All right, here we go again. A brainy dweller of academia's ivory tower descends from on high with a brilliant practical solution to the big squeeze through which the record industry is suffering. So many times, these blindingly simple solutions have been proposed and debunked already in the real world. In this case: Sandy Pearlman of McGill University in Canada. Speaking at a conference in Toronto, Professor Pearlman suggested that all recorded music be placed online, indexed by a robust search engine, and sold at five cents per song (not sure what he thinks about classical music—20 cents for a symphony?). The result would be much more music sold for much less money, and Pearlman's calculations indicate that everyone would come out way ahead.

Actually, I think he might be right, and the simultaneous devaluation and globalization of music content is certainly the trend, notwithstanding the labels' attempt to raise prices at the already ridiculously expensive iTMS. But Pearlmans' short-sightedness comes into play when he naively assumes that all the competing rights-holders would agree to the scheme (labels, authors, publishers, performers), or that any artist should be forced to accept a mandated price for a recording. (Statutory licensing does exist for certain types of performances, of course, such as Webcasting.)

Pearlman also suggests adding a one-percent surcharge on ISP charges and new-computer sales, pooling this money as music-industry revenue. But if revenue is to be pooled at the gateways to the Internet, why should music companies get all of it? How do Hollywood, TV production companies, software companies, and porn distributors fit in?

(Thanks to John Parres for the link.)