r/SpotifyArtists

Just dropped a new single two days ago. Zero promotion, no playlist pitching, no ads, nothing. Literally just uploaded it and shared it with a couple friends.

Now Spotify for Artists is showing this banner:

>

All-time streams: 6
Listeners: 5

How the fuck do you get flagged for artificial streaming with 6 total streams?

Is Spotify really out here flagging normal people hitting play a few times on a brand new track? Because that’s the only activity this song has had.

Anyone else had this happen on a release with basically zero streams? Feels completely broken.

(Screenshot attached)

Started regularly posting reels on Facebook and Tiktok this month and got 200k followers on FB and 35k followers on tiktok so far, so that momentum probably helped.

Released a music video a week prior (Aug 5) on FB reels/YT/Tiktok before releasing the single.

No ad spending.

I checked playlists and there is none listed in streams section.

So our ad spend essentially is somewhere near $50 a day and I unlocked maybe the best ad ever of all time that has gotten so many people to our music, and then the reactions have been wonderful. It’s crazy. It’s led to about 1000. true followers on Instagram not just weird but follow type things, it’s also led to tons of comments from people just saying that they enjoy the album more that it’s a good album or that they really like the music and stuff. It’s interesting to see the countries involved all tier one.

I’ve gained 1600 streams in 4 days. When will Spotify start to push the track for real?

I swear I’m struggling seriously I don’t know how to get the streams I don’t know if anyone has tips for streams but help me I’m struggling seriously

And there is it...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNTgDY1V0pg

I appreciate Andrew asking the question that has for months consumed many conversations and speculations here and elsewhere. Those massive algorithmic drops back in March/April and in July that artists using AI have noticed: Spotify was indeed "optimizing the algorithm to favor human artists".

Translation: AI assisted music was flagged and suppressed, without announcement.

This is NOT about AI. This is about the ethical treatment of all, at all times, at all sizes, whether indie or signed, and irrespective of what tools are used: whatever the rules are, they MUST be transparent, for all.

In this example, regardless what you think about AI, real people spent real time and real people spent real money driving listeners to Spotify, believing they were playing on a level field and had equal access to algorithmic recommendation surfaces. Yet, many saw their algorithmic exposure collapse, and wasted hours reaching out to Spotify support, only to be told that "nothing was wrong" and that Spotify does not target their music. All of that could have been avoided had Spotify publicly announced it would suppress AI discovery PRIOR to doing so.

Spotify spent the last year rolling out AI "transparency" initiatives: AI credits, SongDNA, etc. The hypocrisy was demanding transparency from artists while not extending that same transparency back to the artists.

Changing the playing field in secret for any class, status, or size (AI or not), while publicly denying it, is unethical. Spotify denied for many the ability to make informed business decisions by keeping them in the dark.

Trust has been damaged.

Won’t let me upload a 2nd photo but the order is completely different on my actual Spotify page

Released our EP Aug 5. By Aug 7 it only had 250 daily streams, which is painfully low for an EP.

Then we did a coordinated push using old recordings, behind the scenes, even life updates on Tiktok and FB starting Aug 7. A few reels on FB and 1 reel on tiktok picked up, with the best performing one at 3.5m views, and now all our music, even the older releases, on Spotify started picking up.

Zero ads.

This is the release "HOPE" , it has a symbol next to it that I have never seen before ?

So here you go AI-haters 😄 It's finally here!

AI Persona badges on Spotify - Spotify