Good job Thom, you're an idiot as always!
Yes, Spotify is cheap as shit and artists make no money from it unless they get millions of streams per month. Here's the thing, though: small and independent artists aren't really out for money when they put their stuff up on Spotify -- they want exposure. Spotify is great in that aspect, not because they'll end up on top lists or anything, but because it's super easy for people to share stuff.
You want to show your new track to a friend? Just send them a link on Spotify, who knows, they might pass the link on, and so on, and suddenly you have a pretty large network of people who have heard the track. Sure, you could argue "but I could just put it on Soundcloud". Of course, you could, but how many people do you know who actively listen to music on Soundcloud? Not too many, I suppose. If your track is good, they might want to put it in a playlist or something, which Spotify also helps with.
The only artists who "suffer" from Spotify are the mid-way to fame people. You know, the guys who are well known with quite a few listeners, but not enough to make decent revenue from streams. Even so, would the people listening on Spotify buy their album if it wasn't easy to stream? Probably not, people are lazy as shit.