[usrusr]

Big difference between TV and music streaming, in a nutshell: a TV streaming library is defined by what they have, a music streaming library is defined by what is missing.

Serial TV is consumed like a novel, as long as the next episode is available, the availability of everything else is unimportant. Music is consumed in a much more random access pattern, like a lexicon: if the letter M is missing, it's broken. ("You want that particular song by Morrissey? Sorry. Be sure to check out these five Spotify Originals that have also been tagged with #sad" - no, people won't be willing to pay for that)

[cmurphycode]

It may be true that music listeners are currently much more annoyed when songs aren't available. However, I think it's wrong to say that TV and movie watchers were any different 5 years ago -- even today, people's number one complaint about Netflix is that famous movie X isn't on there.

Netflix worked hard to change that model by figuring out what people liked to watch and generating high quality content in the patterns they saw. Turns out, now everyone watches whatever show Netflix puts in front of them.

Do you think it's possible a similar phenomenon could happen for music?

I can tell you that since signing up for Spotify Premium, I've certainly been exposed to more new artists that I like, based on their recommendations. Since their library is currently still extensive (like how Netflix had a lot more movies back in the day), I'm very rarely looking for a song they don't have. I can imagine a world where the content holders get more scared (although that would be an impressively delayed reaction) and thus Spotify is pressured out of contracts (just like Netflix was). I'm guessing that Spotify is betting that if that is the case, they can rely on the fact they've been changing their listeners tastes to survive.

[usrusr]

I doubt that a streaming provider would be able to starve out interest in third party music. Most active choice music consumption is essentially a nostalgic act, even when searching for the latest hit that you heard at that party last night. Music preference could almost be considered involuntary.

An "original content superspotify" would have to dominate all channels to ensue that customers are rarely overcome be the desire (and the resulting dissatisfaction) for third party music, or restrict themselves to the subset of the market that is never exposed to channels not under their control. Both of these options are what I would consider a likely base for economic success.