Kanye West is out of legal trouble after promising his album would be exclusively available on Tidal.
The artist settled a class-action lawsuit of nearly $85 million with a fan over the exclusivity of ‘The Life of Pablo.’ West originally said the album would only be streamed on the platform, but weeks later it was offered on both Apple Music and Spotify.
Justin Baker-Rhett, the plaintiff in the lawsuit, said that he bought a $9.99 subscription to Tidal in order to stream ‘The Life Of Pablo.’ After the album began streaming on other platforms, Baker-Rhett felt slighted and deceived into downloading the service.
The terms of the settlement are not known; however, the 2016 lawsuit from Baker-Rhett has been dropped.
Exclusivity on streaming services is now a thing of the past. As artists, record labels and the platforms agree to more effective contracts, an artists’ need to only offer content on one service has evaporated. There are special cases when artists offer albums exclusively for a limited time on one service, but those are rare.
