Streaming
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LONDON — In early February, Universal Music Group chairman/CEO Lucian Grainge drew a line in the sand between the traditional record business and financial companies entering the fray to tap into the global growth of streaming. “Our industry is entering a new chapter where we’re going to have to pick sides,” Grainge said at the Billboard Power 100 launch event in Hollywood. “Are we on the side of fintech [financial technology] and functional music, functional content? Or are we on the side of artistry and artists?”
Though Grainge didn’t name names, he could well have been talking about Utopia Music, a Zug, Switzerland-based tech company that delivers financial services for labels, publishers and distributors. Over the past two years, Utopia, whose motto is “Fair pay for every play,” has embarked on a frenetic buying spree of 15 companies, including music tech company Musimap; Lyric Financial, a Nashville-based provider of royalty-backed cash advances; and Proper Music Group, the United Kingdom’s leading independent physical music distributor, which provides distribution services for 1,000-plus indie labels and service companies.
Industry executives don’t quite know what to make of Utopia’s rapid growth, its direction or where exactly the company fits in today’s multifaceted global music business. It’s one of several fintech companies, many backed by venture capitalists, that have penetrated the music business to varying degrees amid the streaming boom. “At its core, Utopia is a royalty tech company,” co-founder and executive chairman Mattias Hjelmstedt tells Billboard in a rare interview. “It’s about fixing the many data gaps in the industry.”
Hjelmstedt says he understands and even agrees with Grainge’s opposition to “pure fintech” companies that “go in and try to optimize [their] revenue versus the rest of the industry.” But that, he insists, is not what Utopia is about. His company uses technology — leveraging what has been described as “a database of more than 213 billion global data points” — to better capture royalties and process them accurately, faster and with greater transparency. That, in turn, will “help all facets of the industry earn more money,” not just Utopia’s slice of it, he says.
“We’re on the side of anyone who owns the copyright, which is a creator, which is an artist, which is also a Universal [Music Group] or a copyright fund or a publisher,” he says. “I don’t think there is a mismatch there [between fintech and artists]. It is actually fully aligned for me to have a clear path from usage to creator.”
Utopia is hardly alone in pitching ways to use tech to give artists more control over their music royalties than they’ve traditionally had with label deals. Hifi, a fintech with backers that include industry executives like Quincy Jones and Capitol Records chair/CEO Michelle Jubelirer — as well as artists Diplo and G-Eazy — is launching an “enhanced royalties acceleration service” that promises to pay artists advances based on predicted streaming royalties. Los Angeles-based beatBread offers funding for existing music catalogs and employs artificial intelligence to help artists secure advances of up to $1 million for unreleased music. And Brazilian fintech company Hurst Capital says it has set up a “hyper-specialized team” to manage the royalties of catalogs it has acquired from sertanejo (Brazilian pop-country) stars like Gusttavo Lima and the late Marília Mendonça.
Hjelmstedt is a Swedish serial entrepreneur known for founding gaming platform Electronic Sports Network, which Electronic Arts acquired in 2012, and co-founding video-on-demand platform Voddler, which filed for bankruptcy in 2018. He co-founded Utopia in 2016 with Thomas Gullberg, basing it in the town of Zug, where around 60 of the company’s staff of 1,000 are based.
Details about Utopia’s finances and funding remain opaque. The company’s only publicly listed investors are Switzerland-based investment firms CV VC and FiveT Fintech (formerly Avaloq Ventures). Hjelmstedt says the firms “are by far not among the largest investors” but declined to reveal any others. Utopia, which he says generates over 100 million euros ($107 million) in revenue a year, recently completed an investment round, but Hjelmstedt declined to discuss figures or what the capital will be used for.
Lately, the company has been characterized by change. In November, Utopia cut its workforce by around 20%, or about 230 jobs, according to a company representative. Hjelmstedt says the job cuts resulted from the global economic downturn coupled with the company’s goal of achieving sustainable growth. A month later, in December, Utopia restructured its business into two separate divisions: Music Services and Royalty Platform. Then in January, Utopia reshuffled its senior leadership, with former CEO Markku Mäkeläinen exiting the company and Hjelmstedt taking over as interim chief executive. (U.K.-based Roberto Neri is CEO of the Music Services division.)
As part of the reorganization, Utopia announced on Feb. 7 that it had sold U.S.-based music database platform ROSTR — which has a directory of artists, managers, booking agents and record labels — back to ROSTR’s founders for an undisclosed sum. Utopia purchased the company in December 2021 to strengthen its direct ties with the artist community. But Hjelmstedt says Utopia will now primarily focus on delivering financial services. He declined to comment on whether there will be further divestments or acquisitions this year, claiming the company will reveal more about future plans, including new product launches, in the coming months.
Utopia’s music services division is headed by U.K.-based former Downtown executive Roberto Neri and includes the acquired companies Proper, Absolute Label Services, Liverpool-based publisher Sentric Music Group and Cinram Novum, one of the U.K.’s leading physical home entertainment suppliers. (Cinram Novum provides warehouse, fulfillment and distribution services to labels, including UMG, Sony Music Entertainment and [PIAS].)
Utopia’s royalty platform arm, which Hjelmstedt oversees, looks after the company’s financial technology services, data operations, copyright and royalty processing.
Hjelmstedt declines to comment on whether dividing Utopia into two separate divisions signals an intention to make the split between distributor and royalty platform permanent. He rejects speculation that Utopia is a tech scale-up looking to capitalize on the growth of the music industry rather than to build a sustainable business. The company’s myriad acquisitions, he says, were made “to understand different parts of the industry better, so we can serve them better with the data.” Despite acquiring a significant chunk of the U.K. music distribution business, he says, it was “never the idea of Utopia to be a distributor.”
“We will never be a collecting society or a [performing rights organization],” says Hjelmstedt. “We will never sell data and we will not take investments from a large strategic player in the industry, and by doing so, we can safeguard the core of what we stand for.”
Music publishing companies Reservoir Media Management and PopArabia are suing Anghami Technologies Limited and its parent, Nasdaq-listed Anghami Inc., the Middle East’s largest legal streaming company, for copyright infringement related to a dozen Western and Arabic songs from artists like Lil Jon, 50 Cent and Kelly Clarkson.
The suit was filed Dec. 22 at the Abu Dhabi Global Markets Court.
In the filing, a copy of which Billboard procured, the court says the claim by Reservoir and PopArabia involves “the exploitation of a small number of songs in one territory” but that “the Anghami service exploits a very large number of songs in numerous territories across the Middle East region and beyond.”
Anghami is primarily a freemium audio-streaming service that says it has more than 73 million users across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), Europe and the United States, and a library of over 57 million songs. The service, which was launched by co-founders Elie Habib and Eddy Maroun in Beirut in 2012, relocated its headquarters in 2021 from Lebanon to Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, where it’s part of the Abu Dhabi Global Market. (Anghami also operates a subscription service called “Anghami Plus” that allows users to download songs.)
PopArabia, which describes itself as the “leading music publisher” in the MENA region, is also based out of Abu Dhabi. In 2020, PopArabia entered into a joint venture with Reservoir to sign and develop Arab talent
The suit names 12 songs, including such international hits as “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” by John Denver; “Candy Shop,” written by Scott Storch and 50 Cent; “Yeah!” written by Lil Jon; “I Gotta Feeling,” co-written by Frédéric Riesterer; “Havana,” “Señorita” and “Break My Heart,” co-written by Ali Tamposi; and “Because Of You,” written by Kelly Clarkson, David Hodges and Ben Moody.
The Arabic tracks are “Laa,” written by Bassem Funky and Dok Dok; “Number 1,” written by Mohamed Saber, Fawzy Hassan, Islam Mohamed Ali and Abdel Hakim; and “LV COCO” and “Hallelujah” by Moroccan hip-hop star 7Liwa.
Reservoir and PopArabia are seeking an injunction to restrain Anghami from infringing its copyrights, as well as unspecified damages, interest and costs. The applicable law for the claim is U.K. Private International Law, the court says.
In an email response to Billboard, Saurabh Poddar, Anghami’s head of licensing, says the company intends to defend itself against the lawsuit. “Despite having this claim for a handful of songs, we assert that Anghami is more than willing to sign a license with publishers no matter how small or big they are, as long as such license is negotiated and implemented with a scientific method with regards to identification of actual market share, legal capacity and provided representation is confirmed especially in the case of a sub-publisher,” Poddar says.
A spokesperson for PopArabia says the company does not comment on ongoing litigation but notes that “we do take the protection of our rights and those of songwriters very seriously and believe it is essential to the development of a healthy ecosystem for music creators, which we have championed for in the UAE for over a decade.”
Anghami says on its website that it has licensing agreements in place with major international and Arabic music labels, as well as with “thousands of independent labels and distributors.”
In their suit, Reservoir and PopArabia counter that “while [Anghami] may indeed have licensed the copyright in certain sound recordings from record companies, it has not…obtained any license to use the underlying musical and lyrical works which are embodied in the sound recordings which it offers to consumers for streaming and downloading, or to reproduce the lyrics of those Songs.”
Two sources with knowledge of the case tell Billboard that in the past Anghami has questioned PopArabia about whether the company owns the rights it says it does. “In these court cases, one of the things that they will always challenge you on is the chain of title,” says a leading executive from a global publishing company who spoke to Billboard on background. “It’s much easier for PopArabia to instigate the case using [a handful of] works that they have directly signed to them.”
Licensing negotiations between PopArabia and Anghami were ongoing for at least three years before they reached a stalemate, says the source. “That’s when the question was raised, are they actually genuine in these attempts to license?”
Abu Dhabi-based media executive Michael Garin, who says he has seen the correspondence between the two companies, tells Billboard that Anghami has made licensing deals with the three major record companies, “who clearly protect their [own] intellectual property rights.” But in the case of Anghami, “it’s my understanding that for 10 years they’ve been using music from the region and from smaller publishers who they just felt were either too ignorant, too disorganized [or] too naive to ever sue for the collection of their rights,” says Garin, the former CEO of film and entertainment company Image Nation and media hub twofour54, of which PopArabia is “an investment and portfolio company.” (Anghami did not respond to Garin’s assertions.)
Garin, who until recently was also the director-general of the Abu Dhabi Creative Media Authority, a governmental organization, says he has been “working for the past decade to help protect the intellectual property rights of content creators.”
On the support section of its website, Anghami says it generates and pays out royalties after deducting 8% for publishing rights from revenues to be paid to music-collecting societies such as SACEM. However, SACEM no longer has a licensing deal with the platform.
“In 2018, we succeeded in getting a settlement with Anghami to cover the period of exploitation [from 2012] until 2018, but from 2019 we do not have any agreement,” says Julien Dumon, the director of development, phono and digital at SACEM. Significantly, the deal, which excluded the United States, covered usage in Europe and the Middle East. Talks for a renewal have been ongoing since 2019, says Dumon.
“We have been negotiating for close to five years now,” he says. “The fact that nothing has been signed whereas on the other side, SACEM has been able to close deals within a year with all the other actors in the industry clearly demonstrates that Anghami is not willing to properly engage and get an agreement in place.” (Anghami did not respond to a question about negotiations with SACEM.)
The Middle East and North Africa is the fastest-growing music market in the world, as per the IFPI’s Global Music Report for 2022, which said revenues from recorded music in the region grew by 35% in 2021 to $89.5 million. Streaming accounts for 95% of those revenues. A consumer research study conducted by the IFPI in April surveyed over 1,500 people aged 16 to 44 in the UAE and found that 54% of the respondents “typically listen to at least one Middle Eastern genre.”
With a claimed 58% share of the music streaming market in the region, Anghami is the dominant player; at least one report has said that Spotify was considering buying the streamer.
According to a source close to the matter, Anghami initially submitted a jurisdictional challenge to the case filed by Reservoir and PopArabia and subsequently withdrew it. The streamer now has about a month to file a response in the ADGM Court.
Beyond the copyright lawsuit, Anghami faces other challenges. The streaming service said in November that it was trimming its headcount by 22%, or roughly 39 employees, in order to maintain profitability. And on Jan. 9 the company received a notice from the Nasdaq indicating Anghami was not in compliance with the stock market’s listing rules due to its failure to file an interim balance sheet and income statement for its second quarter of 2022, according to a company filing. Nasdaq gave the company until Mar. 10 to submit a plan to regain compliance.
To afford living in Austin, Katie-Marie Marschner works two jobs in the music business: In addition to her gig as a tour manager, she earns $19 an hour working remotely 40 hours a week as a YouTube Music subject matter expert — poring over spreadsheets for errors in the company’s charts algorithm. To manage it all, she alternates between her YouTube Music “office computer” and her “fun computer.”
Marschner’s employment for YouTube Music is through Cognizant, an IT company that contracts with the Google-owned music streamer to supply staff. But after she and her coworkers petitioned the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to hold a union election that would effectively unionize them, Cognizant is now mandating that all 58 employees report to work in Austin — even though Marschner and her colleagues say the company hired them with the understanding they’d work remotely, often outside the city. This kind of flexibility has allowed Marschner to travel on off-days as a tour manager and book hotels during her lunch breaks, and she says, “Returning to the office is completely unfeasible.”
Marschner and her colleagues see the new in-office mandate as a union-busting move: Rather than allow the workers to unionize, Cognizant is demanding they return to the office, and, presumably, will fire the workers who can’t. The remote employees – some of whom work far from Austin and even Texas – say they accepted their jobs years ago with the understanding they’d be able to work from home and accuse Cognizant of changing the terms after their union activity. In response, on Jan. 23, the workers filed an Unfair Labor Practice complaint with the NLRB. Three weeks ago, the workers went on strike, marching last Tuesday to Google’s downtown Austin headquarters for a rally.
The division’s union movement caught the attention of Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) and Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas). They wrote a Feb. 21 joint letter to the CEO of YouTube’s parent companies, Google and Alphabet, complaining the return-to-work announcement was an “anti-union posture” and requested the workers be “able to freely exercise their right to join a union as guaranteed by federal law.”
“These workers are inspiring people across the country,” Casar tells Billboard. “When the United Auto Workers started organizing at General Motors, their first strike was 50 workers. Soon enough, hundreds of thousands of autoworkers decided to join. That helped make auto-worker jobs stop being poverty-wage, dangerous jobs and made them into middle-class-family-sustaining jobs.”
A Google rep did not respond to inquiries, but a spokesperson has told reporters the striking workers are employees of Cognizant, not Google. Jeff Demarrais, a Cognizant spokesperson, sent a statement saying the company “respects the right of our associates to disagree with our policies, and to protest them lawfully,” adding that it is “disappointing” the workers decided to strike over a return-to-office policy the company has “communicated to them repeatedly” since December 2021. In an email, Demarrais accused the protesters of issuing “death threats” against other Cognizant employees and “blocked the office driveways with downed trees.”
Neil Gossell, who works for the striking YouTube Music division, calls the downed-tree claim a “flat-out lie,” saying a recent Austin ice storm was responsible for the blocked walkways. “I don’t know of any threats we made to anybody who chose to return to work,” says Gossell, a music generalist with YouTube Music who oversees “missing content” taken down due to copyright issues or missing artist names. “Sure, we’re frustrated with them, but we hope we can convince them into joining and help themselves have a better and fairer workplace.”
Gossell and Marschner are upset that Google, whom they see as their employer, has deferred to Cognizant. “I’ve gone through Google training. I go through their security training. I go through their ethics training…. [But] if we want to negotiate over pay, they say, ‘Pay is based on the contract we have with Google, so we can’t bargain over that.’” Marschner says.
The employees, affiliated with the Alphabet Workers Union, which has never held a strike, are awaiting National Labor Relations Board decisions on their election petition and the two Unfair Labor Practice complaints.
“It’s going to be a long labor movement, because we’re not stopping until we have a union,” Gossell says. Referring to recent union activity at Amazon, Disney and Tesla, he adds: “I’m not saying we’re the tip of the spear, but we’re part of something bigger that’s going on in America. All you have to do is pick up a history book to see how this ends.”
Spotify is experimenting with “token-enabled playlists,” meaning users in possession of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) can connect their wallets and listen to collections of music put together by the likes of Overlord (a company developing blockchain-based games) and KINGSHIP (Universal Music Group’s Bored Ape band). Android users in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Australia and New Zealand can now test the new feature.
“At Spotify, we routinely conduct a number of tests in an effort to improve our user experience,” a spokesperson for the streaming platform said in a statement. “Some of those end up paving the path for our broader user experience and others serve only as important learnings. We have no further news to share on future plans at this time.”
Spotify CEO Daniel Ek discussed blockchain technology — which enables the creation of unique digital files that are also uncopyable — on the Culture: Now Streaming podcast in 2019. “The most important thing is it will enable paying for things digitally in many of the places around the world where those kind of methods just doesn’t exist,” Ek said. “A service like Spotify, you can imagine what would happen by allowing users for instance to be able to pay artists directly. That can open up massive opportunities where all of a sudden, a user in Japan might pay a creator in Argentina. And that opens up huge opportunities for how we can further our mission.”
Last year, Spotify started allowing “a small group of artists [to] promote their existing third-party NFT offerings via their artist profiles,” according to a statement from the company. (At the time, Spotify reiterated that it “routinely conduct[s] a number of tests in an effort to improve artist and fan experiences” some of which “serve only as an important learning.”)
Steve Aoki and The Wombats were among those testing the feature, which was made available to Android users in the U.S.
Once again, the Sanremo Music Festival impacts Billboard’s global charts. Italy’s qualifying competition for the Eurovision Song Contest, the showdown yields a handful of debuts on the Feb. 25-dated rankings. Sanremo was held at the Teatro Ariston from Feb. 7 to 11, and was broadcast by Radiotelevisione italiana. (Eurovision is set for May 9-13 in Liverpool.)
Five songs from the Sanremo competition enter the Billboard Global Excl. U.S. chart, led by Lazza’s “Cenere,” at No. 29. In the week ending Feb. 16, “Cenere” drew 22.5 million streams worldwide, according to Luminate. Ultimately, it placed second in Sanremo.
The competition’s winner was Marco Mengoni for “Due vite,” which topped its competitors in all three categories – public televoting, jury of the press and demoscopic jury. Though it swept its way to a Eurovision qualification, it debuts just under Lazza’s high mark, hitting Global Excl. U.S. at No. 32, on the back of 21.3 million streams.
Mr. Rain follows at No. 42 with “Supereroi,” also third place in Sanremo. These three top 50 debuts also crack the Billboard Global 200 at Nos. 68 (“Cenere”), 80 (“Due vite”) and 97 (“Supereroi”).
Additionally, Madame enters Global Excl. U.S. at No. 104 with “Il Bene Nel” and Tananai rounds out the Sanremo scope at No. 195 with “Tango.” The latter song finished in fifth place in Sanremo, while the former ranked seventh.
All five charting songs from Sanremo drew more than 90% of their streams from Italy, with Lazza, Mr.Rain and Tananai each above 94%. They make up the entire top five of Luminate’s latest Global Hits – Italy ranking, as seen in the data firm’s Music Connect platform, with “Cenere” leading the pack.
The sum of five Sanremo-sparked Global Excl. U.S. entries falls short of last year’s seven but is still above 2021’s four. Plus, the three Global 200 debuts match last year’s high, after no Sanremo songs impacted two years ago. (Both worldwide tallies began in September 2020.)
The zero-to-100 (er, three) momentum from 2021 may have something to do with the notoriety that that year’s winner brought to the competition. Måneskin triumphed with “Zitti E Buoni,” before winning Eurovision and then scoring multiple global hits later that year (plus a Grammy nomination for best new artist this year), including “Beggin’,” which reached No. 2 on Global Excl. U.S.
The band’s pan-continental, and then worldwide, fame may have assisted a top 10 debut for last year’s Sanremo champion, “Brividi” by Mahmood and Blanco. The ballad reached No. 7 on Global Excl. U.S. following Sanremo and returned to the chart after Eurovision.
But while Måneskin may have helped launch a new era of international success for Sanremo-associated titles, one may forget that the Italian glam-rockers were initially outpaced on the global charts. “Zitti E Buoni” debuted at No. 106 on the March 20, 2021-dated ranking, slightly behind the year’s runner-up “Chiamami Per Nome” by Francesca Michielin and Fedez at No. 100. That Måneskin went on to greater heights should give extra hope to Mengoni as he prepares for Eurovision, as even though his competition-winning song didn’t yield the biggest initial chart impact, even bigger things could be right around the corner.
On Feb. 12, Rihanna headlined the Super Bowl LVII halftime show in Glendale, Ariz., using less than 15 minutes of airtime to amplify her sprawling discography.
In a spur of debuts and re-entries, she logs 16 titles on the Feb. 25-dated Billboard Global 200 chart and nine on Billboard Global Excl. U.S., more than any other act on either of this week’s surveys. In all, they totaled 257.2 million streams worldwide in the week ending Feb. 16, according to Luminate.
American football is a specifically stateside sport, but the Super Bowl is a major pop cultural event. The NFL revealed that an estimated 208 million Americans watched this year’s game, while The Athletic estimates an additional 40 million viewers outside the United States.
All of those eyeballs on Rihanna created a firestorm of consumption worldwide. She properly performed 12 songs during her halftime set, and those dozen tracks averaged a week-to-week streaming increase of 231%.
Her hit parade is led by 2007’s “Umbrella,” featuring Jay-Z, debuting on the Global 200 at No. 32 and re-entering Global Excl. U.S. at No. 66. The classic spent three weeks on the latter chart in January 2021 but never hit the former until now.
2012’s “Diamonds” and 2011’s “We Found Love,” featuring Calvin Harris, both crack the top 50 of the Global 200, at Nos. 40 and 47, respectively, while arriving at Nos. 71 and 77 on Global Excl. U.S.
“Only Girl (In the World),” “B**** Better Have My Money,” and “Where Have You Been” debut further down both charts. “Work,” featuring Drake, “Run This Town,” with Jay-Z and Kanye West, and “Rude Boy” debut on the Global 200 while missing the Global Excl. U.S. ranking.
The superstar performed three other songs during her set – “Pour It Up,” her featured verse on DJ Khaled’s “Wild Thoughts,” and her refrain from West’s “All of the Lights” – that miss both charts.
But while Rihanna’s hyper-curated setlist spurred chart activity for specific tracks, the performance also drew listeners to her entire discography, hungry to rediscover deeper hits as the seven-year gap since her last studio album continues to widen. She charted an additional seven songs from beyond her halftime performance. See below for a rundown of all of Rihanna’s globally charting hits on the latest lists.
The seven songs above that were not performed drew the smallest streaming bumps, up anywhere from a still notable 23% (“Lift Me Up”) to 107% (“Don’t Stop the Music”). Next are the songs that were performed that were generally expected to be performed, and therefore had already been picking up steam in the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl. “Umbrella” was up by 131%, “Diamonds” by 138%, “Only Girl (In the World)” by 159% and “We Found Love” by 160%.
Then, there are big-to-massive gains for songs that may have surprised fans with their inclusion and had smaller global streaming counts to begin with, and therefore more room to grow after last weekend’s exposure.
Among all Rihanna tracks, the seemingly NSFW “B**** Better Have My Money” got the biggest gain, up 594% globally to 14.7 million streams. “Pour It Up” followed, up 334%. Those songs’ original releases, in 2015 and 2012, respectively, predate Billboard’s global charts but they peaked outside the top 10 of the U.S.-based Billboard Hot 100, where Rihanna has 32 career top 10s. Including both in a tight 12-song set alongside six former No. 1s (and another three top five hits) ensured a massive resurgence.
Across the board, Rihanna’s gains in the U.S. were bigger than those beyond. That is to be expected considering that an estimated 80% of the viewing audience watched from somewhere in the U.S. Still, Rihanna’s 12 songs from the halftime show averaged a 201% gain in non-U.S. streams. That’s notably smaller than the 297% average domestic gain, but still enough to land more than a handful of songs on the Excl. U.S. ranking.
Spotify announced a new listening feature that incorporates artificial intelligence technology on Wednesday (Feb. 22). Instead of clicking through an editorial playlist like Today’s Top Hits or an algorithmic one like Discovery Weekly, premium users in the U.S. and Canada can now turn to “DJ,” which supplements algorithmic recommendations with commentary about the selections delivered via an AI voice platform.
DJ “will sort through the latest music and look back at some of your old favorites — maybe even resurfacing that song you haven’t listened to for years,” Spotify wrote in a blog post. “It will then review what you might enjoy and deliver a stream of songs picked just for you. And what’s more, it constantly refreshes the lineup based on your feedback. If you’re not feeling the vibe, just tap the DJ button and it will switch it up.”
Sulinna Ong, Global Head of Editorial at Spotify, praised DJ as “a new and unique music experience” in a statement. “I’m personally so excited about DJ because we’re able to harness this power to tell an artist’s story, to be able to provide context around their work and their songs in a broader cultural arena like never before,” she added.
Spotify’s blog post also noted that “early tests” of DJ — the feature is still in beta mode — indicate “that when listeners hear that additional audio context alongside their music recommendations, they’re more willing to try something new and listen to a song they may have otherwise skipped.”
The streaming service said that technology from OpenAI, the company that also developed ChatGPT, helps furnish “insightful facts about the music, artists, or genres you’re listening to” — facts sourced in part from Spotify’s editorial team. The AI voice of DJ is based on that of Xavier “X” Jernigan, the platform’s head of cultural partnerships, who previously hosted a morning show podcast for the streaming service. Spotify announced that it acquired Sonantic, an AI voice platform, last June.
Generative artificial intelligence has become a red-hot topic in tech in recent months thanks to ChatGPT and new image generators like DALL-E 2. AI is already being incorporated by tech companies like BandLab and Boomy, which aim to make the barrier to artistic creation lower by providing aspiring acts access to AI-powered music-making tools.
HONG KONG — Concerned about the impact that fake streams are having on the accuracy of China’s music charts, Tencent Music Entertainment (TME) has designed an annual chart that incorporates both streaming and sales data with votes from industry professionals, the company tells Billboard.
The new year-end chart, which TME recently released to the public in China, combines inputs from two existing charts, the TME UniChart and TME Wave Chart, which track weekly and monthly streaming data. They feed into the Tencent Music Chart, the year-end charts compiled by the China-based music giant, which operates streaming apps QQ Music, Kugou Music, Kuwo Music, and karaoke service WeSing.
The TME UniChart, which first launched in 2018 and has been featured on Billboard’s global website (billboard.com) since November, calculates listening data from China’s public radio stations and streaming data on TME-run platforms, including clicks, favorites, downloads, shares, purchases and recommendations. The TME Wave Chart, on the other hand, is compiled by scores and recommendations from over 250 industry professionals every month. (TME, which licenses the Billboard brand in China and publishes Billboard China, would not disclose its math formula for weighting its results.)
The new combined chart was developed to ensure the accuracy and fairness of the rankings, and to address growing concerns from music professionals that China’s music charts are subject to tampering, and include inflated streams and social media statistics, a company representative tells Billboard.
The issue mirrors concern expressed in the U.S. music industry about aggressive organizing by fan groups of certain pop artists to push them up the rankings. That has notably included K-pop group BTS’ fan ARMY and its agency, HYBE, which have come under scrutiny for BTS’ chart successes. (Both HYBE and BTS have rejected accusations that chart manipulation accounts for the group’s success.)
Chinese fan groups often engage in “data work,” which includes conducting online activities to ensure the high placement of celebrities on social media ranking boards,” says Dr. Celia Lam, associate professor in Media and Cultural Studies at the University of Nottingham Ningbo China, who studies audience and fan engagement. “Organized team-building activities within fandoms can include daily data targets – liking, sharing or reposting social media posts or using specific hashtags — to ensure the continued data performance of a celebrity figure,” she says.
China, the world’s sixth-largest music market, has dozens of domestic music charts, including some run by China’s state-owned broadcaster that have been operating for about two decades. But the country lacks an industry-recognized reference chart like the Billboard Hot 100 or Spotify’s Weekly Top Song Global.
Several established music charts already exist in China, including Global Chinese Golden Chart (jointly launched by seven largest Chinese-speaking radio stations), China Music Billboard (run by China National Radio MusicRadio), and Global Chinese Music under CCTV. There are also emerging music charts run by streaming platforms such as Fresh Asia Music Weekly Chart, NetEase Music Hot Songs Weekly Chart and QQ Music MV Chart, along with some hosted by social media platforms such as Sina Weibo and Douyin.
With fewer music listeners tuning into radios, charts run by China’s public broadcaster have become limited in their ability to reflect a song’s popularity. Music professionals have questioned the credibility of emerging music charts, as fans in China are known to mobilize in mass-streaming activities to push their singers to the top of the charts, preventing those charts from reflecting the organic popularity of songs.
Tencent Music says it wants to help weed out fraudulent activity and create more credibility for its own charts. Still, the move comes amid recent government regulatory scrutiny on TME for its potential monopoly stranglehold on the streaming market. Music listeners in China spent 70% of their time streaming music in 2022 on TME’s three major platforms — QQ Music, Kugou Music and Kuwo Music, the company says. TME had 85.3 million paying music users as of the third quarter of 2022, according to company filings.
Leveraging the huge amount of data generated by TME’s services, the annual rankings also offered insights into China’s fast-growing music industry. In 2022, pop stars Jay Chou, Yisa Yu, Lala Hsu, G.E.M., Mao Buyi and Jackson Wang took the top spots on the Tencent Music Chart. Rising stars Zhou Shen, Joker Xue, Liu Yu Ning, Xin Liu rounded out the top 10.
“Looking at the annual charts in recent years, we can see that the Chinese music market has begun to diversify,” Vincent Lee, director of TME’s charts team, tells Billboard. “Influential singers like Jay Chou, Eason Chan, and Karen Mok still occupy important positions in the music market. But the power of the new generation should also not be underestimated such as the very young boy band Teens In Times and Zhou Shen, who gained popularity through variety shows and original soundtracks of film and television dramas.”
Music lovers in China have also started branching into different music genres. Besides Jay Chou’s “Greatest Works of Art” and “Free of Worries When Flowers Blossom” by Zhou Shen, Chinese listeners embraced “You Are My Magic” by Taiwanese psychedelic rock band Accusefive and Cai Xu Kun’s romantic love song “Hug Me.”
Younger rising artists have also begun to win the hearts of fans. “Getting Warmer” by Teens In Times topped the UniChart as song of the year, while the song “Beautiful” by the boy band INTO-1 member Mika has remained on the chart for 52 weeks.
“Judging from the hit songs in recent years, there is less and less a ‘standard formula’ to musical success,” says Lee. “Different types of music have shown strong potential in China’s music scene, and popular songs have emerged from all kinds of genres.”
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Keen observers noticed that last quarter Warner Music Group’s global streaming revenues were down 2.6% year over year, a rare sputter in the music industry’s main engine of growth. The company’s total revenue declined 7.8% as losses in recorded music’s physical and digital revenues couldn’t make up for publishing gains.
On its face, a year-over-year decline in streaming revenue – the driving force behind growth at labels as well as the rise in music catalog valuations – might seem alarming. Declines are routinely seen in download and physical sales. Streaming is typically the dependable bright spot of any earnings report.
The decline was more noticeable when compared to companies that released earnings for the same quarter. Sony Music Entertainment posted strong growth in the same period. SME’s streaming revenue improved 33.2% in its recorded music division and 59.8% in its publishing division. Reservoir Media didn’t show streaming softness last quarter, either. In its recorded music division, digital revenues were up 17% year-over-year. Digital revenues in its publishing division rose 29%.
So, what happened? Some of it is due to a quirk of WMG accounting, some of it is due to WMG, and some of it is due to factors that affect the entire music business.
One factor in WMG’s weak streaming revenue was a shorter quarter: WMG’s last quarter had one fewer week than the prior-year quarter, which gave the company a tough basis for comparison even before other factors could be considered. A 14-week quarter has 7.1% more days to generate income than a 13-week one and that’s a big gap to overcome. Adjusting for that, WMG streaming revenues would have been up 5% year-over-year.
The stronger dollar — WMG’s financial statements are reported in dollars, Sony reports in yen, Universal Music Group in euros — also played a part in the decline. In WMG’s recorded music division, streaming revenues declined 4% as reported but were flat on a constant currency basis (which assumes no change in foreign exchange rates). In its publishing division, streaming revenues grew 13.2% as reported and 16.8% at constant currency.
WMG also blamed the soft streaming numbers on a new release line-up that CFO Eric Levin called “a softer, largely U.S.-based release schedule” that “could roll into our fiscal Q2. But given our release schedule as second half-oriented this year,” he added, “we do feel good about our performance of releases and strength in the second half of the year.”
Another factor was not specific to WMG: a slowing ad market. Levin called it “a dislocated ad market” and warned “the decline is getting more pronounced.” The decline in ad-supported streaming revenue isn’t a surprise. The Ledger wrote about the soft advertising market in August 2022. Spotify CFO Paul Vogel warned advertising growth in the third quarter would be “slower than we might have forecast earlier in the year.” French music company Believe said “ad-funded streaming activities should be affected by rising inflation and economic uncertainties.”
The streaming market has become bifurcated. Subscription services have fared well through the pandemic and high inflation. Advertising is more closely associated with the direction of the broader economy. Consumers are generally reluctant to cancel entertainment subscriptions, but it’s easier for brands to pull back on ad spending, hurting everything from YouTube to broadcast radio companies like iHeartMedia (and music publishers to a lesser extent). At WMG, “subscription streaming grew by high single digits” but was partially offset by a drop “in the mid-teens” in ad-supported revenue, Levin said. WMG also noticed the slowdown in brands’ spending has created “a somewhat softer market for synch.”
In the fourth quarter, Spotify’s advertising revenue rose 14% compared to an 18% improvement for subscription revenue. With the growth of Spotify’s podcasting business, not all the advertising growth could be attributed to music. Advertising growth lagged subscription growth in the third quarter by three percentage points.
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Now that the Super Bowl is behind us, sports fans can set their sights on the NBA All-Star Game. The 2023 NBA All-Star weekend launches on Friday (Feb. 17).
From the slam dunk contest to the halftime show, keep reading for the NBA All-Star Weekend details and how to watch without cable.
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NBA All-Star Game Schedule
When and where is All-Star Weekend? This year’s events will be held in Salt Lake City from Feb. 17-19.
21 Savage, Cordae, Janelle Monáe, Ozuna, Nicky Jam and more will suit up for the Ruffles Celeb Game airing Friday at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN followed by the Jordan Rising Stars three-game mini-tournament on TNT (click here for tickets).
Saturday’s schedule includes the NBA All-Star Practice Presented by AT&T at 1 p.m. ET on NBA TV, NBA x HBCU Classic Presented by AT&T at 4 p.m. ET on NBA TV, TNT and ESPN2; and the State Farm All-Star Saturday Night — featuring the Kia Skills Challenge, Starry 3-Point Contest and AT&T Slam Dunk — at 8 p.m. ET on TNT.
Welcoming fans to State Farm All-Star Saturday Night will be Creed III stars Michael B. Jordan and Jonathan Majors.
The 2023 NBA All-Star Game goes down at the Vivint Smart Home Arena on Sunday at 8 p.m ET. Tickets are still available for the game and other events.
(Find the full 2023 NBA All-Star Weekend schedule here.)
Who’s Performing at the 2023 All-Star Game?
Burna Boy, Tems and Rema will headline the halftime show with an Afrobeats-themed performance. After the halftime show, LeBron James will be honored for becoming the league’s all-time scorer.
Post Malone is set to perform a medley of hits during pre-game show at 6 p.m. ET on TNT. The All-Star Draft Presented by Jordan Brand will take place before the game at 7:30 p.m. ET.
Actor Vin Diesel will introduce the All-Star Game players. Grammy-nominated singer, and Utah native, Jewel will perform the national anthem while platinum-selling Toronto artist Jully Black will perform Canada’s anthem.
2023 NBA All-Star: How to Watch the Game, Halftime Show & Other Events Online
The 2023 NBA All-Star Game begins on Sunday at 8:00 p.m. ET (TNT coverage starts at 6:00 p.m.). The game will broadcast on TNT, which gives you different options when it comes to streaming.
If you already have TNT through a cable, internet or satellite provider, you can watch or stream the NBA All-Star game on your TV or online from any location.
No cable? Streaming plans tend to be cheaper than cable, plus you don’t have to worry about renting (and returning) a cable box. The 2023 NBA All-Star Game will be streaming on platforms like SlingTV, and Fubo (Vidgo offers ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN Deportes but not TNT).
Philo is certainly a more affordable streaming option at $25 a month, but the streamer does not carry TNT. However, Sling TV has TNT and other sports, news and entertainment channels for just $20 for the first month (regular $40/month).
DirectTV Stream is another decent option for live television — it’s not very expensive and you can get perks like free HBO Max with select plans and a free trial for five days. The streaming start at $74.99/month for 75+ channels. Hulu + Live TV is around the same price for 85+ channels and access to Disney+ and ESPN+.
Sport lovers who want to stream the NBA All-Star Game internationally can do so with ExpressVPN or NordVPN. Additionally certain All-Star Weekend events can be streamed on the NBA app, including Saturday’s NBA All-Star Media Day Presented by AT&T (1 p.m. ET),
Adam Silver’s news conference on Saturday at 7 p.m. ET will air on NBA TV and stream on the NBA app. The same goes for the NBA Legends Awards on Sunday at 1 p.m. ET.