The problems with music streaming are problems more broadly of culture under capitalism—where decontextualization and historical amnesia make it so people do not look backward, forward, and around, but just flounder in their atomization. Collectives and cooperatives work to counter exactly that by creating the conditions for people to be in more direct collaboration with one another. It is hard work—the polar opposite of the frictionlessness that platform-optimized tech culture imposes. But friction is part of how real connections, and ultimately change, happen.
