“It’s like a natural progression of what you do, to create art and protect your art and have a dialog with the people who consume it. It felt a little weird on the surface, but when you delve down there’s a lot in common.”ĭorsey then asked Jay what was the biggest surprise for him in his path as an entrepreneur. What really dawned on me was how weak some of the tool sets are for artists, with analytics and data, to understand what they’re doing and help them inform their decisions, especially considering other revenue streams like merchandise and touring and NFTs. And in conversation it just became so apparent that there were so many parallels in spirit because of what a musician and a small business is going through. I’d tell you stories about our work around helping small businesses - most of the financial industry is working against them. So our conversations just naturally aligned.”ĭorsey added, “We started talking a year ago now and saw so many parallels. You create a business, take out a small loan, get the things you need to help you be successful and build it out from there. And the things that Square and Cash App were doing is pretty much aligned with what one does with their own brand. Jay replied, “I think we were aligned in our conversation, and viewing artists and creatives as small businesses and treating each individual artist as a business. The pair were joined by a couple of up-and-coming musicians who had appeared in Tidal-curated “Best of” lists: a songwriter from Detroit named Olivia Dear, and one from Brooklyn who calls himself 26ar.Īfter Jay spoke about his motivation in forming Tidal - “This union came from Charlie Chaplin and others creating United Artists, and I pretty much got the inspiration from what they were doing to create this type of coalition,” as he’s said before - Dorsey asked, “Why did our partnership make sense? Why join forces with a payments and financial company?” On Monday (June 28), Jay-Z and Dorsey held a half-hour conference on Twitter Spaces that was big on enthusiasm but very short on details, basically reiterating and vaguely elaborating on the initial comments. It says plans to bring new systems and tools to help artists find new ways to support their work and find “financial freedom.” “There are tools they need to be successful and that we are going to build for them,” said Jesse Dorogusker, a Square executive who will run Tidal on an interim basis.In its initial comments on the acquisition, Square said it sees an opportunity in enabling direct-to-fan business models and will extend its “purpose of economic empowerment” to musicians - a new category for the payments company. Square, founded in 2009, offers financial tools for small businesses, which will help artists to explore options such as receiving digital payments direct from fans. In 2017, Jay-Z removed most of his music from Spotify, but restored it in 2019 for his 50th birthday. Last month, Spotify announced its own high-resolution streaming option, which will compete against Tidal. While Tidal has carved out its niche, offering more than 70m songs and 250,000 high-quality videos, the global market is dominated by Spotify, Apple Music and Amazon Music. The service, which counts artists such as Coldplay and Daft Punk as owners, differentiated itself by offering high-quality audio and video and paying better royalty rates to artists than rivals such as Spotify. Square said it has taken a “significant majority ownership stake” in Tidal, which Jay-Z bought in partnership with other artists for $56m in 2015. New ideas are found at intersections, and we believe there is a compelling one between music and the economy.” “It comes down to a simple idea: finding new ways for artists to support their work. “Why would a music streaming company and a financial services company join forces?!,” Dorsey posted on Twitter, posing the obvious question as he announced the news. While the terms of the deal were not disclosed, the brand has been valued at $630m by Forbes. It is the second deal in as many weeks for the rapper after he sold half of his Armand de Brignac champagne company, better known as Ace of Spades, to LVMH, the luxury goods company.
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