A look back at 2016 reveals that the Canadian hip-hop superstar Drake had some great releases, which attracted the attention of P2P users throughout the world. Starting in January 2016, the release of Drake’s single “Summer Sixteen” drew 91,000 P2P users on the peak day. At the same time, the release of Drake’s latest album “Views” on April 29, 2016, created a virtual explosion of activity from 62,500 to 357,100 P2P users – in just one day. The popularity of this album was the main reason for achieving the worldwide number two spot of 2016. Until his latest playlist drop on March 18, 2017, file sharing numbers decreased continuously, until he reached rank four in January and February. In the space of just one day, the release of “More Life” had a huge impact on file sharing activity, causing the number of his daily file sharers to jump from 45,200 to 174,400.
COMEBACK KID ED SHEERAN SURPASSES DRAKE SINCE BEGINNING OF THE YEAR
Even though Drake’s popularity level spiked yet again, he has not been able to compete with Ed Sheeran’s fan base since beginning of 2017. In comparison to 2016, when we counted a total fan base of 8,510,655 P2P users that shared files of Drake – which was (back then!) almost four times more than Ed Sheeran’s total amount. Looking at the development since the beginning of the year (see infographic), Ed Sheeran not only caught up with Drake’s fan base, but even managed to surpass the Canadian rapper by taking the number one spot right above him among the worldwide charts to date in March.
DRAKE’S FANS ARE MAINLY LOCATED IN THE U.S., FOLLOWED BY HIS NATIVE COUNTRY OF CANADA
For the most part, the strongest impact of Drake’s music can be seen in the U.S. – almost one out of four P2P users that share his files reside there. Nevertheless, a detailed look reveals that Ontario, a state in his native country of Canada, is where the highest density of fans can be found at the moment – and more precisely, most of them eagerly await Drake’s newest releases in Toronto.
Source: TECXIPIO
Definition: The rankings are based on the number of unique file sharers: How many peers shared at least one file of the respective artist?