Recently, we have seen very fast, radical shifts in the music industry because of how the population is consuming music. With the boom of the Internet and other necessary improvements, such as ISPs and search engines, the average music consumer has access to any song he or she wants with a few clicks of a button. While this method may not be the most ethical, it has shifted how we think about music. We perceive it as something that should not cost much to be attained and should be easily available for access. Many governments have tried all they can to stop this abuse of technology at the expense of the artist, however the solution seems impossible. There are simply too many sites continually popping up that allow consumers to download as much as they wish. This was the situation when Spotify came to the U.S. in the summer of 2011.

When Spotify came on the American scene, it brought with it was a "stream" of controversy. Time describes that digital track sales on sites such as the iTunes Store dropped for the first time in 2013, going from 1.34 billion to 1.26 billion. That same year, sales of actual CDs continued their decline, dropping 14%, while online streaming sites such as Spotify continued their upward momentum, increasing by 32% to $118.1 billion.

While some of this decrease in demand for traditional music platforms shifted to streaming sites such as Spotify, this was not the only cause. People were getting their music illegally. In a 2014 Business Insider and Survey Monkey poll, 14% of people admitted to streaming illegal content online. While there is a way to stream content online that is considered legal, with such illegal sites still operating, there is not an incentive for consumers to go this route. Spotify, in particular, has always strived to correct this problem. In an interview with TorrentFreak in December 2013, Daniel Ek, the CEO of Spotify, explains that the company started because he “believed that if we could build a service which was better than piracy, then we could convince people to stop illegal file-sharing and start consuming music legally again.” Considering how many people have already made the switch, it would appear Ek has been largely successful in this goal. Furthermore, artists are actually receiving something for their work, which is better than nothing. They should be happy about this, right? Well, not quite.

Artists argue that streaming portrays music as a cheap commodity. Most services pay less than one cent per stream, which places artist payment as the core ethical dilemma when examining music streaming. Damon Krukowski of Galaxie 500 explained to Vice’s Noisey of earning 21 cents for 7,800 plays of a song on Pandora. At this rate, 312,000 plays would be needed to earn the same royalties as one LP. A major problem contributing to artists not getting much compensation is that the business model of streaming companies has not been bringing in the expected cash flow.

Although Spotify is now valued at $8.5 billion, they are still stuck with the question: will enough paying subscribers join the streaming industry to keep the business model working? Even with the current model, will artists ever be able to make any substantial amount of money? Some companies, such as Pandora, have started bettering relations with artists through providing more than simple monetary compensation. They are giving artists data analytics about people listening to their songs so they can better target that market. This information can then be used to better market merchandise, concert tickets and other money earning opportunities. Perhaps if other streaming companies could adopt this strategy or create their own creative approach to paying back artists, then these relations could be further mended.

While it is clear that illegally downloading music is...illegal, the ethics of streaming music through sites such as Spotify and Pandora is not quite so black and white. While the music industry adapts to one of its consumers' largest paradigm shifts, everything about the industry is changing, ranging from song length, formulated genres and listening platforms. Despite the critiques of digital streaming, hopefully more companies can take on creative approaches to create a more ethical solution for the future.