fake streams

Russ Accuses Major Labels Of Holding Spotify “Hostage”

by

The Drake petition against Universal Music Group and Spotify for allegedly boosting Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” streams artificially prompted a lot of heavy debate around the streaming world, fandom, and the music industry as a whole, especially within hip-hop. But these conversations always existed within and beyond the culture, albeit to less fanfare. One rapper who’s always criticized the system the art form operates within is Russ, who recently took to Twitter with an interesting theory. According to his assessment, streaming services like Spotify are also victims of major label exploitation and not the partner in crime that many would assume.

“Disclaimer : I love Spotify and am grateful for the platform that has connected my music with millions of fans worldwide and this isn’t about any label or artist in particular, moreso just the system,” Russ began his remarks. “Spotify knows who’s faking their streams lol however, they’re not gonna ever (imo) publicly expose any major labels due to potential consequences. Major labels could retaliate by pulling their top artists music from Spotify. That would obviously diminish Spotify’s value and attractiveness to subscribers.

Read More: How Hip-Hop Culture “Revived” Itself & Declared War On Its Leaders In 2024

Russ Posits That Spotify Is A Victim Of Major Labels, Too

“Spotify just punishes them behind the scenes (removes fake streams and removes the song from playlists) because they prioritize (makes sense) maintaining their access to major label content over publicly confronting stream manipulation, which essentially makes them a “hostage” of the major labels,” Russ continued. “Basically Spotify publicly outing major labels is a lose lose for everyone involved.” “I know everyone loves to hate rich companies or rich anything. But tbh in this situation Spotify is lowkey the victim bein held hostage by major labels.” However, we doubt that he excused fake streams here, as it’s something that he rallied against in the past.

Meanwhile, today (Friday, December 20), a Houston court anticipated a hearing on the petition from Drake and presumably determine the next steps… But that didn’t work out. Spotify denied any and all accusations that the 6ix God and his team levied against them, as did UMG. Maybe this goes somewhere or it dies before it can live. But either way, artists like Russ know that the dynamic at play often comes in more complex ways.

Read More: Best Hip-Hop Collaborations Of 2024

[via]

The post Russ Accuses Major Labels Of Holding Spotify “Hostage” appeared first on HotNewHipHop.

Drake Seemingly Accuses Spotify Of Certifying Fake Streams Of Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us”

by

Drake is still mad at Kendrick Lamar over their beef, and he has made that very clear with his Internet presence after the battle wrapped up. While K.Dot filmed a music video and hosted a West Coast celebration as his victory lap, Drizzy’s idea of a triumphant parade is shady IG stories and captions, voting in online polls about the best diss track from the feud, and most recently, some comments on Trainwrecktv’s Kick stream last night. “hey pragmatic can we take it back to 2022…” he apparently wrote in chat. “can you backdoor Eddie like Spotify backdoored the streams for that one song from that one guy.”

Of course, many took this to reference Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us,” which has faced various accusations from Drake’s supporters of using bots to push fake streams. However, many of these claims have either been debunked or dismissed, as fans have brought up how the Mustard-produced banger is number one on Apple Music and how you apparently can’t bot on that platform. As such, these theories remain purely speculative, although it’s pretty likely that both artists benefitted from bots and fake streams to some degree. After all, even though neither MC probably ordered this, their supporters and fans can take matters into their own hands.

Read More: Kendrick Lamar Fans Theorize That He May Have Rapped From Drake’s POV On “6:16 In LA”

Drake Is Mad At Spotify For Allegedly Fake “Not Like Us” Streams

For that reason, discussions around fake streams and botting turn more innocuous by the day as it becomes clear that these songs would’ve been massive successes either way. Also, this whole thing doesn’t really matter as much as the beef itself, and both Drake and Kendrick Lamar are finding it hard to move on from it. The 6ix God just released two summer bangers that even one of his biggest haters proclaimed as smash hits. But it seems like it’s not enough for him.

Nevertheless, we can’t really know how this situation will conclude, or to what extent bots and fake streams assisted “Not Like Us” or a track like “Family Matters.” Drake will likely continue to engage in some social media shots against his opponent, and Kendrick Lamar… Well, we have no idea. There are album rumors that could manifest or come and go with the wind. Will we still see botting accusations if it drops?

Read More: Shaq Apologizes To Drake & Explains His Recent “BBL Drizzy” Post

The post Drake Seemingly Accuses Spotify Of Certifying Fake Streams Of Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” appeared first on HotNewHipHop.

Rappers Who’ve Been Exposed For Allegedly Having Fake Streams

by

Exploring the murky waters of the music industry, allegations of fake streams have cast a shadow over the credibility of some prominent rappers. In an era where streaming numbers can make or break careers, allegations of artificial inflation raise questions about authenticity. Moreover, fake streams cost hundreds of millions of dollars for artists and labels. Therefore, its no surprise that these claims stir up controversy and call artists’ integrity into question. 

Over the years, many rappers have come under fire for allegedly manipulating their streams. Surprisingly, even the likes of Kanye West and Cardi B have been hit with allegations of faking their numbers. Evidently, not even the biggest rappers are above being named for allegedly toying with the system. Here’s a list of five rappers who have faced the same allegations.

Don Toliver

Cactus Jack signee Don Toliver released his single “Do it Right” on November 18, 2022. Four days later, he dropped a music video for the song, which garnered an impressive number of views over the next couple of days. However, some viewers noticed discrepancies in the views’ ratio to likes and comments. After only four days of release, the music video had earned eight million views on YouTube.

While that could be excused, it was the number of likes and comments on the rapper’s video that made listeners accuse Toliver of garnering fake streams and engagements. With 24 thousand comments in four days, some fans just could not believe that the engagement was authentic. Subsequently, some viewers went through the comments and discovered that there were many questionable comments that seemed to have been made by bots. 

G-Eazy

On January 24, 2022, Vice TV dropped the third episode of Black Market Season 2. In it, the late Michael K. Williams went undercover to expose the truth about streaming farms in the music industry. While speaking to Williams, a masked man reveals that many popular rappers allegedly fake their streams. During the episode, one of the rappers mentioned is G-Eazy, whose management was exposed in 2021 for trying to generate fake streams. An audio recording obtained by Rolling Stone revealed G-Eazy’s management exploring options for boosting an upcoming release.

Roddy Ricch

After Roddy Ricch released “Twin” featuring Lil Durk on November 14, 2022, he followed up with a music video a week later. Five days after its release, the video had racked up almost six million views. However, it’s the significant jump in views within the span of a day that made viewers suspicious. Subsequently, he was called out for generating fake streams, especially when it was also discovered that there were a ton of bots that dropped comments on the rappers’ video. 

Travis Scott

@shanemorrisdotsucks

Reply to @user45600501586078 What does software have to do with music? #software #spillthetea #behindthescenes #travisscott #astroworld

♬ original sound – Shane Morris

Since Travis Scott is such a huge star, fans do not expect him to be named among rappers who have generated fake streams. However, if what his former manager said in 2021 is to be believed, then indeed, Scott has had some tailored assistance. On November 8, 2021, Shane Morris, Scott’s former manager, spilled some tea on his TikTok account about alleged fake streams.

“For Travis, what we did was fake his popularity,” Morris said. “I programmed a fleet of SoundCloud bots to artificially inflate his play counts on SoundCloud. This told record label executives that he was much more popular than he actually was,” he continued. Morris went on to share that the same was done for Travis Scott’s Twitter account with technology early on in his career.

Kanye West

Ye is another one of the most prominent rappers to be hit with claims of fake streams. On February 14, 2016, his seventh album, The Life of Pablo, was exclusively released on Tidal. It remained a Tidal exclusive until April 1, 2016, when it was finally made available on other platforms. While it was a Tidal exclusive, the platform disclosed the album’s streaming numbers after a while.

According to Tidal, The Life of Pablo earned over 250 million streams within its first ten days of release. Although Ye is widely regarded as a global superstar, these numbers raised many eyebrows. However, nothing was said until 2018, when Tidal was accused of generating millions of fake streams for the album. Following their investigation in January 2017, the Norwegian newspaper Dagens Næringsliv exposed Tidal and Ye for allegedly faking streams.

[via]

The post Rappers Who’ve Been Exposed For Allegedly Having Fake Streams appeared first on HotNewHipHop.