Streaming Music - Impending Doom?

I was happily going about with my recent Spotify Premium account (RM10 per month with Maxis) only to read about its (and all the other streaming music services out there) impending doom as more and more artists back out remove their songs. Taylor Swift is one of the higher profile ones. Then, there's this other report that the highest streamed single only earned its authors $4,000 each.

Streaming music sounds too good to be true, especially to consumers, and as more artists come out to voice their opinions, it may indeed be true that the returns are way too little. With iTunes sales dropping, even Apple is rumoured to be on the verge of launching their own, what with the purchase of Beats.

These services don't seem to be losing out anytime soon, unless artists like Taylor Swift could convince others through their actions. It would be interesting to see how the streaming services react should the situation change for the worse. Well, there's still digital streaming radio to fall back on should things get too heated up...