Does Last.fm pay up?
So Last.fm is paying royalties to unsigned bands that aren’t affiliated with major labels or (it would appear) organizations like ASCAP or BMI. On the surface, it only makes sense - ASCAP and BMI have traditionally relied on journals or random sampling from those that played the music, and digital programming makes it a lot easier to see what exactly gets played. This makes more sense for smaller artists whose individual plays might be ignored in favor of the artists who received far more spins. It doesn’t look like last.fm would make anybody rich off of these limited spins, but it’s something.
Hypebot makes the move look a lot more pragmatic and mercenary than it might on the surface, and there’s a kernel of truth to that, too. Merely offering something is more enticing to individual artists who haven’t been getting anything up to this point, so it might seem like a good idea to take whatever the payment is. Plus, the artist can sign up themselves, without dealing with management or lawyers or the like.
It’s worth noting here that just because you can doesn’t mean you should, though. The temptation to get something could lead to selling yourself short, and it’s not a bad idea to check with the experts to make sure what the best move is for you. Opinions on the actual rate seem to vary, so make sure you’re comfortable with the rate (listed on the Last.fm site as 10-30% of their net revenue for your play on that service - not exactly a hard number) before you sign up.
In any case, transparency is key to these agreements. Artists need to know up front what they’re making and get a fair and accurate accounting of their royalties. It’s a lack of that information that helped set up the broken system musicians are faced with today.