The Power Of Taylor Swift Recognized By ‘Fortune Magazine’

Taylor Swift truly is a powerhouse in the world of entertainment, and Fortune Magazine has recognized it, placing the songstress and pop sensation on its esteemed “40 Under 40” list.

In fact, Taylor Swift is sixth on the list, beating out Jessica Alba, John Oliver, and Ronda Rousey, and a host of the most influential innovative business people under the age of 40 who make up the seventh annual list.

So, what is this “40 Under 40” list that Taylor Swift is on? Fortune Magazine explains.

“…[i]n 2008, in the midst of the financial crisis, we started noticing that young people were doing some awfully significant things…There seemed to be a movement afoot, and we decided to chronicle it with a list–one that, rather than being about money alone, was about achievements, ambition, and influence.”

Why has Taylor Swift been selected to be part of this prestigious list? According to Fortune, although last year she was the single highest earning artist, it was more for what Swift used her power and influence to achieve that impressed the magazine.

“First [Taylor Swift] stood up to Spotify, pulling her entire catalog and penning a Wall Street Journal op-ed that ‘music should not be free.’ This year, she moved on to a bigger force: Apple. Just as the company was offering a trial period for its much-touted new Apple Music platform, Swift wrote a blog post pressuring it to rethink its artist pay model. (Apple had refused to pay artists during the service’s first three months.) It worked.”

Taylor Swift’s victory in the name of artist’s rights hasn’t come without criticism, however. In another article in Fortune Magazine, Troy Carter, who used to manage Lady Gaga, expressed disagreement with Swift, arguing that pulling music from music streaming services is not the solution to low pay for artists through these services.

“I think Taylor is brilliant but I think that’s sort of a flawed argument. The alternative is piracy.”

Troy does acknowledge that there is a problem even if he doesn’t agree with Taylor Swift’s approach to dealing with that problem.

“We’ve always gotten screwed by the record labels. The record labels made a significant amount of money from Spotify. It’s just not finding its way into the hands of the artists.”

Despite Taylor Swift not having her music on Spotify, including the mega-selling 1989, Ryan Adams’ song-by-song cover of the album is available there and has been garnering plenty of attention for both artists. Adams has been praising Swift’s song-writing abilities, and explaining why he wanted to cover them, as reported by the Dallas Observer.

“Those songs are fragile and vulnerable at their core. They’re constructed from such an honest place. Those are the kind of songs… I don’t think they’re overshares. But they’re all completely giving, to the point that they move people to tears.”

The same article, titled “Thank You Ryan Adams For Mansplaining Taylor Swift To The World,” does rip into the idea that it took a middelish-aged white dude to redo Swift’s album before some music lovers would take what is a good album all on its own seriously.

“If you don’t already recognize Swift as one of pop music’s best songwriters, there’s probably a reason why. People don’t take Swift seriously because she is a young woman with a fondness for cheesy pop beats. People do take Adams seriously because he’s a mid-30s male with a knack for recognizing the good stuff.”

Regardless of what mansplaining Ryan Adams may or may not be doing, Fortune Magazine has acknowledged that Swift is a savvy business person who is able to stand up for artists’ rights, while creating music that sells tons of records, by adding Taylor Swift to their “40 Under 40” list.

[Photo from Getty Images / Duane Prokop]