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Hi Guillaume, first thank you for taking your time to reply.
Although we were not initially aware of the artist ratio, we compared Endless Summer Vacation with Nicki Minaj's album for the reason you mentioned—Nicki Minaj is more prominent on platforms like Apple Music, the same platform where Flowers was a massive hit, staying at No. 1 for 168 days, in the top 10 for over 230 days, and spending a total of 631 days on the chart so far. Endless Summer Vacation also reached No. 1 on Apple Music in 104 countries. Another song, Used To Be Young, performed well on streaming platforms like Apple Music and Amazon music. It was also in the top 10 on iTunes worldwide for five months, despite not having as many streams on Spotify and barely charting on Global Spotify.
Miley is not like other conventional pop stars, and her songs don’t follow a predictable pattern—neither on platforms nor across different countries. While we are certain that the figures for Endless Summer Vacation are inaccurate, we don’t place the blame on you. We understand you have a method and adhere to it, but unfortunately, Miley’s performance doesn’t fit neatly within that method. Nonetheless, we appreciate your response.
Are you using Kworb for those stats for AM? Their global chart isn't the actual global Apple Music chart but based on a point system rather than streams.
Flowers spent 45 days at the top spot on the actual Apple Music global chart and hasn't been in the top 100 since april this year against 82 on top on Spotify where it's currently sitting at #73.
Used To Be Young spent 19 days in the top 100 on Apple peaking at #32 against 22 on Spotify with a #8 peak.
I'm failing to see how she's doing so much better there really, she actually does perform quite normally for a "conventional" pop star if you ask me.
Yep, on top of Al's points about the misunderstanding of AM charts, let's just check some concrete figures. Below I compare first weeks of both Flowers and Super Freaky Girl, released 5 months apart, lead singles of the last Miley/Nicki albums.
Flowers
- 20,849,005 streams on US Spotify
- 41,130,000 audio on-demand streams in the US
=> 50.7% of its US streams came from Spotify
=> 20,280,995 non-Spotify streams in the US
- 96,032,624 streams on Global Spotify
=> the US represented 21.71% of its streams on Spotify
==> the extra non-Spotify 20,280,995 streams from the US represent an addition of 21.11886% to its Global Spotify total
Super Freaky Girl
- 8,783,893 streams on US Spotify
- 18,762,000 audio on-demand streams in the US
=> 46.8% of its US streams came from Spotify
=> 9,978,107 non-Spotify streams in the US
- 18,540,895 streams on Global Spotify
=> the US represented 47.38% of its streams on Spotify
==> the extra non-Spotify 9,978,107 streams from the US represent an addition of 53.816749% to its Global Spotify total
As you can see, despite the fact that their Spotify share in the US doesn't look so different, Nicki Minaj already gains 0.3269789 in her artist ratio in comparison to Miley Cyrus, because her streams elsewhere were much lower. She had hits which were more global, including some with reverse mechanism (say Tusa), just like Miley had songs which weren't as global as Flowers, that's why the actual gap in our algorithm is smaller (1.55766 vs 1.79834 - a 0.24068 difference).
But the point remains very clear - artists with a lot of their streams coming from the US, and even more when they are Apple Music-favored, will have a larger extrapolation ratio simply because their share of streams coming from Spotify will be mechanically lower.
BTW, it doesn't mean the actual number shown wouldn't move at all if we review her completely. The album (thanks to Flowers) did overperform on YouTube, and then songs downloads haven't been estimated, each would add 100k-ish to the actual total of the album. You need to accept that the 4.6m from streams were simply a glitch though.
Average eas 8,190 ,esv has been out since March last year,that's easily over 4 Million !
It's funny how you're quick to dismiss Kworb for using a point system, while your website is also extrapolating data through its own "artist points."
Kworb's Apple Music Worldwide Chart offers an aggregated view of a song's popularity over time across different countries, using a point-based system, as you already know. It also considers the weight of various music markets—something your website also advocates for. This makes Kworb a reliable source for predicting overall streams and broader trends in a song's performance.
In contrast, the Apple Music Top 100 Global playlist (rather than "chart") provides real-time updates, often hourly, based on actual streams happening worldwide. This playlist reflects what’s trending at the moment but does not account for market size. As a result, it serves as a reliable indicator of current stream gains and immediate listener engagement.
Typically, major hits on Apple Music only spend a limited time on the Top 100 Global AM playlist. For example, Harry Styles' "As It Was" spent 45 days at No. 1 in the top 100 and was the second most streamed song on Apple Music in 2022. Similarly, Miley Cyrus's "Flowers" was the second most streamed song in 2023.
And I hope you don’t "fail" to see how many days the "Apple Music favored" artist Nicki Minaj’s song "FCTU" actually stayed at No. 1 on the Top 100 Global Apple Music chart. You'd be disappointed to find out it never even peaked at No. 1—its peak was No. 35.
Meanwhile, Miley Cyrus is an unconventional pop star—one day she’s got a huge hit in the UK, the next day she’s topping charts in Asia. She’s big on Spotify one at times, and then she’s selling for months on iTunes. Then there are times when she’s dominating both Apple Music and Spotify.
Whether it’s because of her genre fluidity or something else, she’s repeatedly proven her versatility. Your "artist ratio" system is flawed when it comes to artists like her. Hope this helps.
Let’s look at some key facts about these two songs:
Flowers
Spotify:
--2.2 billion streams
--No.1 for 82 days
--Still charting after almost two years
Apple Music:
--#2 most streamed song of 2023
--#1 on the Top Global Songs Apple Music playlist for 45 days
--#1 on Kworb's Apple Music Worldwide Chart for 168 days
Super Freaky Girl
Spotify:
--575 million streams
--No.1 for 3 days
--Charted for 60 days
Apple Music:
--Not even in the top 20 most streamed songs of its release year
--#1 on Kworb's Apple Music Worldwide Chart for 7 days
You chose to focus on first-week data to compare two songs with vastly different longevity, attempting to justify your "Artist Ratio" extrapolation method, which ultimately deflates Miley Cyrus’s Endless Summer Vacation sales while inflating Nicki Minaj's numbers. This seems to happen simply because one is considered "Apple Music favored" and the other isn’t, even though Endless Summer Vacation has clearly outperformed PF2 on Apple Music. You also seem fixated on U.S. streams, forgetting that, according to Billboard, Flowers would still debut at #1 with streams alone, while also avoiding other major Apple Music markets like Latin America and Europe.
The point remains: your methodology is flawed when applied to artists like Miley, who may not always be seen as "Apple Music-favored" but can perform exceptionally well on the platform at times. It’s hard to believe that the 4.7 million update was just a glitch—glitches don't last for several months unless your team is incompetent. Although, after reading the comments, I noticed you mentioned that "you were updating the stats from scripts with the artist ratio that extrapolates streams," and the sales dropping immediately afterward paints a pretty clear picture.
What do you even mean by Apple Music's global chart "does not account for market size" ? It simply ranks their most streamed songs.
If something's not accounting for market size it's Kwob's chart as explained in their methodology giving the US, the UK, Japan and Germany the same weight and Australia, Canada, France, Italy, South Korea, Mexico, Russia and Thailand 2/3 of US weight again.
This makes 0 sense market wise when the US makes up half of Apple Music's userbase and Japan being the only other country with a substantial share.
The Kworb worldwide charts are simply made for fun and shouldn't be taken too seriously according to the site owner himself.
But if you can't even back up your arguments with a real chart I'm not going to reply anymore.
It's pretty hard to discuss with so much bias in front of us, I would like you to focus on real data rather than wishful thinking.
You rule out the real statistics were are 100% valid because it's first week only, speaking about longevity. That's pointless, I only mentioned the first week for simplicity purpose, the same conclusions are true for every week or annual figures. That Flowers lasted longer changes nothing, nor that it has more streams on Spotify. We aren't talking about absolute numbers here, but instead the relative strength of platforms. As I proved, Spotify coverage for Nicki Minaj is obviously much lower than the one for Flowers, which is everything but a surprise for anyone slightly knowledge about the music industry. If you want to keep replying, then tell us with real facts how Miley did relatively speaking more globally on Apple Music than Spotify. Good luck!
Let’s talk real stats—Flowers was the 2nd most-streamed song on Apple Music’s year-end chart. And guess what? Apple Music provided that data, not Kworb. So, what exactly are you talking about when you claim I didn’t use real stats to back up my argument? You deliberately tried to deflect and make this all about Kworb.
Now, as for your 'What do you mean by blah blah blah,' I meant exactly what I said, and you understood it perfectly.
Also, the Global Top 100 ranks songs based on daily streams, showing current popularity—not overall. How hard is that to comprehend for an 'analyst,' if you’re even one? And even if Kworb AM chart doesn’t account for market size, it still wouldn’t matter because it’s measuring overall worldwide popularity, not streams!
For streams, I’ve got Apple Music and IFPI to back up my argument. Or are you going to claim they’re fake charts too? Maybe only Chartmasters is 'real' in your eyes, right?
And by the way, the guy who created Kworb is a data scientist, and his website existed before yours. If your 'comprehension skills' took his comment about his site being his 'playground' to mean it’s just for fun, all I can do is laugh. And then laugh some more. I’m not here to be your English teacher and explain what that actually means.
Dearest Guillaume
First, it saddens me that you think I'm being biased, and even more so that you entirely missed my point. I wasn’t trying to prove that Miley did better globally on Apple Music than on Spotify. What I’m trying to say is that Miley's album Endless Summer Vacation performed significantly better globally and in the U.S. on Apple Music compared to Nicki Minaj's Pink Friday 2. Despite this, PF2 is being credited more than ESV because of your methodology.
According to your chart, ESV has only sold 900k more units than PF2, which is far from the truth. If the streams and charts aren’t enough evidence, let me present some real stats to highlight the gap in sales patterns between the two albums.
Here are the updated certifications ESV received before even completing its first year:
Belgium: Gold
Brazil: 3x Platinum
Canada: Platinum
Denmark: Platinum
France: Gold
Italy: Gold
Mexico: Gold
New Zealand: Platinum
Poland: 2x Platinum
Sweden: Gold
Switzerland: Gold
UK: Gold
Meanwhile, PF2 hasn’t received any certifications in any of these countries except UK: Silver
Additionally, out of curiosity, I took a closer look and discovered an even bigger inflation. Nicki Minaj’s total EAS in June was 56 million, and now it’s 63 million. That’s a 7 million gain without any new releases during that period and while her current album underperforms globally.
I’m not trying to offend you, but these inflations and deflations on your website—whether due to glitches or your new 'artist ratio' methodology—should be a cause for concern. It’s unfair to many artists, as well as fans, who once viewed your website as a reliable source.
And again, you go on talking about absolute terms (with certifications) rather than relative terms, making your 'facts' utterly pointless. And you do again the same mistake pretending that "Endless Summer Vacation performed significantly better globally and in the U.S. on Apple Music compared to Nicki Minaj’s Pink Friday 2". What about trying to understand what people tell you rather than repeating the same nonsense again and again?
ESV was bigger than PF2, that's a given, and again, that's pointless to the discussion. What matters is the share of Apple Music (& other platforms), on their global total. And that's where PF2 crushes ESV, because despite being weaker in absolute terms on AM, relatively speaking it represents a much strong share of her Spotify numbers. If you cared to check, I illustrated it myself with SFG/Flowers, with one have 10m non-Spotify streams being nearly twice as valuable (again, in relative terms) than 20.3m for Miley.
Then you come here talk about 'comprehension skills', and acting as if you were surprising to be seen as insanely biased. I work on music industry sales for 20 years, I am a data scientist as well, won national mathematics competitions when I was younger, and you come here, with an obviously limited knowledge, quoting charts without understanding their methodology, showing that you have no idea how YouTube Music works, and tell us we are 'incompetent'. You started saying that you are the 'Admin from Team Miley China', they are in terrible hands if the admin is incapable of behaving respectfully, to understand what he talks about, and be willing to make fake claims out of ignorance.
Facts leave no room for doubt, which is why I cited certifications. But hey, let's gather around the campfire and share our relative terms instead! Why bother with tangible evidence when we can play 'Let's Make A Relative Comparison'? And if that comparison comes out nowhere near the real-world values, you'll just tell those pointing it out that they're living in a delusional world, and insist that to measure the height of a building, a spaghetti ruler must be used!
You admit PF2 was weaker than ESV on Apple Music and Spotify in absolute terms, yet you still say, in relative terms (according to your methodology), PF2 'crushes' ESV. If the absolute success of an album is 'pointless' in a conversation about music sales, what is the conversation really about? The spaghetti ruler?
Now, regarding your SFG/Flowers argument: you suggested that SFG's 9.9 million non-Spotify streams are more valuable than Flowers' 20.3 million non-Spotify streams by relying on relative percentages. But percentages mean little when the base number of streams for Flowers is so much larger. Just because SFG's non-Spotify streams yield a higher percentage doesn't change the fact that Miley's song had double the overall streams. In fact, this example exposes how your methodology distorts the overall picture. The question is whether you can't see it or just don't care about the absolute picture at all. If you don't care, then your website and your methodology don't paint a comprehensive picture of an artist's success.
We’re surprised by the hypocrisy of you calling us biased for highlighting your skewed results and misleading conclusions, where one artist's success is overshadowed by a methodology that gives undue credit to another artist in 'relative terms.' The truth is, your methodology is flawed and you can't handle someone telling you this because you can't take constructive criticism. So yes, you are incompetent, and if you maintain this attitude, your growth will remain stagnant.
You take pride in saying that you're a data scientist, good for you. Now imagine if a surgeon had his values so far from reality how many botched operations would happen.
And crying about respect? You must first give it before demanding it in return. If your team member talks to us in an argumentative tone, don’t expect us to act like Gandhi.
The only thing fake here is the numbers displayed on your website, but what can we say? Even the creator of the infamous 'New Coke' didn’t want to acknowledge the faults in his creation, and we all know how that turned out. Good luck!
It is bigger, 3,7M vs 2,8M for now. There's nothing to deal with. Good luck!
