Yoshiki Talks Streaming

Following his performance, he held a press conference where he was asked if he would participate in hip-hop mogul Jay Z’s premium streaming service, Tidal.

Yoshiki admitted to following the story closely and said, “I’m not sure. As I said [earlier], Internet Service Providers might be the only solution right at this moment because, owned by artists or owned by whoever else, it doesn’t solve the problem. Artists aren’t the only content holders. There’s a lot of people involved in the music creation process.”

Yoshiki’s idea, which has been floated by others, is that ISPs should charge customers “a little more and then allocate that money to content holders.” This model is said to be at odds with principles of net neutrality, and it isn’t likely that ISPs will want to charge additional fees that go directly to all recording artists and producers, regardless of their position in the industry.

But it is a more common position in Japan, where net neutrality isn’t much of an issue.