<story><title>Spotify files for its IPO</title><url>https://www.axios.com/exclusive-spotify-files-for-its-ipo-2522109160.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>nunez</author><text>It’s really not though because music is a loss leader for amazon, apple and google, but it is spotify’s entire business. The only other major competitors out there are either in major cahoots with the big 3 (tidal, pandora) or gone (soundcloud, grooveshark, rdio).&lt;p&gt;Netflix has this problem too but they “solved” it by making their own content. Amazon are Google are doing the same thing. That’s the direction I see Spotify going, though I wonder why Apple hasn’t done this yet.</text></item><item><author>pembrook</author><text>This is the same problem Netflix &amp;amp; Amazon have been successful in combating. The answer is to become a content owner by competing with the big labels directly.&lt;p&gt;All Spotify needs to push the big labels back on their heels is to sign a few top 40 artists of their own.&lt;p&gt;I might be wrong but I remember reading something like 90%+ of streams on music services are of songs currently on the charts. Capture the popular culture like Netflix has and the labels will start rolling over on rates.</text></item><item><author>_whm1</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t think this is a good long term investment.&lt;p&gt;Disclaimer: I worked for a Spotify competitor in the past, so i have a pretty solid understanding of how the business works.&lt;p&gt;I think it is a bad investment for one simple reason: Spotify purchases its main product (music) from a oligopoly. I&amp;#x27;d estimate that 95%+ of the tracks streamed (by total playtime) are from one of the 3 major music labels: Universal, Sony or Warner. That includes sublabels that in some cases may have a seperate deal with Spotify, but at the end of the day are still part of the big 3. Imagine you are a Sony executive, walking by a news stand and the Wall Street Journal Headline is &amp;quot;Spotify Q2 earnings 30% up&amp;quot;. What are you gonna do? You will squeeze them, make them pay, just enough that they survive. And Spotify has zero negotiation power here. If Sptify fails to have a deal with any 1 of these 3 labels, they become useless overnight. People will switch to Apple Music, Amazon PrimeMusic, Tidal or any other service quickly. It doesn&amp;#x27;t matter if Spotifys app is slighty better than the competitors software if they lack 1&amp;#x2F;3 of the music.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>fragsworth</author><text>Music is quite a bit different, in that people spend lots of time curating their own playlists and they listen to the same songs repeatedly. It is incredibly annoying to have songs that you &lt;i&gt;want&lt;/i&gt; in your playlists but can&amp;#x27;t get, EVEN if you pay for multiple services.&lt;p&gt;Making their own content for video has the advantage that most people are OK with opening a new browser tab or an app to watch a specific movie or show.&lt;p&gt;With music, however, you don&amp;#x27;t want to run multiple conflicting music players, especially when they don&amp;#x27;t sync up playlists and seamlessly work together.&lt;p&gt;I wonder how that will pan out. It&amp;#x27;s a significant difference.</text></comment>
<story><title>Spotify files for its IPO</title><url>https://www.axios.com/exclusive-spotify-files-for-its-ipo-2522109160.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>nunez</author><text>It’s really not though because music is a loss leader for amazon, apple and google, but it is spotify’s entire business. The only other major competitors out there are either in major cahoots with the big 3 (tidal, pandora) or gone (soundcloud, grooveshark, rdio).&lt;p&gt;Netflix has this problem too but they “solved” it by making their own content. Amazon are Google are doing the same thing. That’s the direction I see Spotify going, though I wonder why Apple hasn’t done this yet.</text></item><item><author>pembrook</author><text>This is the same problem Netflix &amp;amp; Amazon have been successful in combating. The answer is to become a content owner by competing with the big labels directly.&lt;p&gt;All Spotify needs to push the big labels back on their heels is to sign a few top 40 artists of their own.&lt;p&gt;I might be wrong but I remember reading something like 90%+ of streams on music services are of songs currently on the charts. Capture the popular culture like Netflix has and the labels will start rolling over on rates.</text></item><item><author>_whm1</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t think this is a good long term investment.&lt;p&gt;Disclaimer: I worked for a Spotify competitor in the past, so i have a pretty solid understanding of how the business works.&lt;p&gt;I think it is a bad investment for one simple reason: Spotify purchases its main product (music) from a oligopoly. I&amp;#x27;d estimate that 95%+ of the tracks streamed (by total playtime) are from one of the 3 major music labels: Universal, Sony or Warner. That includes sublabels that in some cases may have a seperate deal with Spotify, but at the end of the day are still part of the big 3. Imagine you are a Sony executive, walking by a news stand and the Wall Street Journal Headline is &amp;quot;Spotify Q2 earnings 30% up&amp;quot;. What are you gonna do? You will squeeze them, make them pay, just enough that they survive. And Spotify has zero negotiation power here. If Sptify fails to have a deal with any 1 of these 3 labels, they become useless overnight. People will switch to Apple Music, Amazon PrimeMusic, Tidal or any other service quickly. It doesn&amp;#x27;t matter if Spotifys app is slighty better than the competitors software if they lack 1&amp;#x2F;3 of the music.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>joemi</author><text>&amp;gt; or gone (soundcloud, grooveshark, rdio)&lt;p&gt;I can&amp;#x27;t speak for grooveshark or rdio, but as far as I know soundcloud still exists. I just added a song there and listened to some other stuff a week ago. Did I miss something?</text></comment>