The bother of the Bandcamp sale

Summary: <p><strong>This week's episode is a chat around the sale of Bandcamp from Epic Games to Songtradr. </strong></p><br><p>With streaming paying pennies or less than for many artists, the independently-driven music platform <a href="https://bandcamp.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Bandcamp</a> is the last bastion of online revenue making for many bands - allowing musicians to sell their music digitally, and on vinyl or CD direct to their fans.</p><br><p>Artists on Bandcamp collectively earned $193 million in the last year alone, and Bandcamp has paid out $1.19 billion since its founding in 2007.</p><br><p>But recent business deals have meant Bandcamp was acquired by Songtradr, after a short 18 months owned by Epic Games. With the acquisition came news today that approximately half (60) of the Bandcamp staff of 118 employees, including the Bandcamp Daily team, had been laid off, with the entire negotiating team at the workers' union - <a href="https://twitter.com/bandcampunited?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Bandcamp United</a>, let go.</p><br><p>We discuss what it means for independent musicians, what the alternatives are and also the other dodgy news this week, that <a href="https://firstfloor.substack.com/p/nts-radio-is-now-partially-owned" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">NTS radio have been partially bought by Universal</a> and <a href="https://www.stereogum.com/2240332/spotify-reportedly-plans-to-pay-even-less-in-royalties-to-less-popular-artists/news/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Spotify is planning on reducing its royalty payouts to a minimum threshold</a> so that many artists literally won't get a penny for their song streams.</p><br><p>All that, plus Niall shares his months-long local detective story, and Andrea talks about presenting PHD at a <a href="https://dancecult-research.net/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">dance music conference in Huddersfield last week.</a></p><br><p>* <a href="https://www.patreon.com/Nialler9" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Support Nialler9 on Patreon</strong></a></p><p><br></p><h3><strong>Show notes</strong></h3><ul> <li><a href="https://nialler9.com/thinking-of-ditching-spotify-musician-joel-harkin-explores-alternative-music-platforms-so-you-dont-have-to/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Thinking of ditching Spotify? Musician Joel Harkin explores alternative music platforms so you don’t have to</strong></a></li> <li>Bandcamp alternatives: <a href="https://simonrepp.com/faircamp/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Faircamp</strong></a> / <a href="https://www.ninaprotocol.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Nina</strong></a> / <a href="https://tone.audio/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Tone Audio </strong></a>/ <a href="http://mirlo.space/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Mirlo</strong></a> </li> <li><a href="https://interdependence.fm/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Interdependence Podcast</strong></a></li> <li><a href="https://firstfloor.substack.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>First Floor Substack</strong></a></li> <li><a href="http://dance%20music%20conference%20in%20huddersfield%20last%20week./" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Dancecult conference</strong></a></li> <li><a href="https://open.spotify.com/playlist/01BYWpca42gRDQfJXwvilh?si=3db6d2fc2373427c" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Songs played on the Nialler9 Podcast Spotify Playlist</strong></a></li> </ul><br><hr><p style="color:grey;font-size:0.75em;"> Hosted on Acast. See <a style="color:grey;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://acast.com/privacy">acast.com/privacy</a> for more information.</p>