Evan Keeton@pixiecata I feel like combined Spotify and Apple Music playtime would be the most objective metric. Not only is it easy to control for region, i.e. if you want to rank playtime just in the US, but it’s an almost universal mode of consumption. I would love to see fan sales be a determining metric, but since different genres are built around different modes of consumption, it would be unfairly biased towards heavy metal, indie, k-pop, etc. where physical product is the culture
@pixiecata That being said, from what little I know of Billboard I have no doubt that they aren’t playing fair, and one can argue for days about the right way to measure popularity while Billboard continues to strip the rightful pop kings of their spots at No. 1