Comic actor W.C. Fields was well known for claiming the
"The news of my death is greatly exaggerated."
I was reminded of decades of such exaggerated news about the
murder of old media content – news reporting, music,
television, movies – by the internet. One day, I read and
article describing YouTube's payment of more than $3 billion in
2019 to the music industry of the $15 Billion it reported in
advertising and subscription revenue in 2019. The same article
noted that Warner Music reported that streaming by Spotify and
Apple Music accounted for 27% of its 2019 revenue.
The same day the Wall Street Journal reported that Google is seeking to pay news
publishers a licensing fee for news content. In the past year, both
Apple and Facebook started paying news organizations to license
real-time headlines, articles and story summaries for new feed
streaming. Old media properties like News Corp and AT&T's
CNN are developing their own properties for aggregating
