[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":213},["ShallowReactive",2],{"codex-\u002Fcodex\u002Fthe-equity-nobody-shared":3,"codex-around-\u002Fcodex\u002Fthe-equity-nobody-shared":201},{"id":4,"title":5,"body":6,"cover":167,"date":168,"description":169,"draft":170,"extension":171,"faq":172,"kind":185,"meta":186,"navigation":187,"noindex":170,"ogImage":167,"path":188,"readingMinutes":189,"seo":190,"seoDescription":191,"seoTitle":192,"standfirst":193,"stem":194,"tags":195,"updated":167,"__hash__":200},"codex\u002Fcodex\u002Fthe-equity-nobody-shared.md","The Equity Nobody Shared",{"type":7,"value":8,"toc":157},"minimark",[9,18,24,27,34,37,42,45,48,51,54,58,61,64,71,74,77,81,84,87,90,94,97,100,109,113,116,119,128,131,134,137,145,148],[10,11,12,13,17],"p",{},"At Pop-Kultur in Berlin, on a panel called ",[14,15,16],"em",{},"Regaining Control",", City Slang\nfounder Christof Ellinghaus was asked how the independent sector takes power\nback. He opened with a diagnosis rather than a plan:",[19,20,21],"blockquote",{},[10,22,23],{},"Recorded music is kaput.",[10,25,26],{},"He went on: a late-stage crisis, control lost, and within five to ten years it\nwill be mandatory to build something that actually works in the interest of\nartists and of the people who invest in copyrights — which, in his phrasing,\nmeans independent labels. Up against opportunistic oligarchs, monopolists, and a\nmarket that has grown around the art and makes a fortune from it.",[28,29],"embedded-player",{"height":30,"provider":31,"src":32,"title":33},620,"Instagram","https:\u002F\u002Fwww.instagram.com\u002Fp\u002FDQ7E3x_jOvg\u002Fembed","Regaining Control panel, Pop-Kultur Berlin",[10,35,36],{},"I want to take the structural claim seriously, because there is a specific piece\nof history underneath it that gets repeated wrongly all the time.",[38,39,41],"h2",{"id":40},"the-majors-do-not-own-spotify","The majors do not own Spotify",[10,43,44],{},"You hear this constantly, and it is not true. It is also less interesting than\nwhat actually happened.",[10,46,47],{},"When Spotify needed catalogue in order to exist at all, it could not simply buy\nlicences — it did not have the money. So the 2008 deals paid the rightsholders\npartly in equity. Sony BMG took around six per cent. Universal five. Warner\nfour. EMI two. And Merlin, the body representing the entire independent sector,\ngot one.",[10,49,50],{},"Most of that is gone now. Warner sold its whole position after the 2018 listing\nfor something in the region of half a billion dollars. Merlin sold out too. Sony\noffloaded about half. Today Universal and Sony each hold roughly three per cent\n— real money, no control.",[10,52,53],{},"So no, they don't own it. What matters is that they were paid in shares at the\nmoment the terms of the entire streaming era were being written.",[38,55,57],{"id":56},"two-currencies-one-of-them-shared","Two currencies, one of them shared",[10,59,60],{},"Here is the mechanism, and it is worth being precise about because it is the\nwhole argument.",[10,62,63],{},"A record contract pays an artist a share of revenue earned from their\nrecordings. Royalties are recording revenue, so royalties are shared. Proceeds\nfrom selling a block of shares in a technology company are not recording\nrevenue. No standard contract has a claim on them.",[65,66,68],"codex-note",{"kicker":67},"The structure",[10,69,70],{},"The catalogue was the consideration. The shares were the payment. Only one of\nthose two things had the artists' names on it.",[10,72,73],{},"Several majors did promise to pass some of it on, voluntarily, after the fact,\nand some money did move. But a promise made after a windfall is not the same\nthing as a term agreed before one. The value that artists' recorded work created\nlanded in an asset class their contracts had never heard of.",[10,75,76],{},"And note who got nothing. One per cent, shared across every independent label on\nearth, at the exact moment the rules were set. Ellinghaus is not describing bad\nluck. He is describing a table he was barely seated at.",[38,78,80],{"id":79},"what-it-did-to-the-rate","What it did to the rate",[10,82,83],{},"The conflict is not hypothetical. If you hold shares in the company you are\nnegotiating with, your upside arrives through two doors. A higher per-stream\nrate is one. A larger, faster-growing platform whose valuation lifts your\nholding is the other — and unlike the first, the second does not have to be\ndivided with anybody.",[10,85,86],{},"Layer the pro-rata payout on top, where the pot is split by share of total\nplays, and the structure favours whoever owns the most catalogue and the most\nvolume. Which was, and is, the same handful of companies.",[10,88,89],{},"None of this requires anyone to have behaved corruptly. It only requires people\nto have acted in their own interest, which is the least surprising assumption\nin economics. The result is a rate that was never really argued for on the\nartist's behalf by a party with an undivided interest in arguing for it.",[38,91,93],{"id":92},"where-the-money-goes-when-it-accumulates","Where the money goes when it accumulates",[10,95,96],{},"Ellinghaus finishes with drones, and it sounds like rhetoric until you check it.",[10,98,99],{},"In June 2025, Daniel Ek led a €600 million round into Helsing, a European\ndefence company building AI systems and combat drones, and became its chairman.\nDeerhoof, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Xiu Xiu and eventually Massive\nAttack pulled their catalogues in protest.",[10,101,102,103,108],{},"You can hold a range of views about European defence spending and still notice\nthe structural point, which is not about weapons. Value extracted from music\ndoes not stay in music. It accumulates with whoever owns the layer above the\nartists, and then it goes wherever that person finds it most interesting. There\nis no mechanism returning it to the ecosystem it came from, because none was\never built. I made a version of this argument about\n",[104,105,107],"a",{"href":106},"\u002Fcodex\u002Fa-number-without-a-denominator","what the metrics measure","; this is the\nsame problem one floor up, in the cap table rather than the dashboard.",[38,110,112],{"id":111},"what-regaining-control-actually-looks-like","What regaining control actually looks like",[10,114,115],{},"Less than the phrase suggests, and that is worth saying plainly.",[10,117,118],{},"It looks like selling directly. Bandcamp is still the most familiar route — you\nbuy, the artist keeps most of it, you own the file. Its structural weakness is\nthat it has been sold twice in recent years and nobody using it had a vote\neither time.",[10,120,121,127],{},[104,122,126],{"href":123,"rel":124},"https:\u002F\u002Fwww.subvert.fm\u002Fhybrid-flight",[125],"nofollow","Subvert"," is the attempt at fixing that\none specific thing. It launched in 2025 as a co-operative with roughly 22,000\nfounding owner-members — artists, labels, workers and listeners who own it,\nelect its board, and voted to charge no platform fee. AI-generated music is not\npermitted. Whether it survives is genuinely open. But it cannot be sold out from\nunder the people who built it, which is a structural answer to a structural\nproblem rather than a better app.",[10,129,130],{},"Our own releases sit on Bandcamp and Subvert. Streaming, where it happens, runs\nthrough Tidal, Apple and YouTube. Spotify appears nowhere on this site.",[10,132,133],{},"That is not a solution to anything. It is one small label-shaped decision, and\nit costs reach every single time. Ellinghaus is right that the fix has to be\nstructural and that five to ten years is the honest timeframe. What individuals\ncan do in the meantime is refuse to feed the part of the machine that was built\nto keep the returns.",[10,135,136],{},"Or, more usefully: buy the record.",[138,139],"codex-cta",{"body":140,"href":141,"kicker":142,"label":143,"title":144},"Five tracks between sun-drenched afternoons, Mediterranean sunsets and late-night club moments. On Bandcamp and Subvert — the money goes where you'd expect it to.","https:\u002F\u002Fhybridflight.bandcamp.com\u002Falbum\u002Fbetween-coasts-ep","The work","Buy on Bandcamp","Between Coasts EP",[146,147],"hr",{},[10,149,150,153,154],{},[14,151,152],{},"Source: the"," Regaining Control: A Sustainable Future for Independent Artists and\nLabels ",[14,155,156],{},"panel at Pop-Kultur Berlin, with Christof Ellinghaus (City Slang), Sadie\nThompson (Motive Unknown) and Andy Zammit; clip posted by the festival on 11\nNovember 2025. Equity figures are from the 2008 licensing deals and the 2018\nlisting as reported at the time; Helsing figures from June 2025 reporting.",{"title":158,"searchDepth":159,"depth":159,"links":160},"",3,[161,163,164,165,166],{"id":40,"depth":162,"text":41},2,{"id":56,"depth":162,"text":57},{"id":79,"depth":162,"text":80},{"id":92,"depth":162,"text":93},{"id":111,"depth":162,"text":112},null,"2026-08-31T09:00:00","City Slang's Christof Ellinghaus called recorded music kaput at Pop-Kultur. The structure behind that verdict is a 2008 deal in which labels took shares in Spotify — an asset no artist contract has a claim on.",false,"md",[173,176,179,182],{"question":174,"answer":175},"Do the major labels own Spotify?","Not any more, and they never controlled it. As part of the licensing deals that made the service possible, Sony BMG took around 6 per cent, Universal 5, Warner 4, EMI 2 and Merlin — representing the entire independent sector — 1. Warner and Merlin sold out entirely after the 2018 listing; Sony sold about half. Universal and Sony are each understood to hold roughly 3 per cent today.",{"question":177,"answer":178},"Why is it a problem that labels held shares in Spotify?","Because it paid them in two currencies while paying artists in one. Royalty income is shared with artists under their contracts; proceeds from selling shares are not recording revenue and no standard contract has a claim on them. Warner's exit alone realised around 504 million dollars gross. The parties negotiating the per-stream rate on artists' behalf also profited from the platform's valuation.",{"question":180,"answer":181},"What did Christof Ellinghaus say about recorded music?","Speaking on the Regaining Control panel at Pop-Kultur Berlin, the City Slang founder said recorded music is kaput, describing a late-stage capitalist crisis in which independent labels and artists have lost control, and arguing it will become mandatory within five to ten years to rebuild a music business that works in the interest of artists and the people who invest in copyrights.",{"question":183,"answer":184},"What are the alternatives to Spotify for independent artists?","Selling directly rather than streaming. Bandcamp remains the best-known route. Subvert is a member-owned co-operative launched in 2025 with roughly 22,000 founding owner-members, charging no platform fee and structurally unable to be sold to an outside buyer. Tidal, Apple Music and YouTube Music all pay more per stream than Spotify.","Essay",{},true,"\u002Fcodex\u002Fthe-equity-nobody-shared",5,{"title":5,"description":169},"Universal, Sony and Warner took equity in Spotify as part of the licensing deals that built it. Why that structure shaped streaming royalties, and what independent labels and artists can do about it.","Do major labels own Spotify? The 2008 equity deal and what it cost artists","The majors don't own Spotify. What they own is stranger, older and harder to argue with — and it explains the rate you are still being paid.","codex\u002Fthe-equity-nobody-shared",[196,197,198,199],"music industry","spotify","independent labels","subvert","6jAXUlblN9E68jizaZxYGD2dA7NCeO3rYOaHdkFp5z4",[202,208],{"title":203,"path":204,"stem":205,"description":206,"kind":207,"children":-1},"Show Them the Reason","\u002Fcodex\u002Fshow-them-the-reason","codex\u002Fshow-them-the-reason","Asked what he wanted from a first back-to-back with DJ Hell, Marcel Dettmann named imperfection, surprise and tension before anything else. On why none of that is about skill, and on the difference between transmitting something and claiming the past was better.","Response",{"title":209,"path":210,"stem":211,"description":212,"kind":185,"children":-1},"The Floor Is Not a Stage","\u002Fcodex\u002Fthe-floor-is-not-a-stage","codex\u002Fthe-floor-is-not-a-stage","Why the best club nights in Berlin happen when the DJ stops performing — a working argument for reading the room instead of playing to it.",1789031394227]