- General
- January 14, 2019
- 4 minutes read
Jay-Z’s Tidal Under Investigation By Norwegian Authorities
Tidal co-owner Jay-Z image : Penn State on Flickr Tidal, the music streaming service acquired by rapper Jay-Z in 2015…
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| Tidal co-owner Jay-Z
image : Penn State on Flickr
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Tidal, the music streaming service acquired by rapper Jay-Z in 2015 is being investigated by Norwegian authorities over allegations of false inflation of listening numbers. The Norway based streaming service is being probed by the Norwegian Authority for Investigation of Economic and Environmental Crime (Okokrim) after allegations from Norwegian artist associations who claim potential loss of income from data manipulation.
“It has been made known through media coverage that the reports relate to Tidal’s streaming service and a suspicion that someone has manipulated the number of plays of some songs,” Okokrim Attorney Elisabeth Harbo-Lervik said in an e-mailed statement to Bloomberg.
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| Tidal co-owner Beyoncé
image : Ronald Woan on Flickr
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Tidal which was acquired by Jay-Z owned Project Panther Bidco in the first quarter of 2015 claims to pay the highest percentage of royalties to music artists and songwriters but has failed to catch up with services like Spotify and Apple Music. Telecom firm Sprint purchased 33% of the company for a reported $200 million in January 2017 following reports of a discussed sale to Apple, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Tidal thanks to Jay-Z’s influence has ties to popular artists including J Cole, T.I., Rihanna, Lil Wayne, Beyoncé, Calvin Harris, Daft Punk, Coldplay’s Chris Martin, Nicki Minaj, Madonna and deadmau5, all of whom are co-owners of the streaming service. The service currently has over 60 million songs and more than 240,000 music videos available to its users.
