German music streaming service SoundCloud was originally conceived not as a streaming service but as a social media platform for...

Tidal, originally founded in Norway as WiMP, is a good example of a high-fidelity music streaming service that has struggled economically since it was bought by superstar rapper Jay Z and has since changed hands several times. This part of The Music Streaming Economy series tells the story of Tidal/WiMP and takes a closer look…

Tidal, originally founded in Norway as WiMP, is a good example of a high-fidelity music streaming service that has struggled economically...

As we have seen, Spotify was not the pioneer of music streaming. Other services, such as RealNetworks/Rhapsody or MOG, had been around for a long time when Spotify arrived. The French music streaming service Deezer also went online before Spotify and temporarily worked its way up to become the second largest music streaming service in…

As we have seen, Spotify was not the pioneer of music streaming. Other services, such as RealNetworks/Rhapsody or MOG, had been around...

The international music streaming market is firmly in the hands of technology companies, and it is telling that Spotify also defines itself as a technology company rather than a digital music distributor. Before Spotify entered the streaming market in 2008, the three major tech companies, Amazon, Google and Apple, competed primarily in the music download…

The international music streaming market is firmly in the hands of technology companies, and it is telling that Spotify also defines...

2008 is rightly regarded as a watershed year for the music streaming industry, with Stockholm-based streaming service Spotify launching in October. It was also the year that the fourth generation of mobile telephony (4G LTE) became widely available in many developed countries. This laid the foundations for the music streaming boom: Mobile broadband technology (4G),…

Twenty years ago, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry’s (IFPI) Online Music Report first mentioned music streaming as a potentially relevant source of revenue for the phonographic industry, which at the time was still dominated by recorded music sales. However, it was not until 2010 that music streaming became commercially relevant, and in the…

Twenty years ago, the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry’s (IFPI) Online Music Report first mentioned music streaming...

As we saw in part 14 of the series using the example of the AI company Anthropic, the music majors are already taking legal action against copyright infringements that they believe are taking place through the training and use of AI models. At the same time, however, they are also supporting projects such as the…

As we saw in part 14 of the series using the example of the AI company Anthropic, the music majors are already taking legal action...

We saw in part 17 of the series that voice clones such as ‘Fake Drake’ raise copyright issues, although the legal situation in the US and the EU is different. However, deep fakes go far beyond copyright and can affect a person’s privacy and therefore their general personal rights. In this part of the series…

We saw in part 17 of the series that voice clones such as ‘Fake Drake’ raise copyright issues, although the legal situation in the US and...

In mid-April 2023, there was a lot of excitement when the song “Heart on My Sleeve” appeared on the Internet and went viral. It features Canadian rap superstar Drake in a duet with his famous compatriot The Weeknd. Fans were already thinking that Drake had released a new song with a crazy new promotional campaign…

In mid-April 2023, there was a lot of excitement when the song “Heart on My Sleeve” appeared on the Internet and went viral. It features...

As we saw in part 15 of the series ‘AI in the Music Industry’, artificial intelligence will not have a copyright personality for the foreseeable future. However, it is being discussed that the output created by AI creates could be protected by a related or neighbouring right, as in the case of images (film and…

As we saw in part 15 of the series ‘AI in the Music Industry’, artificial intelligence will not have a copyright personality for the...

In 2017, something revolutionary happened, and yet hardly anyone took notice. In March of this year, the Luxembourg branch of the world’s oldest music collecting society, the Société des auteurs, compositeurs et éditeurs de musique (SACEM), for the first time recognised an AI as an author and registered the musical works it produced for use.…

In 2017, something revolutionary happened, and yet hardly anyone took notice. In March of this year, the Luxembourg branch of the world’s...