The Math You’ve Been Writing About
An Open Letter to Tim Ingham
Dear Mr. Ingham,
You’ve spent a decade documenting who gets paid in music — and who doesn’t. The streaming economics. The label margins. The songwriter royalties that come out to fractions of pennies. You’ve shown the numbers, over and over, and the numbers are damning.
I’ve read your work. I built something based on it.
The Problem You’ve Quantified
In your Rolling Stone columns and at Music Business Worldwide, you’ve tracked exactly how revenue flows through the music industry: what percentage goes to labels, what goes to publishers, what goes to PROs, what gets lost in “administrative fees,” and what finally trickles down to the people who actually made the music.
Your reporting has shown that the system isn’t broken — it’s working exactly as designed. It’s designed to extract value from creators and concentrate it elsewhere.
I took that analysis seriously. And I asked: what would a system look like if it were designed the other way?
What We Built
Liana Banyan is a platform cooperative with a music licensing initiative built on transparent economics:
Cost + 20%. That’s the platform margin. Fixed. Published. Non-negotiable.
Everything else goes to the creators. No hidden fees. No “recoupment” games. No intermediaries taking cuts before artists see a dime.
Here’s how it works:
- Artists set their own licensing rates
- Splits are coded at the point of upload — collaborators, producers, songwriters all get paid automatically
- Every transaction is recorded on-chain, independently verifiable
- Ownership never transfers. Licensing a song doesn’t mean losing it.
We’ve already processed our first transaction: Bruck’lyn’s “Moonshot” for our launch video. They kept 83%+ of the payment. The license terms are on the blockchain. Anyone can verify it.
Why I’m Writing You
Not for coverage. Not yet.
I want you to tear this apart.
You understand the economics of music better than almost anyone writing about it. You know where the money actually goes, where artists get screwed, and what the industry would say to dismiss something like this.
I want to know what I’m missing. Where does this model fail? What am I not seeing that you’ve seen a hundred times?
If the math holds up, I’d welcome your scrutiny in public. If it doesn’t, I’d rather know now.
The Specific Ask
- Review the economics. Full breakdown at Cephas.LianaBanyan.org
- Tell me what breaks. Industry dynamics, regulatory issues, adoption barriers — where does this fall apart?
- If it survives your analysis — consider whether it’s worth writing about.
The music industry has been moving pennies around a plate for years. You wrote that. I’m proposing a different plate.
Jonathan Jones Founding Manager, Liana Banyan Corporation November 2025
P.S. — You once wrote that the streaming royalty debate “misses the point.” I think I found the point. I’d like to know if you agree.
406-578-1232 Support@LianaBanyan.org