Jay Z 's bid to purchase Aspiro was approved. This would include Aspiro's streaming service, TidalHifi.
TidalHiFi is a music streaming service that supposedly gives high sound quality and HD music videos . The service is said to have over 25 million tracks available for streaming with lossless quality. This service will also allow consumers to view music video's , interviews, and other features. However unlike Spotify and other competitors, the service is not free. It offers a 7 day trial and then the monthly charge would be $19.99. Once it was launched the price dropped to $9.99 per month. The price most likely dropped to compete with the other streaming services.
Why are we telling you this? Why is this important? That's easy. Last year in 2014 streaming revenue surpassed CD Sales. Streaming revenue rose 29% and CD sales fell 12.7%. Steaming services made a combined total of $1.87 billion, and CD sales where $1.85 billion.
In a previous issue of Dope Souf Magazine, we mentioned that Taylor Swift and withdrew her music from Spotify. Well she wasn't the only artist that was disastified with the amount of revenue that were being paid to artists. However, Taylor did allow her music to be put on TidalHiFi. This would obviously mean that TidalHiFi, plans to pay more than the Spotify, Pandora, and all the competitors.
One of the questions we are pretty sure you are asking is "Can an artist submit to TidalHiFi?" Yes, if you search the webiste well enough you will find current contact info as to whom you could submit music. The biggest question we all want to know is if people are willing to pay for the high quality. We guess we are going to have to give this time and come back and visit this topic later.
What they aren't telling you is that Tidal, is also and co-owned by 16 other musicians. What that means for those 16 muscians is that they are turning the tables. Think about this way It was stated that an artist named "Black" received over 108 million streams on Spotify. He received a $4000 check. Do the math. He earned pennies on the dollar. Of course Spotify wins in this situation. So if the artist own theirown streaming service then guess who wins, all the artist who have stock or own the streaming service. Seriously doubt that anybody can just buy stock or own part of the company. Pretty sure you are going to have to some type of major clout, and it's most likely going to be a invite only situation.
Sources at subscription services tell Billboard that record labels have not made them aware of any Tidal artist-shareholders pulling their catalogs. These services, and other industry sources, are doubtful that most artist-shareholders will give Tidal exclusive streaming rights to their catalogs. Instead, they expect Tidal to have limited, short-term exclusives worked out on a case-by-case basis, much like the way artists and labels negotiate with Apple for exclusive, value-added content and limited-time exclusives on tracks and albums.