I’d argue though that talent is subjective of course. You said, let’s give them money for their talent, making music, but how do we quantify that? If someone write 200 songs real quick but they’re all hastily and crappily done, does that get rewarded with money if they themselves argue, hey, I’m talented, this is what I do full time, and I made more songs than other people, so I deserve more? The current way we have to quantify this is by number of streams unfortunately. That doesn’t mean of course that T Swift is more talented than that super sick jazz band you like who have all spent their entire lives being classically trained etc, but it’s what has garnered people’s interest and unfortunately that is the game as it stands today.
I’d argue though that talent is subjective of course. You said, let’s give them money for their talent, making music, but how do we quantify that? If someone write 200 songs real quick but they’re all hastily and crappily done, does that get rewarded with money if they themselves argue, hey, I’m talented, this is what I do full time, and I made more songs than other people, so I deserve more? The current way we have to quantify this is by number of streams unfortunately. That doesn’t mean of course that T Swift is more talented than that super sick jazz band you like who have all spent their entire lives being classically trained etc, but it’s what has garnered people’s interest and unfortunately that is the game as it stands today.