Firstly, happy 2019! I hope people are getting back into the swing of the new year.
It’s been a super busy start to the new year on my end. I haven’t posted here in a couple weeks so I thought I’d share an interesting video that came out of last week’s Consumer Electronic Show (CES) held in Las Vegas.
From the looks of it, Spotify’s moving into branded deals for their algo-driven playlist, Discover Weekly. Fitting for that specific playlist, Microsoft’s going to be running advertisements focusing on artificial intelligence. In line with existing revenue streams like sponsored content (e.g. editorial video) within playlists and a focus on podcasts (whether it be Spotify for Podcasters or their Spotify-original podcasts), their move into branded playlists diminishes the music-related share of revenue for the streaming platform, which we know has been an on-going pain point for Spotify when it comes to the steep licensing fees paid out to the major record labels.