What’s the purpose of a music video? Is it to be an artistic expression in-and-of itself? I can’t honestly think that it is. No, a music video (much like a radio spot) is an advertisement – for the band, the song, and the album. It is quite frankly absurd to me that artists believe that they should be paid – beyond the amount they already get through the ads they place on their own pages – because Google is providing them a platform to transmit their commercials to millions of people around the world – FREE.

So when the Performance Rights Society (PRS – UK’s RIAA) could not reach an agreement, Youtube pulled all the music videos down in the UK, signaling that, in fact, it doesn’t need them nearly as much as they need Youtube. The best part? Numerous artists, even ones who had been complaining about how Google was “stealing their money” and “not paying for music” suddenly found that their own, personal websites didn’t work. The videos on their own sites had been embedded versions of Youtube videos. That’s right, in addition to providing free advertising and free distribution, they were also shouldering the largest, most expensive part of a band’s website – the streaming media content – FREE. The cost to artists to host and stream their own videos, thousands or millions of times, would be far higher than anything they could hope to re-coupe from licensing fees.

It appears that the PRS is doing everything it can to actively torpedo its artists’ futures online. Their actions have already driven Myspace Music and Pandora to simply cut off UK service. Does it appear to be hurting either of them? Not in the slightest. You know who it is hurting though? I made a list:

• The Fans
  • No longer able to find their favorite band’s music online
  • Can’t introduce friends to the music in an engaging way
• The Musicians
  • Less exposure means fewer ticket sales
  • Fewer new fans because of lack of sharing
• Music Video Makers
  • If a music video can ONLY be played on MTV, it has less value
  • Less value means people pay less to make music videos
  • Fewer bands (especially UK bands) will even bother making music videos

I hope this is helpful to the people at the PRS, and that they carefully consider who they are ultimately trying to serve. Clearly, artists and fans are both hurt by their actions, and value is generated for no one. It is yet another example of an outdated, monolithic group trying desperately to stay relevant.

So here’s my proposal: If artists want Google to pay them for every view, they can pay Google for every single embedded version of the video. Every time someone embeds it anywhere and Google isn’t getting any advertising revenue, the band can go ahead and get billed for that bandwidth. Then, at the end of the month, they can get together and see which bill is bigger – bandwidth or licensing.

Here’s a Radiohead (one of the bands that complained) video. Just for you to enjoy on Radiohead’s theoretical dime.

Warner Music Group recently approached a number of Universities throughout the US with a problem, and a wonderfully elegant solution. The problem? College students “steal” music. Now, we’re not talking about walking out of Target with it tucked under your jacket, when they say “steal” they mean “copyright infringement”, the big DL, swappin’ bits, or whatever you kids are calling it these days. Downloading music.

Warner proposed a truly graceful solution, one that I’m sure any 14th century monarch would be proud of: just fine EVERYONE! It is much too time consuming and expensive to actually bring everyone to court, especially for the relatively small number of people actually committing a crime. Rather than just take the shotgun-to-a-swarm-of-bees-in-front-of-a-small-child approach they have been, where an occasional target actually settles out of court, though hundreds of innocent people get accused and dragged through lengthy, expensive legal proceedings, Warner would like to simply place an arbitrary “tax” on all university students. A few dollars, maybe $5 or $10/mo, from every student, in every university in the country! This would all go into (their words, not mine) “a pot of money”. Then they would, on their honor, dole out money to content creators (it will be too hard to find out who) and license holders (themselves and their friends) in a “fair, not profit-motivated manner”.

And what do you get in exchange for this wonderful, per-student tax? The RIAA agrees to not sue the University. Note, this doesn’t say students, it says University. There are roughly 20.5 million undergraduate and graduate students in the US, according to the 2006 census . This means this pot-o-gold they’re hoping to gather could easily be in the hundreds of millions of dollars a MONTH, and billions per year.

Think about that. They’re trying to set up a scheme by which they get billions of dollars a year from students who’ve done nothing wrong, simply by virtue of belonging to a group in which SOME members break the law, and offer no protection in return.

One of the particularly upsetting points is on Slide 4, Point 1, Subpoint 2. “All Students or None”. This means that despite never having downloaded an album illegally, copied a friend’s CD or even listened to music played in an unlicensed venue, students will be forking over $5-10/mo in protection money. Now think about this: $15/mo gets you unlimited music from Microsoft, Rhapsody, or eMusic, legally. But they want $10 simply because SOME students at SOME universities are downloading music, and better to drown them all.

I hope, with every capitalist bone in my body, that no University would sell out its own students for this. I really genuinely do. But I have seen the music industry do some monumentally cruel things to its best customers, and the fact that this proposition is on the table means that somewhere, someone is considering it (Update: Columbia, Stanford, University of Chicago, University of Washington, MIT, University of Colorado, University of Michigan, Cornell, Penn State, University of California at Berkeley and University of Virginia are in active talks, “considering” it). And it only takes one before “precedent” is set and more fall in line. How long before this just gets rolled into our monthly Internet connection bill?

If you find yourself on the receiving end of such a fee, I strongly encourage you not to pay it. Pay your University fees, short the exact amount of the RIAA protection money. Refuse to pay, write a polite but firm letter to your bursar that you don’t download illegal music and feel that being treated as though you were a criminal by your own University is both wrong and unlawful. If the RIAA wishes to bring charges, then bring them in a court of law, not behind closed doors where the accused can’t even hear the charges against them or face their accuser.

One final gem: “Our approach is supported by the EFF, Public Knowledge and many organizations dedicated to network freedom.” Representatives of both the EFF and Public Knowledge have spoken out against this. They were never contacted for comment, input, feedback, or approval. It was just put in the bottom.