By Mesfin Fekadu, Music Writer
NEW YORK (AP) --Tidal, the music and video streaming service co-owned by Jay Z, Rihanna, Madonna and other artists, is inviting more performers to join the company and earn equity.
Senior executive Vania Schlogel said late Tuesday that Tidal welcomes more acts. It introduced its new co-owners at a launch event on Monday.
"Whatever these artists want to do, this is their playground to do it," Schlogel said. "This is the creative space to just get it done and share that and communicate with their fans."
The current owners "have equal ownership and majority ownership in the company," and artists who join them would earn more money through the streaming service than through others that exist, she said. Artists who join Tidal will "be participating in the equity upside of this," she said.
Schlogel didn't elaborate on how ownership works, and when asked if the artist-owners invested their own money in Tidal, she said she couldn't speak about those details.
Tidal's all-star lineup could help it compete with other free and paid streaming services, from Spotify to Pandora.
"It's not just dollars and cents, it's around all the things that come along with being a shareholder, like voicing your thoughts as a board member and having that creative control," Schlogel said, who added that there's a stock appreciation rights program for artists. "It's a different type of involvement."
Co-owners including Beyonce, Daft Punk, Kanye West, Jack White, Alicia Keys, members of Arcade Fire and Jason Aldean attended the launch. Schlogel dismissed any of the backlash that came after the launch, including a Time magazine article, where the headline read: "How Jay Z's Tidal Press Conference Showed He's Out of Touch."
"(Monday) wasn't meant to be some stunt," Schlogel said. "It was meant to be authentic."
A business controlled by Jay Z bought Tidal for $56 million in mid-March. The streaming service, which has 540,000 subscribers, provides music and video content that users can stream on computers, tablets and smartphones or listen to offline. Subscriptions begin at $10.
She said the only owners of the company are artists, though she said they "are contemplating and in discussions" about adding non-performer owners.
The chief financial officer of subscription music service Rhapsody said Tuesday he was excited about Tidal's launch.
"The fact that you have 16 of the most powerful artists right now … wanting to be in the business we're in, we're excited," said, Ethan Rudin, who also is Rhapsody's head of label relations. "In my opinion, we're still in the very early innings with regards to streaming music and if this can act as an opportunity to educate the public as to the long-term future in this format for music consumption, it's something we're obviously very excited about. We believe the rising tide raises all ships."
Rhapsody, which has 2.5 million subscribers and launched in 2001, is a premium service and costs $10. Like Tidal, it does not have a free version.
In an interview Tuesday, singer Darius Rucker said he liked the idea of the company.
"It's another way to get music and hopefully since its run by artists, the artists will get paid a little bit more of what they deserve than they do from the other ones," the Hootie & the Blowfish frontman said.
"I wish they called me; I'd be standing on that stage, too," he said, laughing.
South Korea fines Meta $15 million for illegally collecting information on Facebook users
South Korea's privacy watchdog on Tuesday fined social media company Meta 21.6 billion won ($15 million) for illegally collecting sensitive personal information from Facebook users, including data about their political views and sexual orientation, and sharing it with thousands of advertisers.
It was the latest in a series of penalties against Meta by South Korean authorities in recent years as they increase their scrutiny of how the company, which also owns Instagram and WhatsApp, handles private information.
Following a four-year investigation, South Korea's Personal Information Protection Commission concluded that Meta unlawfully collected sensitive information about around 980,000 Facebook users, including their religion, political views and whether they were in same-sex unions, from July 2018 to March 2022.
It said the company shared the data with around 4,000 advertisers.
South Korea's privacy law provides strict protection for information related to personal beliefs, political views and sexual behavior, and bars companies from processing or using such data without the specific consent of the person involved.
The commission said Meta amassed sensitive information by analyzing the pages the Facebook users liked or the advertisements they clicked on.
The company categorized ads to identify users interested in themes such as specific religions, same-sex and transgender issues, and issues related to North Korean escapees, said Lee Eun Jung, a director at the commission who led the investigation on Meta.
"While Meta collected this sensitive information and used it for individualized services, they made only vague mentions of this use in their data policy and did not obtain specific consent," Lee said.
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