances their ability of recruitment and cultural sustainability. “Such a scene is particularly

important for highly marginalized movements like the WPM [White Power movement]. Facing,

‘strong codes against the direct [public] expression of racist views’ the music scene provides

physical and virtual spaces where members can freely express and experience the feelings and

attitudes associated with the Aryan aesthetic.”10 The brand communities, or what Futrell et al

refer to as music Web sites, allow for minority cultures to create a home in which member or

potential members are comfortable. Their culture can thrive in these settings free of direct

challenges they would face in a purely physical one.

There is also the sense of group identity that virtual worlds, promoted through streaming

music, create. “The virtual context of the WPM music scene help conjure emotions and ideas

that nourish participants’ identification with the collective ‘we’ of the scene and the wider

movement . . . virtual experiences become an increasingly important part of contemporary

identity formation process.”11 This particular article by Futrell et al. highlighted the emergence of

over 40 brand communities in North America that stream WPM music, including Panzerfaust,

that are intent to “build community around an authentic, indigenous Aryan cultural alternative to

9Robert Futrell, Pete Simi, and Simon Gottschalk, "Understanding Music in Movements: The White Power Music Scene," The Sociological Quarterly, 47, no. 2 (2006): 275-304.10Futrell et al, 295.11Futrell et al, 296.

mainstream pop culture.”12 The idea is not just to provide a streaming service of music and video

tied with the WPM, but to create an area where members of the WPM can actively participate in

protest of dominant culture with hundreds and thousands of sympathizers. Essentially, this is an

invisible landscape for the WPM created through the means of streaming. The WPM knows of

its existence in virtual geography, but people outside of the sub-culture are unaware of its

existence. The presence of an unseen landscape is evidence for the idea that streaming, as a

byproduct, has enhanced the significance of the invisible concepts of cultural geography. The

virtual world, the brand communities, and web-sites present formations and preservations of

culture, like the WPM, through an artificial environment. This differs from the traditional ideas

of culture being formed with or though the physical, natural environment.

Of greater consequence, streaming also helps the preservation of culture in spite of

natural landscape. Using the example of the WPM, it has been determined streaming via brand

communities creates a place for unpopular racist views and feelings to be expressed in a

community like stage. The WPM would be confronted with many direct challenges if these same

views were expressed in a physical setting outside of its respective physical place. As the

dominant culture of the world becomes increasingly globalized, their views have become the

focus of criticism by an incredible amount of the populace. Without the use of a digital service

like online music streaming, these subcultures are at a greater threat of extinction when faced

against the physical landscape. However, in a virtual setting they have room to grow. This idea

has also been used by less controversial cultures.

12Futrell et al, 283.

In 2008, Vanderbilt University created a streaming archive of East African Music

recordings.13 The influence of which created the Global Music Archive, a service that provides

streaming of indigenous music of Africa and the Americas.14The professor and

ethnomusicologist, Greg Barz, began the documentation because he, “realized that American

popular culture was sweeping Africa and could very well threaten centuries-old musical

traditions.”15 The organization streams the music in order to promote the preservation of minority

subcultural traditions that would otherwise fall to victim to globalization. Streaming the music to

a general audience can help create awareness of the importance of diversity. “It is a public

facility that promotes education in African and American traditional and popular music through

its own activities and its support for the activities of others.”16 Streaming music is being used to

challenge the physical geographic expansion and assimilation of a dominant culture.

Both cases create a virtual space for cultures to continue their existence in spite of losing

ground in a physical geography. The virtual landscape, though invisible, is maintaining the

culture. The cultures have an opportunity to expand and connect globally because of the

opportunities enabled to them by streaming music. Sharing music is an expression of a culture

reaching out. It allows for cultures to engage in global community. Streaming the music as a

means to share it, allows for cultures to participate and position themselves in a new virtual

world, in spite of physical geographic limitations. The limits of streaming music in a cultural

sense, are limitless. The emergence of competing services like Pandora, Spotify, Panzerfaust,

and the Global Music Archive have aided the creation of structure, order, and design in a digital

setting. Consumers of streaming services are aware of which service caters to one’s culture and

13Anonymous, . "Vanderbilt University Announces Creation of Largest, Free Streaming Audio Archive of East African Music Recordings." The Tennessee Tribune, Jan 31, 2008.14 Tribune, 2008.15 Tribune, 2008.16 Tribune, 2008.

when they choose to actively participate in their respective choice they become part of the

structure. A structure that includes a shared taste or consciousness, a byproduct of the gathering

of like-minded individuals. Streaming music is a powerful tool of culture, its only determinants

are access to a computer, the ability to upload music, and the potential to create brand

communities. However, as beneficial as streaming music can be in the alteration of cultural

settings, it is faced with the difficulty of surviving the economic impact it has on an already

globalized music industry.

Streaming music threatens the future of profitability in music. Here a Marxist approach to

streaming music is taken. Its financial success has the potential to breed its own downfall the

same way capitalism does in a Marxist model. Controversy over miniscule royalty fees,

alienation of labor, and its effect on the roles of a musician has erupted in the public eye. The

consequence of these factors is that money is not being circulated the way it should and it has the

ability to burst the music industry. Artist and investors are being pitted against each other. The

artist and the traditional labor market of the music industry argue the one sided nature of online

services. Investors and owners of streaming service companies argue the artist benefit is in

exposure and the ability for streaming to diversify an individual’s catalogue, allowing suppliers

(mainly small time musicians) to reach consumers in ways not possible before.

The life of a musician has become severely complicated in the twenty-first century.

“Digital music stores, streaming services, and webcasting stations have greatly reduced the cost

barriers to the distribution and sale of music.”17 The benefit of reduced cost is that musicians can

distribute their music much more easily. Simply uploading a video on YouTube or signing a deal

with Pandora allows for musicians to spread their name efficiently. However, “Technology has

17Kristen Thomson, "Roles, Revenue, and Responsibilities: The Changing Nature of Being a Working Musician.," http://wox.sagepub.com/content/40/4/514 (accessed February 8, 2014).

atomized the music industry, and this dispersion of both opportunity and income has meant that

musicians are juggling more work, shouldering more risk, and are tasked with more career-

management duties-often for lower rates than before.”18 Musicians can no longer consider

themselves to be participants in a specialized skill. This comes as a trade-off to the popularity of

consumers using streaming services. Musicians are expected to do more of the work when

partnered with digital services while being paid less. Artist in the industry have referred to the

payouts they receive from streaming companies as the “river of nickels.”19The money in

streaming is not getting to the artist. The changing requirement for an artist’s labor has put larger

stress on the laborer. A musician is expected to be equally specialized in musicianship and

entrepreneurship if they are to succeed in the music industry. These characteristics evolved from

the dramatic reduced cost to distribute music that is tied to streaming.

Streaming music does not require the production of a physical item or contracts with

retailers, they only need to contract the artist directly. In doing so they work out deals based

upon the number of times a song is played. When the song plays the artist receives royalties.

However, the artist’s royalties are nothing compared to the royalties they receive when a

consumer decides to own the music. The problem for musicians is consumers favor streaming

services over buying CDs because the cost of streaming is cheaper, sometimes free.20 Streaming

services play off this environment and offer musicians deals that pay little royalty. “At a royalty

rate of 0.1 to 0.2 cents per track per listener, most artists receive less than $5,000 annually.”21

18Thomson, 2013.19Sisario, Ben. "Music's future is streaming; Royalties pay big bucks for stars, but unknown artists earn micropennies per play." The Gazzette, Jan 30, 2013.

20Warr et al, 130.21Finn, Kathy. "Pandora, Spotify the new radio; Millions turn to streaming sites for music.." The Ottawa Citizen, May 08, 2012.

This particular estimate is taken from an example of the type of contract Pandora offers. The

alternative musicians face is to create their own web pages and market and sell themselves. This

entails tremendous costs to the artist that he/she might not be able to afford. Independent artist

are then better off in succumbing to the one sided contracts offered by streaming services in

hopes they gain popularity and sign record deals with major labels. All the while, they are

required to act as their managers, agents, and marketers when negotiating with large streaming

services. Issues with big name artist have also challenged streaming. Pink Floyd and Aimee

Mann, to name a few, openly criticized Pandora and MediaNet respectively.22They too complain

of little pay in a market where streaming companies have capital in the billions. “As the

companies behind these digital services swell into multibillion-dollar enterprises, the relative

trickle of money that has made its way to artists is causing anxiety at every level of the

business.”23 Artist are just not benefitting economically with streaming and it is worse for those

middle men in the industry.

“Beyond the problems associated with unauthorized file sharing, we have witnessed the

closing of retail stores [and] a drastic drop in physical album sales.”24 Stores like Tower Records

seem ancient and the physical inventory of musical product at stores like Best Buy and Walmart

have shrunk. This causes a shift in the labor market of the music industry as blue collar workers

are forced out of jobs that once employed thousands. The blue collar workforce in music has

become minimal in significance. Businesses like Blockbuster and Hollywood Video have already

suffered the evolution of the entertainment market and many employees were left without a job.

Drawing a parallel, the employees of the music industry face the same fate. Employers of the

streaming market demand skilled labors who know how to work with technology and typically

22Lyden, Jacki, "Paying The Piper: Music Streaming Services In Perspective," Weekend All Things Considered, Web.23Sisario, 2013.24 Thomson, 515.

require an advanced degree in computer sciences; qualifications that were not as dire in the pre-

existing market. Essentially, labor has become highly skilled and the need for blue collar labor

has fallen. A group of qualified people can work as efficiently as a chain store of Tower Records.

As streaming music is rapidly becoming the consumer favorite, it is the fear of musician

and distributor alike that their product will no longer be the essential piece of profit and

accessibility. While the music is necessary for the streaming services to survive, they can reach

out to artist all over the world who will be willing to provide their music at lesser costs to them.

This may diversify the consumer’s musical catalogue, but the money will be monopolized by

streaming’s biggest corporations. These fears have urged artists to form unions. The American

Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) is one union groups that aids artist in

negotiation deals with streaming services.25 The Future of Music Coalition is another example of

the unionization of musicians to battle the changing environment of the music industry. They

supply independent artist with the information necessary to live as a musician in a modern

streaming economy.26

The owners and managers of streaming services differ in opinion. They argue that the

diversity they offer gives independent artist a better chance at major record deals and the bigger

payouts to big artist are just a matter of time.The director of Artists Services at Spotify, Mike

Williamson, stated, “We might not be paying huge checks out to an artist that only as a few fans,

but the way that the model works with Spotify is as we grow, we continue to pay out more and

more money.”27 Williamson is supporting the idea that streaming services are still in their

infancy and big payouts can only come when they come of age. Artist need to be patient and

25Lyden, 2013.26Tomson, 516.27Lyden, 2013.

eventually their incomes will rise when streaming music becomes the premier form of accessing

music. This shift, as data supports, is inevitable. 2013 was the first year since the 1980s, a new

article reported, that no artist in the UK sold a million albums.28 The same article stated that 35%

of the total music market in the UK was represented by streaming services.29 These changes in

economic activity suggest streaming is the new standard of distributing music. If one is to trust

streaming services, they will eventually control the music market and achieve the payouts artist

believe they deserve, but artist are skeptical.

Yet, their faith is irrelevant to the equation for streaming services. “Many music lovers

are ditching their CD collections, listening to music on the move through their smartphone.”30 As

long as consumers support the move through consumption then the artist sentiments will take a

back seat. “The shift in music consumption preference explains why Apple, Amazon.com and

Google are pursuing their own music streaming services.”31 The market for streaming is only

gaining momentum and artist are urged to keep up with the move in spite of their complaints. It

is difficult to argue with large corporations like those mentioned above. The corporate giants of

streaming also argue, “It’s the right model if you want to build the pot of money back up to

where it was in the late ‘90s, when the industry was at its peak.”32 The financial benefits

outweigh its social ramifications.

There is also the argument that elevates streaming services into a position where they

actually help the artist who would have been lost in an already competitive market without their

service. Proponents of streaming services recognize their service to be invaluable to the exposure

28 Cardiff. "Music Streaming doubles but sales of albums slump." Western Mail, Jan 17, 2014.29 Cardiff, 2014.30Onanuga, Tola. “Money: Music Streaming goes mainstream.” The Guardian, Feb 5, 2013.31Seitz, Patrick. “Pandora, Streaming Music Trend Threatens Apple iTunes.” Investor’s Business Daily, Apr 02, 2013.32Sisario, 2013.

of diversity. Tim Westergen, founder of Pandora, implied his service to be one designed after a

musical festival where big name artists are attached to lesser known groups.33 The logic is

Pandora uses big name artist to attract listeners to a specific station and then integrates lesser

known artist it has deals with into the station. This gives the artist an exposure rate that even

touring could not do. As the streaming industry evolves, so does its opportunity for exposure.

One article regarded its evolutionary path as, “[a] grand buffets [that] focus[es] on making their

massive catalogs of music navigable and fresh. But other services will be built for niche

audiences or specific genres, catering to, for example, fans of country or classical music.”34 As

the competition among these services heats up, they will look for diversity and exclusive

contracts to attain a loyal consumer base. A byproduct of this will be more artist thrust into the

scene of a market that is traditionally dominated by a few musicians at a time. This argument

draws from the argument of cultural enhancement attained through streaming.

It is apparent that streaming music has changed the roles and perceptions of labor in the

market, but it is too early to conclude where it is going. This is a relatively fresh debate in the

industry and one that will not go away any time soon. If Marxist predictions are correct, then the

industry will collapse on itself and a market will arise where music is seen as a public good that

cannot give or reap profit. This prompts one to ask the question: how has the idea of ownership

changed with the emergence of streaming music?

Not having a physical copy of a musical piece has become less and less of an issue for

consumers. Streaming allows access to databases with thousands of pieces of music in their

memory banks. While services like Pandora do not allow a consumer to choose specific titles,

33 Finn, 2012.34Jugenson, John. “Off Duty-Gear and Gadgets: An Ode to Joyful Streaming.” Wall Street Journal, Jan 04, 2014, Eastern Edition.

services like Spotify do. Streaming presents an alternative for much of its problems in this sense,

but it still does not answer to the issue of ownership. To date, these services have no had to.

Consumers have become ok with the idea of not owning the music. They do not seek possession

in it as they would a car, house, or even pet. “Today, it’s all about access to music rather than

ownership of an album, or even buying an MP3.”35 As long as consumers can access the music

with relative ease they do not demand an intimate control of the music. “They [digital goods]

don’t really operate as property in the traditional way that we understand it,” is the opinion of

Damon Krukowski, a well-known artist from the 1980s music scene. What he is implying is that

music streaming changes the traditional sense of intellectual property.

Companies like Beats Radio take ownership of the actual streaming of a musicians music

and not the music itself. The piece of music belongs to those who created the music, but

streaming services own the right to use these digital goods. The traditional formula is Artist own

rights, labels own rights to the artist, consumers can own the physical product, and broadcast

services don’t own anything. Because they are available for free or to a lesser cost, consumers

choose to alter their role in this equation. The new equation inspired by streaming services

follows: artist own the music, labels own the rights to artists, streaming services own the rights to

stream the music, and consumers don’t own anything. “Users never ‘own’ the music. They

simply play or stream their selected tracks whenever they want them, directly from the

internet.”36They opt to pay for the service streaming provides rather than take ownership of the

music. The benefit of streaming over owning is that these services provides catalogues that could

only be achieved through ownership of a chain of records stores. Small business like Amoeba

Music in Hollywood, California, known for its huge inventory, could not even keep up with the

35Lyden, 2013.36Walne, Toby. “To Buy or not to buy is question as music lovers start streaming: You can listen to songs online, but only as long as you pay a subscription.” Mail on Sunday, Oct 09, 2011. 91.

databases of Spotify. Consumers then have the opportunity to access music at a cheaper cost.

The only other service that compares to streaming in terms of affordability is illegally

downloading music. However, the amount of time required to inventory a database similar to one

a streaming service offers is tremendous.

The economic benefits to consumers are obvious, but what is left to consider is the

alteration of the psyche. In countries like the USA owning property is a measure of not just

wealth, but power and success. The USA also happens to be the target market, along with

Europe, for services that offer music streams. The room for growth in these regions is apparent,

but their philosophy seems contradictory to the traditions of U.S. culture. The American dream,

as it stood in the eighteenth century, included ownership of property and freedom from burdens

like debt as a pillar of the American opportunity. This changed in the twentieth-century with the

emergence of installment plans and loans becoming accessible to consumers. Now, services like

streaming music, though it may seem miniscule, are an inception to changing the ideals of

ownership the same way car loans were in the early twentieth-century. It is ok to use the music

and not own it the same way it is ok lease a car. Your only benefit is its short term usage.

In the long term the consumer pays. To early U.S. culture this would have been

unacceptable. Now, it only makes sense to pay for a service rather than provide that service to

one self. The desire to own is still prevalent in U.S. culture, but it has narrowed its focus to

owning a house. There is not much else an American consumer will be willing to sacrifice out of

convenience and streaming services support this attitude. Consumers then play an integral part in

the proletarian and bourgeoisie type tension arising in the music industry. They simply do not

care who get paid what, their focus is on the self-interest. What this signals is a triumph of

capitalistic tendencies over the traditional moral philosophy of U.S. culture. Essentially, the

culture is changing and streaming services are signalizing point to this event.