If I have prints of famous paintings on the walls of my business, do I have to pay an annual fee to the Painters Mob?
If I have an automobile motif, with snazzy old cars around, do I have to pay the car manufacturers an annual fee?
If I have newspapers at the tables of my coffee shops, do I have to pay an annual fee to the newspaper company?
If I give away my paper after I've read it, have I violated copyright laws? (Apparently I have if I give away a computer CD to my friends.)
If I have football memorabilia around, do I owe the Universities and the NFL an annual fee?
The music industry is engaged in extortion.
Have you read this thread or did you just stumble onto a few posts and decided to add your two cents? This has been convered already.
The value of your painting, car, etc. are built into the sale price. The value of music to a business (hundreds? thousands?) is not built into the price of a song (about $1.70 at retail). The value is paid for on the installment plan called a performance license. That's hardly extortion.
The newspaper makes it's money from advertising, so the more eyes that see it, the better the paper does. I'm sure they'd be happy if you wanted to pass it around as much as possible.
As I said earlier on this thread, if you want to pay the full value of a song up front in a lump sum, there are many songwriters who would no doubt like to hear from you.