Raising royalty rates won’t save music

(Via The Hill)

Instead, it could kill off an industry that has finally helped combat piracy.

Today, listening to the music you want to hear is easier than ever. Forget waiting for your favorite song to come on the radio or camping out on a Tuesday night to be one of the first to buy the latest CD. Thanks to streaming services like Pandora, Spotify and iHeartRadio, listeners have access to millions of songs at the click of a mouse for less than the cost of buying one CD per month.

But while consuming music is now a breeze, ensuring the right people are getting paid for their work is more complicated than ever.There’s no question that the royalties system is broken. Artists and songwriters are being compensated for their works under completely outdated laws that line the pockets of the record labels while leaving the artists high and dry. But simply raising the royalties tech companies have to pay for music won’t help the situation — if anything it will make it worse.

Read the full article here.