(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) Swifts decision to yank her music from Spotify has prompted Sony Music Entertainment to reconsider whether it will continue to license songs for free.
Taylor Swift strikes again. Sony Music Entertainment artists including One Direction Pitbull Calvin Harris and Carrie Underwood could be dropping out of free-music streaming queues in the wake of Swift€™s company pulling her entire catalog from Spotify. The decision by Swift€™s Big Machine Records to yank the pop star€™s music from Spotify has prompted Sony Music Entertainment to reconsider whether it will continue to license songs for free ad-supported music services according to Kevin Kelleher EVP and CFO of Sony Music.
After Swift spurned Spotify €œa lot of conversation has taken place over the last week in the light of that€ said Kelleher speaking at Sony€™s investor relations day on Tuesday as reported by the Wall Street Journal. €œThe key question is are the free ad-supported services taking away from how quickly and to what extent we can grow those paid services€ Kelleher said. €œWhat it all really comes down to is how much value are the music company and the artist getting from the different consumption methods.€ At the same time Sony is €œvery encouraged€ by the rise subscription-based streaming services Kelleher added.
Last week Google announced YouTube Music Key which will offer more than 30 million songs € including Taylor Swift tunes € for an intro price of $7.99 per month (versus a regular $9.99 monthly).