By Dalton DeStefano ’16, Arts and Entertainment Editor

In late March, singer Jay-Z gathered a group of influential figures in pop culture to launch Tidal, a Spotify-esque service with which consumers can stream whatever music they like to listen to. However, while Spotify offers a free package with occasional ads interrupting the music, Tidal is only available to those who pay a minimum of $9.99 a month. Tidal’s “selling points” are that it claims to provide superior audio quality and offers a higher royalty for the artists whose music is being featured on the service. In simpler terms, Tidal pays artists more for their music. This service saw a surge of popularity in March when Jay-Z, Beyoncé, Madonna, and countless other shareholders of the company held a press conference which garnered massive media attention.

Despite the fact that the biggest names in pop culture came together to create a luxury streaming service, consumers seem to be unimpressed. While the surge of media attention quickly brought the service to the Top 20 of the Apple app store, Tidal has since fallen out of the Top 700 barely a month after its release. Many consumers are finding that these music moguls are surprisingly out of touch with what the average person wants in a streaming service. While Tidal may offer “better audio quality”, the average person listens to music through headphones from their iPhone, which don’t have the capacity to demonstrate stellar audio quality anyway. Additionally, consumers are complaining that the increased royalty for the artists’ music does nothing to make the service more appealing, as many people feel that artists already receive enough money for their music. This phenomenon was emphasized back in late 2014 when Taylor Swift (who did allow her music to stream on Tidal) controversially chose to remove her music from Spotify.

Ultimately, it seems that the public is unwilling to spend an extra $10 a month for a “luxury” streaming service. Spotify is already an established brand that offers free music with a sleek design. Trying to usurp its monopoly on music streaming seems foolish, if not impossible. However, artists’ inclination to go to services that pay them more may prove troublesome for Spotify in the future. Most likely, the company will eventually be forced to increase the amount they pay artists. Otherwise, a service with a better business model will undoubtedly pull away big names that make up the majority of Spotify’s downloads.