Jonathan Potter Quotes

You can't fool yourself anymore that your art is your art. When you're not getting paid for that song that's being traded back and forth among millions of people on the Internet, you have to think like a businessperson.

Every time we buy a CD or download a song, the artist is paid for their work. You might not know that this isn't the case when a musician's work is played on the radio.

The battle over Napster has divided musicians and industry officials.

I think music should be free. I think all communication should be free. I think people should respect artists, and there should be a certain respect for artists who give their music away for free.

When people who are songwriters say 'That's my property and if you give it away for free then I'll lose my incentive,' then, well, good riddance.

When you think of Napster, you think of music. But the first thing that struck me was that this was an important case not only for the music industry but for the whole Internet.

A hundred years ago, of course, the question that the German Composers' Co-operative asked itself sounded a lot more fundamental: How do you create a fair share for those who ensure that works can actually be performed at all?

When I was in N.W.A. and didn't get paid all the money I was owed, that's when the business side of showbiz hit me.

Punishing people for listening to music is exactly the wrong way to protect the music business.

With Napster and the sharing of music, of course, there are going to be people who exploit it. Greed has no end. But there's a lot of good that could happen. We shouldn't let the economic concerns of the major labels infringe on our freedom to share music.

I've never supported this concept of going after Napster. I think the rock bands who fought this were wrong.

Spotify wants to make consuming music simpler and at the same time pay the rights owners.

If you are a musician who has released albums, it would perhaps be morbidly interesting to know how much you would be owed if everyone who now has your music had actually bought your record.

Just because my song was being played on the radio didn't mean I had a load of money. You don't get royalties overnight.

Until the governments don't have a clear law against piracy and the digital downloads are not working worldwide properly, the record industry will keep on suffering.

One could work on a lot of albums such as 'Thiruvasagam in Symphony,' but with issues such as illegal downloading from the Internet and piracy, it is difficult.

The purpose of VEVO is to continue the tradition of corporations preventing artists from making money on their art.

I'd never been paid for the first Roses LP - it was 2002 before we received any royalties.

Music copyright and licensing laws haven't kept up with technology or the times. The Music Modernization Act fixes that with a comprehensive set of reforms that will help musicians receive royalties they are owed while ensuring the public has access to that music.

I can do anything onstage. Here's the misconception: You could record an album called 'The Best of Styx.' And all you would have to do is pay the individual songwriters a mechanical royalty.

If music is to continue to support the livelihoods of artists, it cannot be taken without the permission of artists.

I would say the hummingbird really deserves the royalties on [some of my songs].

I do pay performance royalties on others' songs I perform live, but I'm not recording these songs and putting them up for sale.

All artists deserve compensation for their work, including musicians.

Tell me a musician who's got rich off digital sales. Apple's doing pretty good though, right?