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Standup comics write their own material, and develop it in live performances. There should be a different label for comedians that use other people's material (talentless hack, maybe. Only slightly kidding. ) That aside, there is an actual value to what artists contribute to a platform's earnings. That actual value comprises the revenue generated by ad views and purchases through the distribution of an artist's content. Subtract the infrastructure, labor, and operations and management costs, and you're left with some percentage "X" of the total. For an exclusive deal with a platform, 50% of X would be reasonable, since they're partnering to mutual benefit. For a star with lots of earning potential, you could see a deal for more than 50% of X, and for other artists, the value of being on the platform might mean they only get a 5% cut. The way things are done now, I think most artists are getting under 1% of X, and that's paid out grudgingly. C class employees of the platforms and middle management are playing the usual corporate vampire games, sucking up almost all of the profits earned by exploiting artists. The sad part is that if they played fair and eliminated the useless vampires, everyone would be better off. People fighting for a larger cut off revenue they're responsible for generating makes perfect sense to me, as long as "X" makes sense in the context of the actual costs and value of platforms. |