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Spotify, which generates revenue both from subscriptions and its free ad-supported tier, says it pays ⅔ of every dollar of revenue to rights holders, with 75% to 80% of that going to labels, which translates to 50 to 53 cents on the dollar, depending on agreements between the service and different labels.” The WSJ article unpacks that paragraph more or less accurately, writing: “In the letter, Apple says it pays 52% of subscription revenue, or 52 cents of every dollar, to record labels. This includes label and publisher royalties.” (It does not provide details on how that average was reached.) This value varies by subscription plan and country but averaged $0.01 for Apple Music individual paid plans in 2020. While royalties from streaming services are calculated on a stream share basis, a play still has a value. The per-stream rate is addressed in a brief paragraph in the letter, which reads in full: “Our average per play rate is $0.01.

(Reps for Apple Music and Spotify declined Variety‘s requests for comment.) More to the point, some of the statements in the letter were not fully conveyed in the initial reporting.

Variety has obtained the letter from three different industry sources, and while it makes no direct reference to Spotify and no direct claim that Apple Music pays twice as much per stream, the Swedish company - and particularly a public report it issued last month attempting to clarify its royalty policies - is clearly the target of some of its more barbed statements. The letter, which was not sent to the media, was obtained by the Wall Street Journal, which published a report that was not inaccurate but, since it was the only reliable source of the news for media outlets, was often inaccurately re-reported - most frequently in multiple headlines stating that Apple Music pays twice as much per stream as Spotify. Early Friday, Apple Music sent a carefully worded letter to artists, music labels and publishers that briefly explained “how creators earn royalties” from the streaming service, which is the world’s second-largest, behind Spotify.