Spotify is completely full of shit (as usual). Spotify for Artists webpage the day after they argued in federal court to lower songwriter royalty rates.
Spotify’s claim that they are not suing to lower songwriter royalty rates appears to be a form of False Advertising, that may give them a competitive advantage over competitors. For this reason I filed a complaint with the FTC. Below.
On March 11th 2020 Spotify through its Spotify for Artists webpage made false claims about the nature of its appeal of songwriter royalty rates. (https://artists.spotify.com/blog/you-might-have-heard-about-the-streaming-industry%27s-crb-appeal-here%27s-what ). They also made these claims in a circulated press release on or around March 11th 2020. Specifically, they imply they were not trying to lower songwriter rates. The United States Court of Appeals For the District of Columbia ruling on their appeal (USCA Case #19-1028 Document #1856124 Filed:08/11/2020 Argued 10th of March) clearly indicates this is not the case. Further, Spotify apparently manufactured out of whole cloth the story that their appeal was centered on a technical matter of “bundling” lyric and video rights. On the webpage cited Spotify says “A key area of focus in our appeal will be the fact that the CRB’s decision makes it very difficult for music services to offer ‘bundles’ of music and non-music offerings.” The Appeals Court ruling nor the rest of the docket appear to support this contention. It appears the intention of this statement was to create the false impression that the goal of the appeal was not to lower songwriter rates, thus making consumers think Spotify was not taking a hard line towards songwriter pay. Consumers may have been misled and purchased Spotify subscription over competitors (like Apple) because they thought Spotify was not deeply hostile to pay raise for songwriters (Apple did not appeal songwriter royalties.) Finally, Spotify argued complaint March 10th 2020. The company had to know the March 11th statement was false.
If you want to file your own complaint go here
Just use the “other complaint” form. Let them sort it out.
Use this address for Spotify.
Spotify USA Inc.
4 World Trade Center, 150 Greenwich Street, 62nd Floor, New York, NY 10007
USA
I would use Horacio Gutierrez Head of Global Affairs & Chief Legal Officer at Spotify as the contact responsible for the false claim on FTC form.
The Trichordist 
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