I'm not sure what your basis is for this claim? I've most certainly discovered artists from Spotify and later on bought e.g. merch to support them. I would in a heartbeat also go on their concerts if I was given the opportunity with travel distance, vacation plans etc.

Spotify can't give you these experiences no matter how hard they try so this claim doesn't make much sense to me. A concert isn't exactly competing with streaming services or anything.

Same. Anecdotally I discovered khruangbin on spotify and will be seeing their concert next tuesday.

> People don't go to indie concerts because of a spotify track

Do you have numbers behind this claim?

I definitely got aware of some unknown artists thanks to Spotify and YouTube, some of them had low hundreds views/listens.

Ended up supporting them, going to concerts and buying merch.

Same. I see a show advertised and I want to hear what the bands sound like, the easiest way (for me) is to search for them on Spotify and check out the top few tracks and the new release. If I like what I hear then I'll buy a ticket and go. I probably could have found the tracks other ways if I really tried, but this way just works, almost always.

> And 20 cents corresponds to around 50 to 100 plays

Unfortunately more like 5000+ plays. People tend go to concerts of music they listen to and for a lot of people that means hearing it on Spotify

Actually, the spotify rate is 0.003 cents per track, which reflects my 83 plays ‘earning’ $0.25 on Spotify before this.

>Your arguments veers close to the "for exposure" payment

While it does, note that paying or doing stuff free "for exposure" is exactly how many artists got big and huge hits were made, from payola to DJs (starting way earlier than Alan Freed with radio DJs, and going all the way to EDM DJs being paid to break a track), all the way to paying for artist ads or record shop placement, buying fake streams, followers, and views to appear more popular and drive exposure, or doing for free (or, often, paying for) the support spot on a bigger band's concert.

> People don't go to indie concerts because of a spotify track

Anecdotically I've attended multiple gigs for artists I discovered via Spotify.

If Spotify's search page wasn't so broken and useless, I'd probably have gone to _more_ indie concerts.

Your absolutist claim is already false by virtue of the fact that I have gone to an “indie” show after hearing a track on Spotify.

Next?

Next should be the advice to not take comments of that form as "absolutist" but understand them to mean as "in general"...

It is extremely common and often perfectly rational for creatives to do things in exchange for exposure. There is nothing fallacious about this.

> People don't go to indie concerts because of a spotify track.

Yes they do.

If there's any fallacy here, it is comparing "for exposure" between a gig at your local dive bar (this is where you typically hear the phrase), and uploading your material to Spotify.

The first requires committing time and effort to get 50 people to see you, 20 of which are your personal friends. The second is making the music you have already produced available to millions of people around the world, with virtually no effort.

Surely Spotify should improve on compensating artists, but all-in-all it is still a better deal for the artist than the "for exposure" gig at the local bar.