Nicki Minaj just won a major fight for streaming that will change the music industry
Until now, if a musician went platinum, that certification was based purely on sales, both physical and digital. It didn't matter how many times a record was listened to on Spotify or Apple Music.
But on Monday, the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) announced that it would be modernizing its gold and platinum certification process for albums, which will include both on-demand audio and video streams.
In the new methodology, 1,500 streams will count as the equivalent of 10 track sales or 1 album sale.
This means that the RIAA is retroactively awarding 17 different album titles with gold or platinum certifications. Among the newly platinum albums: Kendrick Lamar's "To Pimp a Butterfly," Hozier's self-titled album, and Coldplay's "Ghost Stories."
Nicki Minaj has been one of the most vocal proponents of counting streaming toward an artist's sales and certifications. She announced that her most recent album, "The Pinkprint," had gone triple platinum including streaming (officially, it hadn't even gone platinum) and faced a lot of criticism online.
While Minaj was not one of the artists given a new album certification Monday, it looks like the industry is only moving further her way.