On-Demand Audio Streaming Hits Record High, Is Up 62.4% Over Last Year

An anonymous reader shares a report: A new report from Nielsen out this week paints a picture of the booming on-demand audio streaming business, pointing to a significant increase in consumers' use of streaming services and record numbers of streams being served. According to the mid-year report, which focuses only on the U.S. market, on-demand audio streams surpassed the 7 billion figure for the first time ever during March of this year. That's audio streams, to be clear -- not just music. That is, the term "audio" also includes non-music streams like spoken word recordings and podcasts -- the latter of which has also seen rapid growth. Nielsen isn't breaking out music versus non-music streams in this new report, but a prior figure from the measurement firm stated that monthly podcast consumption had doubled over the past five years among adults. Still, the rise of streaming music services like Spotify and Apple Music have surely played a role in reaching the new milestones. Says Nielsen, streaming hit a high point of 7.5 billion weekly on-demand audio streams during the week ending March 9, 2017. That's the first time the figure had ever topped 7 billion, setting a new record. In addition, on-demand audio has been streamed over 184 billion times so far in 2017 -- a huge 62.4 percent increase over the same time period in 2016.

Clearly

[TFlan91]

Clearly the problem isn't people illegally downloading music, it's developing a business model that works, is consumer-friendly, and profitable.

I honestly don't even remember the last time I downloaded a song/album illegally. Pandora and YouTube (Yes, I understand some of these videos are illegal) have been my gateways for the last 5+ years.

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[Opportunist]

You think anyone gives a shit about the RIAA. Think again.

The only reason is that it's simply more convenient to open YouTube and listen to whatever you want to listen to than to download something and hope it's not some asshole disguising gay porn as some Rhianna video. YouTube quickly takes care of such problems.

The only reason people reach for "official" sources is that the price is the same but the quality is higher. That's pretty much all.

Economics

[Comboman]

Without piracy, the RIAA would still be trying to sell music on shiny plastic discs for $25 a pop at your local Sam Goody. Innovation only comes from the necessity of competing in a free market, not from government-granted, market-distorting regulations (i.e. copyright).

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

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[LynnwoodRooster]

The model I have seen work is artists GIVE away their music (sometimes unofficially) so that folks will come to their shows and buy merchandise.

That was pretty much the ONLY model prior to ~1945. Musicians made almost nothing on the sales, and made it all on performances. The years post-WWII until now were the abberration, not the "you earn when you perform" model that was around for literally thousands of years (and was figured out by monster groups like the Rolling Stones and others).

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[cayenne8]

The recorded music industry only changed the medium and now we can buy a la cart songs instead of a CD with one good song and 9 to 10 fillers.

While this has always been a problem with some artists....it seemed back in the day, when I bought albums, I'd not buy one unless it had 5+ good songs on it.

Perhaps today it is more telling of the dearth of talent out there?

Also, sadly, the song at a time lends itself to the death of the "concept" album, like Dark Side of the Moon, Tommy, Sgt. Peppers, Pet Sounds,

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[TheFakeTimCook]

Um, no. It's convenience and it's the way people prefer to consume their music.

All of the same RIAA bullshit is still there. And artists are getting screwed [rollingstone.com] even more so.

Nothing has changed much in that regard. The recorded music industry only changed the medium and now we can buy a la cart songs instead of a CD with one good song and 9 to 10 fillers.

The model I have seen work is artists GIVE away their music (sometimes unofficially) so that folks will come to their shows and buy merchandise.

The recording is considering a marketing expense. And a few of them just let fans do all the heavy lifting of recording (even giving them access to the sound feeds) and distribution. Phish is an example.

Umphrees McGee actually has it down to a science. Phish's method is just a copy of what the Grateful Dead did for years (but then again, so is their entire band of Trust Fund Kids)...

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[plague911]

Not entirely true. Without that copyright, Spotify and Pandora would not be paying the music producers/distributors anything. Reasonable balance here is the key.

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[KozmoStevnNaut]

Nope, it doesn't work like that. People generally don't respond that way to obstacles, they just work harder to find ways around them.

But what happened with music is that streaming services like Spotify are so inexpensive, so convenient and have such enormous libraries that it's just so much easier than pirating. THAT's how you get people to pay again.

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[bignetbuy]

Agreed. Between services like Spotify, Apple iTunes, Amazon, Digitally Imported, and others, music is available on-tap and for pocket change.

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[courteaudotbiz]

[...]music is available on-tap and for pocket change.

You think this encourages musicians to make a living of music? If it is available for pocket change, only those with 100M+ views / listenings are profitable. I remember a local artist who had 800,000 listenings of his most popular song on an online music service got paid something like 700$. You think it's enough? Do you think this guy will still record his music and give it for pennies to online music services?

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[bignetbuy]

We aren't talking about artists making a living. We're talking about the availability and popularity of streaming services. Stop trying to shovel your agenda into this thread.

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[phlll]

Nah. Simpler to subscribe than search.

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[Opportunist]

Wait, pay? Who pays for music?

Kids these days, do they have too much money?

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[enjar]

I grew up in the waning days of vinyl, the rise and fall of the cassette, and then the eventual move to CDs. I used to save my pennies to get something in one of those forms, or at least buy cassettes for dubbing or recording off the radio. A new recording was at least $15, maybe $20. That was a lot back then, so I'd spend a lot of time going through used record stores. We now spend $15/month on Spotify family, so basically $4/person for access to a catalog so deep it even surpasses my young teen dreams. Th

Nielsen is outdated...

[flogger]

I was chosen to be in their survey. Lucky me. I informed them that I have no TV (Haven't since 1984 - Go figure.) I still wanted to take part in the survey since I so use services like netflix, amazon, etc. THey refused to let me be part of their data gathering... The days of regular media are gone. Nielsen refuses to let it go so they can perpetuate the importance of advertisers.

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[frank_adrian314159]

You did not match their target demographic profile (i.e., partially, people with TV's) and thus were simply statistical noise to be ignored. The fact that they tossed you from the survey is simply an indication that they were doing their job properly.

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[s1d3track3D]

Nielsen refuses to let it go so they can perpetuate the importance of advertisers.

Well, yes, that is their business model. They are in bed with the rest of these antiquated media monoliths. All of them will hold on until it's ripped from their cold-dead-hands...

Here is an interesting read from a few years ago, "Industry pros are asking if Nielsen botched radio ratings — and inadvertently forced stations off the air." https://fivethirtyeight.com/fe... [fivethirtyeight.com]

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

As long as data plans are decent

[Colin Castro]

We need all the data and as long as it stays decently large for cell phones why wouldn't people pick music they like and be able to be super specific. I also listen to audio books on demand and podcasts because I hate listening to crappy radio DJs. I can't stand the personalities and how they play up being soooo dumb on the air.

NPR is a big winner with podcasts

[Bruinwar]

This American Life

Wait Wait Don't Tell Me

Radio Lab

& many dozens of others...

Good stuff, available when you're ready to listen. The advertising revenue for these shows have seen a massive increase (according to Ira Glass of This American Life). We've entered into a new era of audio & visual entertainment choices & quality.

Compressed All To Ratshit

[Anonymous Coward]

And why on earth would anyone ever want to have anything to do with streaming compressed all to ratshit garbage?

Just shows the number of tone-deaf people in the world.