MySpace. Gotta love it, gotta hate it. 
 
MySpace has opened up a whole new world for music. A social networking site turned music giant, MySpace has become essential to the comedians, musicians and actors always found on the front page of the site. In other words, MySpace gets paid by advertisers to get their products on to myspace. 
 
This subject is a troubling one. MySpace has a system which you now must use in order to get noticed. These days bands can’t get signed unless they have more than 20,000 friends on MySpace. You need to have more than 200 plays a day! This is lunacy! This is madness! THIS IS SPARTA! 
 
No, seriously… What happened to the days of hearing a band you liked, not knowing their stats, and supporting them? MySpace is like a sick, fake-name, faceless popularity contest. You are told a band is great because there view counts and their comments are like, “OMFG, u guys RAWK!” A band is the new rage because their members are ten years old, can shred faster than the speed of light and have over 30,000 other ten-year-olds signed up as their friends. 
 
Through all of this, I’d like to ask one question: How do we get paid for our 20,000 friends and our 100,000 listens? I don’t really know, but MySpace at some point is going to have to pay up. And we’re going to have to make them. 
 
I know they have a disclaimer somewhere on their site that allows them the right to place your music for free. These guys are a corporate conglomerate and they want to use your music for free? It’s the chicken or egg game. Yes, every band needs MySpace, but at what cost? Let’s get down to the brass tacks and get in MySpace’s ASS! Do you want to know why! THIS IS AMERICA! Do some research and tell me what you find! I’ll do my own. Let’s get paid for the intellectual property we create from nothing. Songs, poems, art, etc.

Tags: band economics, independent artists, music industry, myspace, social network