“So @GeorgErgatoudis has just announced that @BBCR1 will v.soon be including @Spotify streams in the Top 40 charts not just sales!” claimed one of the tweets coming out of last night’s Radio Academy Playlists: What Makes a Hit in 2014? event in London.
As head of music at Radio 1 and 1Xtra, Ergatoudis is in a position to know, and he followed up with his own tweet confirming and clarifying the details:
To be clear @PeteyJamesDP @littleboots @earshotcreative @BBCR1 @Spotify Not just Spotify, other music streaming services will be included.
— George Ergatoudis (@GeorgErgatoudis) February 17, 2014
Radio 1 takes its singles chart from the Official Charts Company’s sales rankings in the UK, although the company launched a separate Official Streaming Chart in May 2012.
Now it seems data from the latter will be incorporated into the former chart sooner rather than later – a change in policy from early 2013, when OCC boss Martin Talbot told The Guardian that “with singles sales at an all-time high, there are no plans to incorporate streaming information in the UK”.
With Brits streaming 7.4bn songs in 2013 according to the BPI, though, it is not a surprise that these plans have changed.
