Robb McDaniels. Credit: Grace Phillips<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nWhen you say reaching into the fan space, are you taking cues from the likes of Bandcamp, which recently launched fan accounts?<\/h4>\n Matt<\/strong>: \u201cI wouldn\u2019t say it\u2019s inspired by anybody else in the market, but I think we have a really strong ecosystem, so the better we can engage with both the DJ and label side, the better off both halves will be. And it\u2019s true that there\u2019s options out there for labels and artists to get their music out there, we want Beatport to be the most important home for artists and labels in the dance music world.\u201d<\/p>\nLet\u2019s talk about Plugin Boutique. That\u2019s a huge marketplace for producers across genres \u2014 can we expect any changes to that part of the business?<\/h4>\n Helen<\/strong>: \u201cYeah, again, no immediate drastic changes afoot. The plugin world is a really interesting place at the moment. There\u2019s a lot of change going on, and as a marketplace, Plugin Boutique is sitting in a really useful position.<\/p>\n\u201cFor us, it\u2019s really important that the creative landscape is supported by indie developers, and that they have a place to continue to reach customers at scale, because it means that producers then have a wide range of tools to express themselves with\u2026We see that AI is changing the way that music is being made, but where we\u2019d like to see it is to drive more variety of workflows of sounds of styles rather than a homogenisation of sounds, and that\u2019s what the customers want too. So our focus there is really again to support the long tail of indie developers, make sure there\u2019s a really healthy marketplace.\u201d<\/p>\n
Speaking of AI, there\u2019s obviously a lot of AI-generated music hitting streaming services right now. What\u2019s the sentiment like at Beatport?<\/h4>\n Helen<\/strong>: \u201cAI and generative AI music is a very<\/em> hot topic. We talk about it endlessly inside and outside the office. Our stance is that we\u2019ll be driven by what the DJ community wants. We survey regularly, we talk to the community regularly, and right now the majority is saying that they don\u2019t want to DJ with it. So our policy remains the same as it did before: fully AI-generated music isn\u2019t permitted on the store, and if we find it, we remove it.\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cWe\u2019ll continue to consult with the community. If their sentiment changes, we can assess it again, but what\u2019s important is that, if generative music does land on the dance floor, that it\u2019s trained on fully-licenced data and it compensates artists fairly, so that\u2019s what we\u2019re going to be keeping an eye out for as demands shift. On a personal level, for me, music is about communication and community and empathy, which are all pretty human things. So, whatever happens, I hope we don\u2019t lose that in the next evolution of the creative cycle.<\/p>\n
Matt<\/strong>: \u201cI mean, it goes back to the ecosystem point where the labels and artists are our most important partners, and we have to do right by them. We want to empower them, not engage with anything that they feel is threatening to their business. So, we are currently in a place where\u2026as [AI] evolves and as new technology could potentially be beneficial to our partners, we want to stay ahead of that curve and help move innovation forward in a responsible way that supports creativity.<\/p>\nI\u2019ve seen on some platforms, especially YouTube, where users are uploading tracks and mixes and self-labelling their work as \u201c100% human-made\u201d and \u201cno AI slop\u201d. Have you thought about a labelling system on the Beatport store?<\/h4>\n Helen<\/strong>: \u201cYeah, we\u2019ve thought about the labelling route, and we\u2019ve asked the community if they would they prefer that. Obviously, the response tends to be \u2018Yes, if [AI music] is on Beatport, we want it to be labelled\u2019, but the majority still don\u2019t want it on there in the first place. So, I think we\u2019ll stick with that for now, and, like I said, we\u2019ll follow the wants and needs of the DJ space.<\/p>\n\u201cThere are lots of companies out there offering AI detection systems, and we are testing lots of them to see if we need a safety net for it right now. Because [Beatport is] a niche digital streaming platform, we are ingesting tens of thousands of tracks a week, [and] we try and weed out anything that is making its way into the main spaces as quickly as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n
Beatport has made more of a commitment in recent years to community programs. Is there anything changing there \u2014 anything new we should expect?<\/h4>\n Matt<\/strong>: \u201cOur push into events under the Beatport Live brand has been a big way for us to invest in the community. So, putting on fun events, giving a platform for artists, DJs, and labels. I think that\u2019s an important part of it too, helping them to align with the Beatport brand, and then also the fans that we can bring to a live event. That\u2019s been a really positive new thing for us over the past 18 months or so.<\/p>\n\u201cIn terms of some of the more community-oriented initiatives, like the NEXT programme, those things are going to continue. It may take on different forms, but it\u2019s always important for us to be supporting organisations, artists, labels that are on their way up.\u201d<\/p>\n
Helen<\/strong>: \u201cYeah, we benefit when we have a really strong, healthy middle class of musicians\u2026For us, it\u2019s not just altruistic, we genuinely benefit from variety and interesting talent coming up.\u201d<\/p>\nThe crowd at The Block. Image: Press<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nIs Beatport focused on any new innovations that we can expect in the coming months?<\/h4>\n Helen<\/strong>: \u201cPeople are often surprised when we say downloads grow year after year but they remain the preferred format for the majority of our customers. So, we\u2019re going to keep developing products that support that workflow. Streaming is gaining popularity, but really, as a complementary workflow, rather a cannibalistic thing, so we\u2019ll be looking at ways to support DJs that want to use a hybrid workflow.\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cOne thing that\u2019s new and interesting that we\u2019re looking at is how to not only share what\u2019s being downloaded but what\u2019s being performed around the world in real-time. We recently released Track ID, a feature in the mobile app \u2014 that\u2019s kind of the first step in that direction of collecting a data set around what\u2019s being played out.\u201d<\/p>\n
What\u2019s the goal with collecting that kind of data?<\/h4>\n \u201cThe ambition is to contribute towards creating a much clearer picture about what\u2019s being performed in DJ sets around the world, not just what\u2019s on USB sticks. It\u2019s early days, but ultimately we want to partner with other data providers to help artists and labels understand the early stages of how a track breaks, and also help ensure that performance royalties are paid out to the correct rights holders, which has been a notoriously difficult challenge for the industry.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s more interesting, exciting work that we can\u2019t talk about yet, but no radical changes [right now] to worry about.\u201d<\/p>\n
[Editor\u2019s note: This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.]<\/em><\/p>\n\n
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Sam is the Commissioning Editor at MusicTech, where he\u2019s helped shape the publication\u2019s editorial voice since 2019. With nearly two decades of music-making and a degree in music technology behind him, his focus is on the stories behind studio gear and the artists who use it. He\u2019s spent way too much time sampling disco records.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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