The fate of Bandcamp is in the balance

The internet’s favourite music platform is being volleyed between greedy corps, and the story won’t end well, writes Shaun Prescott.

OPINION | END USER Epic Games purchased Bandcamp in early 2022 for an undisclosed sum. It caused a lot of anxiety in the music world. For those unfamiliar, Bandcamp is a huge distribution platform for music. It’s traditionally been favoured by smaller independent artists, but is nowadays also used by big name acts like Radiohead and Bjork as a means to sell direct to listeners. It’s primarily a platform for outright digital music sales, standing at odds with the big exploitative streaming services like Spotify whose piddling royalty system is completely unsustainable for artists not attracting multimillion listeners. Sure, Bandcamp takes a slice from each sale (15 percent on digital; 10 percent on physical goods purchased through their storefront) but it regularly holds “Bandcamp Friday” events during which the company…

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APC (Digital) - 1 Issue, December 2023

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