Is Tidal in trouble?

For me this video puts a fine point on the art of believing your own bull. Exec summary: There is no business model, we’re practising the fine art of making it up as we go and all’s good as long as we can keep convincing people to throw money at funding a loss making business, because eventually, yes, eventually, consolidation will take place allowing complete control over access and facilitating monopoly pricing. Who cares anyway, I’m just here for the ride.

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Pretty hard to call a 25 minute stream of marketing mumbo jumbo a “fine point,” not even sure he believes his own bull, but hey, as long as we have investors who pony up the cash and subscribers who pay part of the freight and competitors who ‘validate’ the journey how different is this from where Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc. were in their earlier years?

I’m guessing you have never worked for a startup.

None without a viable business model, no.

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For a company that so many people say is in trouble, I am impressed, they don’t act like it. Today on Facebook an Artist I know ‘Hannah Rose Platt’ announced she was releasing a song based on experience and proceeds to a Woman’s refuge charity. The add mentioned Spotify and Soundcloud but I looked on Tidal; and here it is on the release day.

Give it a spin and listen to an amazing young songwriter

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Funny to hear that Tidal is “in trouble”. Sprint invested $200 million for a third of the company. Maybe their biggest “trouble” will be how to invest all of that money into their service.

From what I read on the financial pages, none of the streaming services are profitable. Spotify is creating news stories that (hopefully) in 2018 they will start being profitable.

Well, eventually, Sprint’s 3rd of the company will be T-Mobile’s 3rd.

This doesn’t feel as though it’s going to end well

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That’s quite a shocking story. I hope they can establish with certainty whether the data it is based on has been manipulated.

I am amazed that you are amazed…

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Seems pretty straightforward. If the data shows that anyone listened to either of them willingly (not as part of a playlist) then the data has been manipulated.

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Kanye has expressed admiration for Trump…

…and then decides the best damage control is then doing even more outrageous things.

Meeeh, I bet all of them do it, Spotify has been accused of similar practices. It’s all part of the game.

In this case the artists’ numbers that were inflated are owners of the streaming service in question!

I’m sure it will spark some deeper investigation and data analysis by record labels as to tampering and fraud.

Maybe they can use Cambridge Analytica for the investigation :wink:

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image

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True, not saying it is OK. Especially since they are the owners they could be accused of lining their own pockets. These things are getting more and more the norm, sadly. And if it leaks, we call it fake news.

Wasnt it Kanye that said he wants to run for president? Sure he will get 150% of the votes :joy:

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It’s not quite as straightforward though is it?
The data, under statistical analysis, shows that false plays were generated (in order to increase profits).
However, the data isn’t authenticated, and that’s what I meant by establishing whether “the data it is based on has been manipulated”, or not. The Tidal lawyers can argue that it’s irrelevant what patterns of manipulation are uncovered, because anyone could have put them in there, for example, some IT guys working for the newspaper that broke the story.
I find that quite unlikely, but it is a distinct possibility, and unless the data is proven to be authentic and untampered with, the conclusions won’t stick, and Tidal will get away with it.