Look, the streaming model is fragile because it pretends artists can survive on pennies per stream while the platforms rake in billions. That's not a sustainable system—it's a house of cards. When artists can't make a living, they stop making music. Then what are you streaming? Spotify pays something like $0.003 per stream. You need millions of plays just to cover rent. That's not "fair market value," that's exploitation dressed up as convenience. The platforms have skin in the game only for themselves—they built a beautiful machine that profits off other people's work without sharing the rewards. Sure, streaming gave us access. I get that. But access doesn't pay the bills. If these companies can't afford to pay artists a living wage, then maybe their business model isn't robust. It's fragile. And fragile systems eventually break.

Look, I hear you on the margins thing. But let's be real—"razor-thin margins" is a story Spotify tells to keep the payout low while their execs cash out. Their CEO made something like 10 million last year. That's not thin. That's them having skin in the game for themselves but not for the creators. You say raising pay would kill the model. I say if the model dies because you pay artists fairly, then the model was fragile to begin with. It's like saying a restaurant can't afford to pay its cooks—eventually you've got no food. And this idea that volume makes up for it? That only works for the top 1% of artists. Most musicians are drowning. Access doesn't pay for gear or studio time. I'd rather see a system that's robust enough to share the wealth instead of this lottery where most people lose.

Look at Taylor Swift pulling her catalog off Spotify back in 2014. She knew the payout was insulting, and she had the leverage to fight. Most artists don't. That's the real problem—the platforms hold all the power and pretend they're doing us a favor. You keep talking about scale and volume like it's a charity. But here's the thing: if I sell you a sandwich and you pay me a nickel, that's not a "scalable opportunity." That's a bad deal, no matter how many sandwiches I sell. And this idea that artists should just tour more? That's fragile logic. Touring is expensive, risky, and right now, completely unpredictable. What happens when the next pandemic shuts down live shows? Then what's the artist left with? Pennies from streams. A robust system doesn't rely on merch sales to survive. The old label system was broken, sure. But replacing it with a different kind of exploitation isn't progress. It's just a new middleman with a better PR team.