On Tuesday, March 2, Soundcloud announced its rollover plan for what it calls “fan-powered royalties.”

The streaming music platform, where mainly independent artists directly upload their material, stated: “Fan-powered royalties are a more equitable and transparent way for independent artists who monetize directly with SoundCloud to get paid. The more fans listen on SoundCloud, and listen to your music, the more you get paid. Under the old model, money from your dedicated fans goes into a giant pool that’s paid out to artists based on their share of total streams. That model mostly benefits mega stars. Under fan-powered royalties, you get paid based on your fans’ actual listening habits. The more of their time your dedicated fans listen to your music, the more you get paid. This model benefits independent artists.”

For independent artists, Soundcloud has remained a main portal to access single drops or the release of standalone tracks. Bandcamp, a Soundcloud competitor, is typically where more polished bodies of work such as EPs and LPs live digitally. Merch is also available on the Bandcamp portal and in November of last year, Bandcamp announced a livestream feature. That said, it does not appear that many artists utilized this feature of Bandcamp, opting to remain loyal to the FacebookLive, non-ticketed and non-monetized model.

Soundcloud added: “Fan-powered royalties are a more equitable and transparent way for independent artists to get paid. With fan-powered royalties, each listener’s subscription or advertising revenue is distributed among the artists they actually listen to, rather than being pooled. This new model benefits independent artists and empowers fans to play a larger role in the success of their favorite artists. It also encourages the growth of local scenes and the rise of new genres.”

 

For more information on the new Soundcloud model, visit here.