The debate went up a gear yesterday, when independent distributor ST Holdings pulled its music catalogue from streaming sites.
Hopkins turned the air blue on Twitter today, reporting: "Got paid £8 for 90,000 plays. Fuck spotify."
He later added: "Radio 1 pay about £50 for each play."
That set in motion a stream of opinion from industry execs to Music Week's @MusicWeekNews account.
Radio presenter Stuart Miller wrote: "This Spotify thing is a total joke. I make dance music. If Radio 1 plays like 6 mins I get £120 or around that from PRS."
Universal product manager Steve Marsh came out in Spotify's defence, commenting: "How much did they get paid from pirated music...would that be £0? Spotify is reducing the amount of pirated music."
Music publishing house Sentric also stuck up for the beleagured platform. They said of Hopkins: "Yes, he gets £120 for a six minute play on Radio 1; because 8 million people are listening to it... If he received 8 million streams on Spotify he'd be earning more than £120 in royalties... Spotify is good for artists & the music industry. Can we all just get along with our lives and embrace it please?"
Universal's Jamie Vaide said: "Streaming can never replace sales as a major income source - but many people are stealing, not buying... I think the killer point is artists get SOMETHING from @Spotify whereas they get NOTHING from illegal downloading."
Others were less forgiving. The BBC's Wales Music account Tweeted: "Didn't Madonna get about 3s 6d for millions of plays? Streaming surely can't pay long term for artists..."
Record producer Dom Morley called Spotify "pointless", while UK pop songwriting collective The House of Mammoth said: "Spotify = this generation's mix tapes."
Coldplay decided not to release their album Mylo Xyloto onto Spotify and other streaming sites last month.
Other famous Spotify snubbers include Tom Waits and Adele - whose album 21 is unavailable on the platform, although individual tracks can be streamed.
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