Turns Out the Whole World Wants to Tell Supersized Streaming to Shove It

Melanie Bainbridge

4 minute read

So, remember how I mentioned The Pack could work internationally? Well, I've been crunching some numbers (yes, I know, I'm fun at parties), and it turns out I might have been thinking too small. Way too small.

Here's a stat that should make Daniel Ek choke on his morning kombucha… conservative projections suggest The Pack's model could attract tens, if not hundreds of millions of users globally. We're not talking about some little Australian experiment that makes people go "aww, Aussies are so cute." We're talking about a genuine threat to the big tech music extraction racket.

The Pack’s scaling plan is to develop a new Pack Music Cooperative wherever a country or city values its local sound. Every new cooperative we build would give people who are fed up with having their local music scenes treated like resource extraction sites by tech bros who think culture is just another commodity to be mined for shareholder value a new hope.

This is our planned international cooperative revolution, where local music scenes finally get to tell Silicon Valley exactly where they can stick their algorithms.

You know what's hilarious (to us at least)? Every country faces the exact same problem that we do. French artists getting buried under English-language content that the algorithm knows will generate more ad revenue. Brazilian musicians competing with American chart-toppers that have unlimited marketing budgets. Canadian Indigenous artists getting pushed aside by whatever's trending globally this week. Indonesian artists watching their local languages disappear from platforms designed primarily for English speakers.

It's like the super-streamers looked at the world and said, "You know what this needs? Complete cultural homogenisation in service of our advertising revenue!"

But here's where it gets really interesting. Let's talk about the math that should make every tech Exec very, very nervous.

France could attract 18 million users paying €10/month. That's €2.16 billion annually flowing to French artists instead of big tech shareholders. Brazil might hit 44 million users at R$30/month - that's R$15.8 billion staying in Brazil instead of funding another tech billionaire's space hobby. Canada could reach 10 million users at C$12/month, creating C$1.44 billion in annual revenue for Canadian artists. Indonesia presents 24 million potential users at $8/month, generating $2.3 billion annually for local musicians.

Even if That Pack only captures 10-20% of these projections, we're still talking about hundreds of millions annually flowing to artists instead of shareholders. Multiply that across dozens of countries, and suddenly you're looking at a genuine existential threat to the super streaming monopoly (#sorrynotsorry).

France, in many ways, is the perfect test case. They're already suspicious of American (and weirdly Swedish) tech dominance (bless them), they already have strict radio quotas for French-language content, and they understand cooperative business models. Plus, 73% of French listeners use streaming platforms, so there’s a ready-made adopter base.

A French Pack could require 70% French-language content, with payments going directly to French artists who are creating music for French audiences. We can challenge cultural colonialism through technology, rather than amplifying it.

Brazil is even more exciting because Brazilians overwhelmingly prefer Portuguese-language content despite international stuff being available. They have 110 million streaming users, they love their local music, and they have a history of telling foreign corporations to take a hike when they try to dominate Brazilian markets.

Canada? They already have CanCon requirements, government funding for Indigenous and French-Canadian content, and a deep suspicion of cultural imperialism (I’d guess it’s even deeper now). And, they understand cooperatives.

And Southeast Asia? Indonesia has 274 million people, 45% streaming adoption, multiple local languages that need platforms designed for their communities, and a government that's increasingly interested in digital sovereignty. The Philippines has 110 million people who prefer local artists over international hits despite being fed predominantly English-language content.

Unlike corporate platforms that extract value from every market while contributing nothing to local culture, the cooperative model is designed to create genuine value exchange. Each expansion shares the technology, builds networks for artist collaboration, transfers cultural policy expertise, and creates solidarity between communities.

Australia could become an exporter of cooperative technology and cultural sovereignty expertise instead of just raw materials (and in a mining export economy, that’s epic). We could lead global innovation in democratic digital infrastructure.

What I love most about The Pack is its potential to be algorithmic decolonisation in action. When local communities control their cultural algorithms, you get cultural self-determination instead of behavioural manipulation. Currently, streaming platforms extract billions from international markets while returning minimal value to local creators. The Pack could reverse this. Countries can reclaim digital sovereignty without building from scratch - they can adapt proven models to their cultural contexts while maintaining democratic control.

And even more beautiful? As The Pack expands internationally, it will create a global network of cooperatives sharing resources, knowledge and advocacy strategy, while maintaining local control. Technology costs get spread across multiple markets, artists can collaborate across platforms based on actual interest instead of marketing budgets, successful strategies get shared between cooperatives, and we build a genuine solidarity economy.

From globalised streaming’s skewed perspective, cooperative international expansion is a nightmare. Revenue they've been extracting from captured international markets starts staying local. Algorithm control shifts from corporate boardrooms to community governance. User data stays in community hands instead of corporate surveillance systems.

But here’s what we really love about it. When communities prove they can own and operate digital infrastructure successfully, the monopoly power of tech platforms becomes vulnerable across all sectors. When communities demonstrate that alternative economics work better than corporate extraction, the entire model of platform capitalism is open to challenge.

Each Pack expansion becomes a node in global cultural resistance to digital colonialism. Communities control their cultural infrastructure, artists build sustainable careers from local audiences, culture gets preserved instead of homogenised, and technology serves users instead of exploiting them.

We think the choice is clear, but the question remains… will communities act to control their cultural technology, or will they keep surrendering it to corporate extraction that treats culture and creativity as a resource to be mined?

The revolution starts with music, but it definitely doesn't end there.