OK - PRS have let us down badly at a time when musicians and venues are struggling.

It's no good just shouting that music shouldn't be licensed. It should! But here's what they have to do if they don't want to be responsible for musicians going bust 1/7 https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/jan/28/uk-music-industry-outraged-over-licence-fee-cost-for-live-streamed-events

First the fact that the flat rates of a £22.50 license for gigs making <£250 in ticket sales or £45 for gigs grossing £251-£500 = a license fee which is 9-18% of the takings as opposed to 3-5% for a physical gig.

There is no justification for that - it should just be 3-5% 2/7

They seem oblivious to the fact that most people doing ticketed online gigs are in fact performing their own music (or in the folk world - public domain music).

There should be an exemption for gigs where you're not performing other people's works. 3/7

They need to let us know what happens if a gig makes over £500. They also need to explain how the online gig can know how much they are going to make before the event in order to apply for a license. Most shows get ~50% of ticket sales on the day of the event! 4/7

In the article PRS say that we, the members will make back the license fees via the same system as we do for live shows. But of course that doesn't happen as PRS take a lot of that off in admin costs.... 5/7

... and we don't know (and the staff at PRS member services don't know either) if the hugely inflated percentages being asked will make their way back to us several months down the line. 6/7

At this particular moment in time, when nobody has done a proper gig since last March, the very last thing musicians and venues need is for money to be taken away from us only to be given back a portion of it months down the line after taking off admin costs. 7/7