While I agree creators should be paid for their work, this little gem put a chill up my spine:
"Nowadays it's possible, via metadata, to log exactly what got played to whom, when, and for rightsholders to be paid accurately."
That's just ... Orwellian. Whatever happened to "pay once for a record/tape/CD" and the right of first sale? Why should it be a basic assumption that anyone else other than myself and possibly some friends know what I am listening to when or why?
I thought that part of why Spotify et al. were cheaper than the "purchase" model was that you give them access to all of this free data, maximizing revenue per stream or somesuch? If they are not even paying the artists, sue them all....