Music streaming: an unprecedented collaboration between research and business to illuminate our practices
At the intersection of the social sciences and computer science, the teams of the Mixtapes (Mixed methods and data for music streaming analysis and listening practices) associated research laboratory will work for four years to measure, analyse, and model the social and spatial diversity of listening practices for music and podcasts on music streaming services. This research will, among others, help study the changing tastes and listening habits of users over the long term, the consistencies and inconsistencies between stated preferences and listening habits, the impact of streaming service algorithms on the latter, and family transmission of musical tastes.
This associated research laboratory follows on the close collaboration between Deezer and teams from the Géographie-Cités Laboratory (CNRS/EHESS/Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne/Université Paris- Cité) that began in 2017. It follows on the Records (music streaming service audience practices) project conducted between 2020 and 2025.
A body of quantitative and qualitative data of unprecedented diversity
In conducting this research, the teams will use experimental protocols that combine and compare big data for listening habits collected by Deezer with declarative data collected in surveys based on questionnaires and individual interviews. Developed collaboratively in 2019, these protocols make it possible to complete surveys with tens of thousands of Deezer users in France in conformity with the French General Data Protection Regulation (RGPD), as well as the anonymity of surveys. The scientists eventually plan to deploy these survey protocols abroad. The goal is to conduct comparative studies in a number of other countries in which Deezer is an important actor in music distribution. Another key issue is to produce open and anonymized data based on procedures that are reproducible and accessible to the entire scientific community.
Such enduring access by public research actors to individual and anonymized data for the actual consumption of cultural content is unprecedented in France.
“The CNRS is joining forces with Deezer to create the MIXTAPES associated research laboratory, the extension of a collaboration based on trust that began in 2017. This unprecedented project will explore the digital uses relating to listening to music and podcasts. It brings together the scientific excellence of the CNRS and that of a major actor in streaming, with a view to better grasping contemporary cultural pratiques, thereby illustrating an association between science and innovation in the field of culture”,
declares Mehdi Gmar, CNRS Chief Innovation Officer.
Aurélien Hérault, Chief Innovation Officer at Deezer, stresses: “We are pleased to expand our collaboration with the CNRS via the Mixtapes LabCom. By sharing a wealth of anonymized listening data, we are contributing to cutting-edge research on the habits and practices of music streaming. This knowledge will strengthen transparency in the sector, and will help with the ongoing improvement of our products and functionalities in the service of our users and subscribers.”
“Developing, strengthening and diversifying relations between the academic world and industry is a priority for the ANR, which offers several complementary and specific funding schemes to facilitate public- private partnerships. We are delighted with the launch of the Mixtapes LabCom, which fully illustrates this complementarity by following on from the Records Collaborative Research Project - Companies (PRCE), a funding instrument also supported by the ANR, and which consolidates an ongoing collaboration that we hope will last. This is what is at stake for the ANR, which is committed to a global approach to supporting innovation”, says Arnaud Torres, advisor to the ANR President.
From left to right: Aurélien Hérault, Director of Innovation at Deezer; Mehdi Gmar, Deputy Director of Innovation at CNRS; Arnaud Torres, Advisor to the President of the French National Research Agency (ANR); Clarisse Berthezène, Université Paris Cité and Estelle Girard, Head of Projects and Agreements in the Research Development Department at EHESS. © David Pell/CNRS Images.
Contacts :
CNRS Press | Manon Landurant | T +33 1 44 96 51 37 | manon.landurant(at)cnrs.fr
Deezer Press | Nicolas Pré | T +33 6 61 99 50 11 | npre(at)deezer.com
EHESS Press l Alice Jourdan l T +33 6 14 12 66 35 l presse(at)ehess.fr
Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne Press | Gwenaël Cuny | T +33 1 89 68 43 59 | presse(at)univ-paris1.fr
ANR Press l Katel Le Floc’h | T +33 6 81 61 12 97 | contactpresse(at)anr.fr
