Soundcloud announced today its new ‘fan-powered royalties’ model. Unlike the current industry model which pools revenues and pays based on total number of streams, the new fan-powered model distributes royalties based on revenue from fans/users directly to the artists that they streamed. Prior to reading about this I was not aware that there was such a large gap in royalties paid between the two models. I was also surprised and saddened to learn that streaming services was not paying on a per-stream basis already (Spotify pays royalties calculated from percentage of streams out of total global streams), which results in niche and indie artists being at a disadvantage.
Here is an article which goes into more depth: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/mar/03/soundcloud-announces-overhaul-of-royalties-model-to-fan-powered-system
Here is the official page on Soundcloud’s website: https://community.soundcloud.com/fanpoweredroyalties
This article discusses the issue of royalties in streaming services, with a focus on Spotify: https://goodtimes.sc/cover-stories/bandcamp-streaming-pay-musicians/