Taylor Swift Quotes

In recent years, you've probably read the articles about major recording artists who have decided to practically give their music away, for this promotion or that exclusive deal. My hope for the future, not just in the music industry, but in every young girl I meet...is that they all realize their worth and ask for it.

I see everybody arguing about what the value of music should be instead of what I think the bigger conversation is, which is that music has value, it's subjective and we're moving to a new era where the audience is taking more responsibility for supporting artists at whatever level.

One of the things I wonder is whether it's good that the whole free model makes a lot of people listen to more of your music. I'm wondering if it devalues it, it becomes disposable, because you can get it so easily.

Music is everywhere - you consume it every day, everywhere you go. The content creator should be compensated. It's only fair.

Companies like Spotify, the new Apple service, and all the others are really going to have to pay artists more. And I think it's a matter of time; I think a lot of these companies and the individuals that are involved in them realize that as well. They know that artists are not getting what they should be getting.

With music, you've got to find ways to get paid again, 'cause all the cool kids in junior high school and high school, they think you're wack if you pay for music.

Music is now becoming 'free,' and it's very difficult for new artists to start.

Music was everything. But what the digital revolution has done, with streaming services and downloads, is take the value out of music. When things lose value they lose their meaning.

The fact is that 'free' in music streaming is so technically good and ubiquitous that it's stunting the growth of paid streaming.

The day that music is taken for free by the majority is the day that the phrase "sell out" doesn't exist any more.

In the past, people were going to record stores and buying albums or CDs. And the label was exposing their artist as much as possible and maybe getting them picked up by a major. Now I tell people to cut a good tune and have it up in the marketplace the next day. You better be prepared to give it away, and people will come pay to see you.

There's definitely some sort of dissent brewing between record labels, publishing companies and artists [about the compensation they get from streaming services] Spotify is returning a HUGE amount of money [to the record labels]. If we continue growing at our current rate in terms of subscriptions and downloads, we'll overtake iTunes in terms of contributions to the recorded music business in under two years.

Technology has changed the way we think about music.

Music copyright and licensing laws haven't kept up with technology or the times. The Music Modernization Act fixes that with a comprehensive set of reforms that will help musicians receive royalties they are owed while ensuring the public has access to that music.

Social media being used to discover new artists is great. There's not a barrier to enter the industry. People can just post music and share it. And if it's good enough, and people like it, it will grow.

Apple, iTunes, and streaming services have made the single a more easy thing to access. What that's done has made the album as a collection of songs almost meaningless. But an album that has a concept or story or reason to be an album, if anything, has more meaning now than it ever has.

When you do mixtapes, a lot of times your fanbase can say, 'We've been getting this for free for so many years, his new album is about to drop, we've listened to it, and we're not going to buy it. We'll download it for free.'

The facts show that the music industry was much better off before Spotify hit these shores.

If you wake up in the morning and your favorite artist isn't on the service that you're paying ten dollars a month for, sooner or later you lose faith in the subscription model.

It's harder and harder to sell records now. You've got to give extra value. You've got to give people a reason to go out and buy it rather than burn a friend's copy.

There's all this talk of music needing a monetary value, this ownership of music, even that it needs a physical form. But intrinsically... it's music. It should be better than that.

I've watched the dynamics of music completely change to where we've sold tapes, we've sold CDs, then everything started becoming 'music is free' now. In a perfect world, Napster wouldn't have come along. But the world isn't perfect, and when it changes, you have to adapt.

I think music should be free. I think all communication should be free. I think people should respect artists, and there should be a certain respect for artists who give their music away for free.

The value of streaming platforms is estimated at a few billion dollars, and creators can only afford a pizza without pepperoni at the end of the year with the revenues. Without musicians, all those platforms wouldn't exist, so we urgently need an appropriate and sustainable business model for musicians for the 21st century.

To me, the music industry doesn't exist, it's like the devil, it doesn't exist if you don't believe in it.