streaming 2.0

The U.S. Supreme Court is set to rule any day on the future of TikTok, a popular social media platform that boasts more than 170 million American users and has become a crucial promotional tool for the modern music industry. Citing national security concerns, lawmakers enacted legislation last year requiring the app’s Chinese-owned parent company ByteDance to either sell TikTok or face a total ban — a measure set to go into effect on Jan. 19. TikTok sued to overturn that law by arguing it violates the First Amendment, but at a crucial hearing last week, the high court’s nine justices seemed likely to side with the government and uphold the ban. 

A key wild card? President-elect Donald Trump — who once tried to impose his own TikTok ban but now publicly opposes it. Set to take office a day after the ban goes into effect, Trump has said he wants to “negotiate a resolution” to save the platform. —Bill Donahue

For decades, Sean “Diddy” Combs — one of the industry’s most powerful men — was not just a chart-topping hip-hop artist/producer, but also a media mogul with his own record label and consumer brands. But starting in late 2023, he was hit with a flood of sexual abuse allegations, first in the form of civil lawsuits, then in a stunning September criminal indictment on sex trafficking and racketeering charges. All eyes will be on a Manhattan federal courtroom in May, when Diddy heads to trial for a showdown with federal prosecutors — a battle that could end with a life prison sentence. —BD

Concert ticket pricing used to be as simple as setting two price points for the show — one for the front and one for the back. Today, determining how much a fan pays to get into a show is a complex mix of algorithmic pricing, data analysis, economic modeling and artificial intelligence. 

“Effective pricing means creating enough entry points so that fans at every socioeconomic level can find a way to participate,” says Kirk Sommer, senior partner and global co-head of music at WME, whose clients include Hozier, Sam Smith and Adele, among many others. “Yes, there is premium, but it’s accessible to everyone that values that premium.” 

This push toward pricing efficiency has pushed ticket prices up — according to Billboard Boxscore, the average ticket price to one of the top 100 tours of 2024 had increased more than 20% compared to 2022. But concert industry insiders hope that new rules outlawing drip-pricing — where fans aren’t shown the actual price of a ticket inclusive of fees until checkout — will make it easier for fans to comparison shop. But Nathaniel Marro with the National Independent Talent Organization worries that all-in pricing could lead to an increase in the junk fees regulators are seeking to combat. 

“Transparency in how new fees are calculated and collected is critical to any effort to keep ticket prices affordable,” Marro said. —Dave Brooks

Streaming fraud — artificially boosting the stream count of a particular song — has been a contentious issue in the music business for years, but efforts to curb the problem intensified in 2024 and will continue into 2025. 

The industry’s fight against streaming fraud hit a fever pitch in September, when a man in North Carolina was indicted by federal prosecutors over allegations that he used AI to help create “hundreds of thousands” of songs and then used bots to stream the AI tracks and earn more than $10 million in fraudulent streaming royalty payments since 2017, marking the first-ever streaming fraud case in the U.S. Then, in December, Amazon Music became the latest streaming service to test out UMG’s new “Streaming 2.0” plan, which is designed, in part, to help prevent artificial streams. 

As AI streaming fraud lawsuits continue and the streamers continue to consider new rules to curb artificial consumption, 2025 is expected to add at least some new guardrails around streaming fraud. The only problem is that the fraudsters keep evolving. —Kristin Robinson

In 2024, at least half a dozen independent music distributors started fundraising or explored selling their businesses, and the year ended with Universal’s Virgin Music Group buying Downtown Music Holdings — which includes the DIY artist distributor CD Baby as well as the B2B tech and distribution platform FUGA — for $775 million. Consolidation in this space is likely to continue as the major labels look to prevent erosion of market share and adapt to a world where more and more artists desire distribution deals. —Elias Leight

“Music Streaming 1.0 was all about offering a giant catalog of music and helping customers find what they should play next,” Steve Boom recently told Billboard. Boom, who serves as vp of audio, Twitch and games at Amazon, believes the music industry is entering a new phase. Now “you’re going to see increased divergence on the value proposition” from different streamers, he added. “And the services are there not just to play music, but to help deepen fan culture — connect you to other listeners, connect you to the artist, and develop listeners into fans.” —EL

iHeartMedia remains radio’s bellwether: The 860-station, 10,000-employee company has more broadcast listeners today than it did a decade ago and it’s the No. 1 podcast publisher, according to chairman and CEO Bob Pittman. And a Luminate study in December reports 54% of millennials and 38% of Gen-Z listeners discover new music via old-fashioned AM-FM radio. “Radio is important to this company,” says John Janick, chairman and CEO of Interscope Capitol. But Spotify-style streaming’s growth hasn’t been great for terrestrial radio, beginning with iHeart, over the past few years: Other studies have suggested radio is declining; broadcast radio’s advertising share is declining and expected to keep doing so; iHeart and the No. 2 broadcaster, Audacy, must contend with billions in debt; and both companies laid off dozens of employees in 2024. 

How will the ongoing debt affect those companies’ operations? Are more layoffs forthcoming? Will labels slash their radio-promo resources accordingly, as they did early in 2024? After losing his job in November as an 11-year co-host of a drive-time show on iHeart-owned Cleveland rock station WMMS, Bill Squire answered succinctly: “They’re cutting costs wherever they can.” —Steve Knopper

It rained biopics in 2024, with theatrical films chronicling the hard-won success stories of legendary music artists such as Bob Marley, Amy Winehouse, Maria Callas, Pharrell and Robbie Williams. With the latest, the Bob Dylan-focused A Complete Unknown, gaining considerable Oscar buzz, another downpour is forecast into the coming year and beyond with previously announced high-profile biopics portraying the lives of The Beatles, Bruce Springsteen, Michael Jackson, Madonna, Linda Ronstadt and Janis Joplin. —Gail Mitchell

Expect the trends of the ‘20s to continue into 2025: investment and consolidation in artist and label services businesses; distribution platforms; and tech platforms that help music companies monetize hardcore fans. At the same time, music companies will gain greater focus by shedding non-core assets — just as Warner Music Group sold its media assets (Uproxx, HipHopDX, others) in 2024, SM Entertainment is currently preparing to unload unspecified businesses. More broadly, there’s a belief across the financial world that conditions will lead to a strong year for mergers and acquisitions: interest rates are steady, inflation is declining and recent elections have removed some of the political guesswork. Consulting firm KPMG, for example, expects “strong growth in dealmaking” in tech and media driven by “continued AI fever.” —Glenn Peoples

Country music’s growth spurt is likely to continue in 2025 as coastal labels continue to sign artists who had previously fallen under Nashville’s purview given the tremendous success of crossovers acts like Post Malone’s F-1 Trillion and Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter and country heavy hitters like Zach Bryan. Additionally, Morgan Wallen, whose 2021 Dangerous: The Double Album ranked No.1 on Billboard’s Top Billboard 200 Albums of the first 25 years of the 21st Century, is working on new music, as are several other country superstars. —Melinda Newman