It's Time to Decentralize (and Federate) Music

Bandcamp has been the best thing to happen to independent music since CD Baby. It's easy to use, it promotes discovery of new music, pays mostly pretty fairly, has loads of great features, and has historically been integral to the success of many artists. But it has its problems, and like any other company, it's certainly not impervious to failure.

Spotify and other streaming companies are straight-up robbery. We're so enchanted by the (admittedly amazing) ability to instantly call up virtually any popular song from the last 60 years that we happily overlook any damage it does to the people who make up the industry (artists, producers, etc.). As long as we can instantly hear the latest Taylor track, why should we give a fuck if Spotify pays almost nothing, or in the case of lesser-known artists, literally nothing? Spotify is just the example. It could be YouTube, Amazon, or any others. Yes, even Tidal. Paying fractions of a cent more than the next ripoff is still a ripoff.

Musicians are so used to being screwed over by savvy business people, we are so ready to hop onto any bandwagon that comes along, just to get played and heard. Hard to be heard by someone who exclusively used Spotify, Apple, Amazon, etc., if we're not on that platform. We "have no choice." It sucks.

In recent years, a number of good alternatives have come up:

• Funkwhale: This is a decentralized, federated music library sharing service. Very cool, but not exactly the solution to this specific problem.
• Faircamp: I love this DIY solution, but it's still not exactly what I'm looking for and it's too hard for any old rando to just fire up a page and start selling their music.
• Mirlo: Excellent! On the right track. Needs some elbow grease in the features department, but overall very nice.
• jam.coop: Similar to Mirlo. Slightly more cumbersome, but still pointed in the right direction.

If I had to pick, I'd say Mirlo could easily be an indie successor to BC. Their collective model, plans to exit to community, and plans to federate really call to me in this age of enshittification. I put all my normal releases on there a couple months back, supported their recent Kickstarter, and even just occasionally give them financial support (a great, built-in, Patreonesque feature of Mirlo).

But what I really want is a decentralized effort that anyone can host. I'm looking for Bandcamp functionality with Funkwhale's pods.

Some folks are really trying to push things in a good direction and I love it. I want them to do well and I want to help if I can.

In the meantime, how tf can I give up the modern miracle that is streaming??