I have said for the past 10 years or so that I would gladly pay a small fee directly to an entertainer instead of having them get an even smaller fee from a middle-man. For example, torrent the latest Rush album + give the band $5 directly = everyone (who matters) is happy. I have the satisfaction of supporting my favorite artist and Rush has quite a few more $$$s directly in their pocket.
All we have to do if find a way to send money directly to an entertainer and keep the (MP|RI)AA off our backs. Maybe this would be a good startup idea. Provide a "Pay Me" button (implemented with Stripe :) for artists to stick on their site. Joe consumer torrents their work then visits their site and clicks the button. Neat and easy. Of course, then you become the middle-man...
I started out with that idea (adding a "contribute to me" button), and tried to validate it.
It turns out that the people I approached weren't interested in a service to accept contributions if said service had significant fees, and I couldn't find a way to make those cheaper (moving money has a significant cost) and couldn't compete with Paypal Donate.
I still believe there's a market for it (you're an example :) ), but it's going to be tough to convince the content owners.
All we have to do if find a way to send money directly to an entertainer and keep the (MP|RI)AA off our backs. Maybe this would be a good startup idea. Provide a "Pay Me" button (implemented with Stripe :) for artists to stick on their site. Joe consumer torrents their work then visits their site and clicks the button. Neat and easy. Of course, then you become the middle-man...