The Future of Music is to Slow Down and Build Small

It looked like something would finally change when Spotify began running ads for ICE recruitment. (Don't worry – I guess – they stopped.) Musicians erupted in disgust, some even pulling their music from the service and fans cancelling their subscriptions en masse. It seemed, for a moment, that calling attention to one source of Spotify's profits could lead to outrage about its main source: bilking artists. The groundswell seemed so pronounce that legendary music impresario Jimmy Iovine pronounced Spotify was "minutes" from collapsing (lol. But we'll get back to him.)

Unfortunately, it worked about as well as when artists boycotted Amazon Music in 2019 for the same reasons – absolutely no long-term changes in these tech juggernauts and how they treat their customers/content providers (sorry – I meant artists.)

At this point, after years of algorithmically-generated content, AI, and now algorithimically-generated AI content getting shoved down our throats and our lives being no better for it, people are sick of all of it: Spotify, social media, smart phones, the Internet in general. But if artists can't make money from streaming, can't promote their tours on Instagram, and can barely make gas money at each show...what are we gonna do?

I've had an eye on a few different projects: both on the Fediverse (I know I know BUT) and a new project from Kelly McCartney that suggest that musicians need to start thinking a little bit smaller in order to get bigger, and perhaps turn to labor organizing as a role model – after all, this is a question about how their labor is valued (or not.)

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