Popular artists get a “royalty boost” on Deezer as the platform enters into an “artist-centric” agreement with Universal Music Group

Universal Music Group’s proposed “artist-centric” licensing model for streaming services has been a big talking point in the global industry this year — though the finer details of what the model might entail haven’t always been clear.

Today (September 6th) everything changed.

Deezer and UMG have announced the launch of the “first comprehensive artist-centric streaming model,” which the companies say is designed to “better reward the artists and music that fans value most.”

According to the Financial Times UMG and Deezer expect the model to “increase payouts to professional artists by 10 percent.”

Deezer will launch the model in France next month (October 2023), with other markets around the world to follow in the new year.

Under the new model, “professional artists” — defined as those who have at least 1,000 streams per month and at least 500 unique listeners — will receive a so-called “double boost” in royalties.

In other words, when calculating their royalties, the streams of their music are weighted twice as much as the streams of “non-professional” artists.

The Deezer model will also apply a “Double Boost” – another doubling of stream weight – to tracks played by artists that fans have actively searched for.

In fact, this means that the playback of songs by popular artists that fans have searched for is 4 times larger than the playback of songs by unpopular artists provided to users by algorithm.

Deezer and UMG say this will “reduce the economic impact of algorithmic programming.”

Another key element of the model: what Deezer calls “non-artist noise audio” is being demonetized.

The definition of what “noise” is has not yet been defined in detail by the platform. What we do know: Deezer says it will replace all non-artistic “noise” content on its platform with its own “functional music” content. This “functional” content created by Deezer is then excluded from the royalty paid to music rights holders.

Notable: Deezer has recently started creating its own functional AI music for its Zen by Deezer app.

As part of the artist-centric model, Deezer also intends to adopt what it calls a “tougher provider policy” that includes steps “to limit non-artist noise content.” In other words, Deezer will limit the uploading of certain music that isn’t of high enough quality.

Deezer notes that “the size of the catalog available on digital platforms has exploded in recent years” and says that its own catalog has grown from 90 million to over 200 million pieces of content in the last two years alone.

In fact, with the rise of generative AI tools and a growing digital music distribution landscape, more audio recordings are being created and released than at any time in human history.

This vast supply of content, some of which is literally white noise, has provoked anger from leading record labels such as Universal Music Group chairman and CEO Sir Lucian Grainge, who describes it as an “oversupply”.

According to Luminate’s half-year report for the first half of 2023, including ISRC recording activity from the second quarter, the average number of ISRCs (i.e. new music audio files) added to music streaming services was throughout the first half of 2023 112,000, with 20.2 million Total uploads during the period.

Deezer says streams tagged as “noise” make up around 2% of streams on the platform.

Additionally, as part of today’s announcement, Deezer has pledged to fight streaming fraud by “continuing to push an updated and stricter proprietary fraud detection system, removing incentives for bad actors and protecting streaming royalties for artists.”

Deezer claims to have identified around 7% of streams as fraudulent by 2022

This pledge follows Deezer’s strategy, which began back in June to weed out “illegal and fraudulent content” on its platform.

“This is the most ambitious change in economic model since the inception of music streaming, and one that will support the creation of quality content for years to come.”

Jeronimo Folgueira, Deezer

Jeronimo Folgueira, CEO of Deezer, said: “This is the most ambitious change in economic model since the inception of music streaming and one that will support the creation of quality content for years to come.”

“At Deezer, we always put music first, providing a quality experience for fans and promoting fairness in the industry. We are now adopting a necessary change to better reflect the value of each and every piece of content and remove all false incentives to protect and support artists.

“There is no other industry where all content has equal value, and it should be clear to everyone that the sound of rain or a washing machine is not as valuable as a song by your favorite artist streamed over hi-fi.”

“The goal of the artist-centric model is to mitigate dynamics that could cause music to drown in a sea of ​​noise and ensure we better support and reward artists at all stages of their careers, whether they have 1000 fans, Have 100,000 or 100 million.”

Michael Nash, UMG

Michael Nash, UMG’s EVP and Chief Digital Officer, said: “The aim of the artist-centric model is to mitigate dynamics that could cause music to be drowned in a sea of ​​noise and to ensure that we artists at all stages of their careers support and reward better.” They have 1000 fans or 100,000 or 100 million.

“With this multi-pronged approach, music by artists that attracts and captivates fans will be given a weighting that better recognizes its value, and fraud and gambling, which only serve to deprive artists of the compensation they deserve, will be vigorously combated.”

He continued, “By addressing the shared goals we highlighted at the beginning of this chapter of our partnership, together we will maintain a flexible and adaptable approach.

“As the ever-evolving music landscape continues its rapid transformation, UMG and Deezer will rigorously address the impact of these changes by incorporating new insights from data analysis and refining the model where appropriate.”

“This comprehensive initiative will reward fan engagement and active streaming of the music created by artists much more effectively.”

Olivier Nusse, Universal Music France

Olivier Nusse, CEO of Universal Music France, said: “Following an extensive collaboration with Deezer in 2023, we are very proud to be pioneers in France in the highly anticipated launch of their version of the Artist Centric model.”

“This comprehensive initiative will reward fan engagement and active streaming of the music created by artists much more effectively.”music business worldwide