An Open Letter to the Music Industry and the MusicFIRST Coalition

by Cary D. Pall

Imagine, if you will, that you were the owner of FedEx or UPS, or any shipping company. One day, the government comes along and says, "OK, all you shippers! From now on, you will have to pay your customers for the privilege of hauling their packages from place to place. Oh, and, by the way, any attempt to collect money from the customer will be deemed illegal and you will go to jail if you do." How long do you think it would take for every shipping company in America to close their doors?

That is how absurd the idea of a performance royalty for radio is.

I will put aside for a moment how ungrateful the music industry appears. You also appear to be suicidal.

There is a reason why the European music industry could not begin to perform at the levels of the American music industry during the second half of the twentieth century. The combination of government control of radio and performance royalties stifled the ability of the music industry to gain wide acceptance of music.

Meanwhile, the symbiotic relationship of free market radio combined with the free marketing juggernaut provided to the music industry via radio airplay made scores and scores of talented artists from around the world millions and millions of dollars in the U.S. market. Despite hard times, new technologies that have captured many ears and the sometimes empty guidance provided at the top of mega-corporate radio today, even now radio still provides a virtually free outlet for quality new music to be exposed, and still reaches millions more potential fans than any other outlet.

And you would now like to stab that golden goose in the heart. Brilliant. (Hope you can smell the sarcasm in that. Today, I wonder if you people even know what a golden goose is.) Instead of learning how to take advantage of new tech, you figure the time is right to bludgeon the old tech.

I have urged every one of my clients to boycott music from artists that support the performance royalty. I will continue to do so until the music industry comes to its senses and decides to abandon committing suicide. To do less would be a denial of everything that has made both of our industries effective.

At one client, we are ready to throw the switch on music entirely and change to an all-talk format if the royalty is passed. I assure you, we are not the only ones thinking in this way.

Please wake up to reality. You are cutting your own throats. You are killing yourselves. Don't do it.