We backed up Spotify (metadata and music files). It’s distributed in bulk torrents (~300TB). It’s the world’s first “preservation archive” for music which is fully open (meaning it can easily be mirrored by anyone with enough disk space), with 86 million music files, representing around 99.6% of listens.
  • kindred@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    83·
    4 days ago

    This is by far the largest music metadata database that is publicly available. For comparison, we have 256 million tracks, while others have 50-150 million. Our data is well-annotated: MusicBrainz has 5 million unique ISRCs, while our database has 186 million.

    Does this mean the MusicBrainz database will soon go from 5 million to 186 million tracks?

    • zingo@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      11·
      3 days ago

      That’s exactly what I was wondering too.

      Acquiring high quality music is already easy enough in most cases.

      What I am interested in is the metadata. Accurate tagging of all my files is of high interest.

    • purplemonkeymad@programming.devEnglish
      7·
      3 days ago

      If I ran mb, I would be cautious importing the data directly. I’m sure Spotify would consider it trade information and go after anyone directly using it. However if a few million people added the tracks with individual edits then it probably won’t take too long.

        • zarkony@lemmy.zipEnglish
          3·
          3 days ago

          It can’t, but I’m sure that wouldn’t stop Spotify from raising a stink if they see it being bulk imported. I’d imagine this would be similar to OpenStreetMaps and Google Maps; they probably could scrape and bulk import missing info, but they restrict it to licensed sources and user edits to limit liability and enforce quality.

  • massive_bereavement@fedia.io
    64·
    4 days ago

    I’ll strongly suggest to take out all the cheaply AI generated music from this “back up” and save themselves some space.

  • helpImTrappedOnline@lemmy.worldEnglish
    51·
    4 days ago

    The data they compiled is really cool.

    If reading the chart right, the genera with the most artists is opera.

    Even if they didn’t have the music files, the analysis on the metadata is insane.

    Publicly admitting they are the origin of the torrents is definitely a risky an insane move. I don’t think they want Sony going after them, but also fuck Sony for locking art behind shitty contracts that forces these kind of projects to exist.

    • JensSpahnpasta@feddit.orgOPEnglish
      28·
      4 days ago

      Publicly admitting they are the origin of the torrents is definitely a risky an insane move. I don’t think they want Sony going after them

      Let’s be honest: Everybody is trying to go after Annas Archive. Every book publisher wants to get them, the US government, too and it really doesn’t matter if every music publisher wants them also. I hope that they are based in a country where the western systems can’t get them

      • Tangent5280@lemmy.worldEnglish
        4·
        3 days ago

        I hope (also assume since it hasn’t been taken down yet) it’s more of a decentralised deal with servers in many places and backups in every nation under the sun

    • douglasg14b@lemmy.worldEnglish
      19·
      4 days ago

      Yeah, it’s a wild move admitting that they are the source of pirated content for music here.

      We don’t need Anna’s Archive to go under as a result of Sony going after them because of this…

      • rainwall@piefed.socialEnglish
        10·
        4 days ago

        They have had a dozen or more lawsuits/police actions against them. They are already enemy #1 in piracy terms, so I expect they are okay leaning into it and doing more good for the world.

  • lietuva@lemmy.worldEnglish
    43·
    4 days ago

    There’s definitely gonna be some crazy guy who will put this on their server and stream it to their phones lol

      • Wolf314159@startrek.websiteEnglish
        4·
        4 days ago

        No. Soulseek is old school P2P. All you need to do is run the client software, set a local shared folder, and your are client and server in one. Funkwhale is more like running your own Lemmy instance and building a community. The difference between them is like the difference between using Airdrop or Syncthing to share files and hosting hosting your own domain and server.

      • nymnympseudonym@piefed.socialEnglish
        21·
        4 days ago

        Soulseek afict requires dedicated clients. The Subsonic standard is supported by more & more mobile/PC apps, I wish it was supported

      • three@lemmy.zipEnglish
        22·
        4 days ago

        Oh no, around here we mention esoteric software but we will never include any extra information in the post. If you know you know.

    • noodlejetski (he/him)@piefed.socialEnglish
      18·
      4 days ago

      a few years ago, back when I was still using Spotify, I checked my Wrapped and apparently I was using Spotify more than 99.5% of users in my country, and when it came to my most listened artist, I was in top 0.05% listeners worldwide. doing some back-of-the-napkin math with the data I got online about Spotify’s payouts, it turned out the money the artist got during that year from me amounted to less than just a bit over a dollar.

      if you’re really concerned about supporting artists, use the money you’d pay for your music streaming subscription and buy their album or a piece of merch every two months.

      • HereIAm@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        4 days ago

        I’ve had Spotify since it basically released. I fully switched to a self hosted music library about 5 months ago. I imagine I’ve supported artists more in those 5 months than I did during my 18-ish years of Spotify premium. I still use Soulseek for large artists or quite old albums, but most new releases and remix tracks I pay for.

        • noodlejetski (he/him)@piefed.socialEnglish
          10·
          4 days ago

          okay so this next bit might shock you, but there’s already a HUGE amount of music available on Youtube for everyone to search through and listen to with just a few click. and in addition to that, there’s the Soulseek network, countless torrent trackers – both public and private – that let you download entire discographies, as well as Youtube download tools, websites and tools that let you rip music from streaming services. and all of those are free! more than that, they have been around for years! and before that, people would download songs from Limewire or Kazaa or Napster, tape songs from radio, or buy bootleg albums. and somehow, there’s still people buying music and T-shirts from their favourite bands, and paying to attend their concerts. absolutely bonkers.

          • bridgeenjoyer@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
            3·
            2 days ago

            I buy at least 5 cds a month from groups I like. Usually on bandcamp or the artist website. Usually smaller groups. If theyre massively famous or were hugely successful 40 years ago I may not purchase it though. Or get a used copy.

          • Mihies@programming.devEnglish
            12·
            3 days ago

            It might shock you, but content on YouTube gets paid. And illegal sources out there don’t make it more legal to share it. It’s funny though, you are basically saying what? Listen for free, middle finger to authors, and buy merchandise? As opposite to listen legally, authors get something and buy merchandise? But hey, I’m glad that you speak for authors.

            • noodlejetski (he/him)@piefed.socialEnglish
              5·
              3 days ago

              It might shock you, but content on YouTube gets paid

              similar fraction of pennies as in Spotify’s case, and often the people who receive the money aren’t the people behind the content, especially when it comes to older or less popular music, because it’s been uploaded by some random guy 14 years ago.

              you are basically saying what? Listen for free, middle finger to authors, and buy merchandise? As opposite to listen legally, authors get something and buy merchandise?

              no, my good guy, I say middle finger to Spotify and their warmongering, slop-embracing, Joe-Rogan-loving business, and spend money in a way that skips at least one middle man which hopefully results in the artist getting a bigger cut, and in you actually owning something even when the company you’ve bought from goes down, rather than renting it.

              But hey, I’m glad that you speak for authors.

              right back atcha!

              • Mihies@programming.devEnglish
                11·
                3 days ago

                right back atcha!

                How so? You are the wiser what artists really wants - not being paid for listening to their music and would like you to listen to it for free. I merely follow what they offer and not trying to listen to it illegally.

                • Übercomplicated@lemmy.mlEnglish
                  2·
                  3 days ago

                  I am a small indie artist. I earn nearly no money from streaming services, but I do from Bandcamp, SoundCloud (though fuck Soundcloud, they also suck), actual LPs and CDs sold, etc.

                  If someone decides to listen to my music over Spotify, or really any streaming service, they are also “stealing” my music. Because I get no money from that, and listening to my music over those platforms strengthens their monopoly (this mostly applies to Spotify).

                  I need to publish my music on Spotify et al (fuck you discogs) for discoverability, because they have an evil fucking global monopoly, but the moment anyone finds my music there, I would ask them to listen to it elsewhere.

                  It will literally benefit me, and indie artist, more, if you bootleg my music instead of listening via streaming services, as this weakens their monopoly. Seriously.

                  I have a different job, I don’t need to live from my music right now, so the stakes are fairly low for me. But it still sucks to see streaming services ruin independent music like this. I would ask everyone to bootleg music, and then support artists like me through Bandcamp (especially CDs and LPs) and donations (or merch, though I don’t have any), if you appreciate the art.

                  I don’t expect anyone to immediately buy niche music they don’t know, so bootlegging until you become a fan seems reasonable to me. I’ve discovered many of my favorite albums like that, eventually buying LPs online and donating to the artist; that is far more beneficial to those artists than listening over any streaming service (including the slightly better tidal and Amazon music).

                  /rant over

    • Gravitywell.xYz@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      24·
      4 days ago

      Its mostly Sony, UMG, and all the other leeches who would get paid less for their share holders.

      I dont feel like editing the image but imagine the guy with most of the cookies in this picture was UMG and the artists are the guy on the right.

      • Mihies@programming.devEnglish
        13·
        4 days ago

        Yes, sure, but if those don’t get paid, artists don’t get paid. And artists are not forced to pick a label, they are free to go solo, but they still prefer labels, so it’s not that black and white labels bad, artists good

        • yessikg@fedia.io
          1·
          2 days ago

          You have no idea how hard it is to go solo, how the fuck would they get their songs out there? They would have to get really lucky on social media. How would they book concert venues? They would be stuck playing in shitty venues that pay peanuts.

          Anyways, artists make money off of music purchases, concerts, and merch

        • Gravitywell.xYz@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          3·
          3 days ago

          Well if you genuinely care about seeing artists get paid the ones who need it most tend to make their conent available already for free on bandcamp or similar services, and have physical albums and merch you can buy.

          Last night i spent $10 on 3 albums on bandcamp, those artists each made more on that single purchase then they would from thousands of streams.

          Spotify making less (or more) money does not trickle down to artists on a per stream basis.

          Dont be a corporate bootlicker. Say it with me now, "If buying isnt owning Piracy is not stealing. "

          • Mihies@programming.devEnglish
            11·
            3 days ago

            It is really refreshing how this thread spins in “we know what’s best for the artists, certainly not paying for listening to their streams, that’s exactly what they want”. If you don’t want to use Spotify, that’s fine, I don’t want to either because they are an awful company. But that doesn’t make you the person who create the rules for artists nor does it give you the permission to listen to illegal content.

            • Gravitywell.xYz@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              2·
              3 days ago

              I dont think its a huge leap to think artists would rather you be able to buy their music once and make a $ instead of stream it from a sevice that pays them next to nothing.

              • Mihies@programming.devEnglish
                1·
                3 days ago

                What is stopping them? But it seems that general consensus here is that artists would like you to listen for free and here and there buy something from them.

        • cyberwolfie@lemmy.mlEnglish
          5·
          4 days ago

          I’m not sure how you think Spotify compensation works, but it is not a “one stream and you get paid”-deal, but rather a revenue share model where artists are compensated from a large pool by total streams. The main share of your Spotify monthly subscription that goes to compensating artists goes to Taylor Swift, Bad Bunny etc. Being a top listener to your favorite, but underground band contributes negligibly to what they actually get paid.

          If you care about their compensation, buy the album as directly from them as possible, or buy merch/go to concerts, and recommend their msuic to other people so they might end up paying customers. Subscribing to Spotify and thinking they get a fair deal out of that is not the way, and increasingly not the way (with their GenAI-shenanigans).

          • Mihies@programming.devEnglish
            12·
            4 days ago

            First, what am I using is beyond the point and I’m not using Spotify because of their payment method and their politics. And again, if albums are on streaming services, they are voluntarily there, are they not?

            • cyberwolfie@lemmy.mlEnglish
              3·
              4 days ago

              How voluntary is it when these platforms have a monopolistic grasp on how consumers access music these days? And the more people believe that the artists are actually fairly compensated from this model, the firmer this grasp becomes. What choice do they have of being there if they want to have any kind of reach?

              A Spotify Premium subscriptions will cost someone 156€ a year. If that person instead spent that entire music budget on purchasing albums from select musicians according to the enjoyment they derive from their works, or buy concert tickets or merch, and decides to pirate the rest of their music listening, what changes? For the consumer, they are now left with actual, irrevocable access (legal and illegal) to the same music you had rented access to before, and have spent the same amount of money. For the musicians, the ones who received the purchases are left with much more of your dedicated music spend, and the rest will have marginally less (their share based on total streams of your monthly subscription x12). For Spotify and Taylor Swift, they receive marginally less money (but more than the artists you actually listen to) of which they should probably not have received to begin with.

    • Dyskolos@lemmy.zipEnglish
      5·
      4 days ago

      Who’s fault is it that there’s no fair systems one could use (except maybe bandcamp)? Not mine at least, I don’t use Spotify at all. I would not sell my music there if I would be an artist.

      • bridgeenjoyer@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        2·
        2 days ago

        Bandcamp is good. Bands still have websites and mailing lists too. There was never anything wrong with these but big tech wants to keep you in their walled garden and forget the TRUE internet still exists out there.

        Also, record stores bro.

        • Dyskolos@lemmy.zipEnglish
          3·
          2 days ago

          Actually I would just be FLACing my records for convenience, as I did with my whole (SA)CD/BR-Archive. And yes, I do like Bandcamp. It’s really nice to discover indie-artists noone knows (yet). If the bands do make decent money there, I dunno. Hence I said “maybe bandcamp”.

          • bridgeenjoyer@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
            1·
            2 days ago

            Ill do that someday too. I dont like getting rid of media though since 1 glitch/hack/brownout could take out your entire nas very easily.

            • Dyskolos@lemmy.zipEnglish
              1·
              2 days ago

              Sure, I still have all physical media as a backup 😁 As for the NAS, I have a triple backup of it. I learned that the hard way a long time ago 😐

      • Mihies@programming.devEnglish
        22·
        4 days ago

        I don’t use Spotify, either. And do what you want to do, nobody is forcing your to put your music on Spotify.