MAROON 5, TRAVIS SCOTT and BIG BOI performed essentially for free at the SUPER BOWL (but hey, think of the exposure, dudes) (no, not that exposure), but their colleagues who licensed songs to the commercials made no such deal. Those syncs pay in exposure plus oodles of cash. Up to a million bucks for the publishing on a A-list tune and up to another million bucks for the master, even for just a few seconds of the song, BILLBOARD reports. Which means that $10 million-ish PEPSI spot featuring 8 seconds of "I LIKE IT" might have cost more like $12 million-ish, and that's before you've paid CARDI B or anyone else to actually be in the ad. I know what you're thinking: Wow, $00.00331 per SPOTIFY stream looks like a really, really bad payout compared to that. But of course, as digital services love to argue, only one person is listening to that Spotify stream, whereas the Super Bowl had an audience of 98 million. And if 98 million people streamed that song one time each on Spotify, at that per-stream rate, suddenly the payout would be a respectable $324,380. Add in the millions more people who'll see the ad on YOUTUBE or when it plays on TV again and the per-eyeball rates are getting even closer. And there's this: Spotify pays in cultural exposure, too. Remove "I Like It" from a year's worth of Spotify (and APPLE and YOUTUBE and TIDAL) playlists, and maybe Pepsi doesn't want to spend one or two million bucks on it anymore. So that's part of what streaming is worth, too. At least for some artists. Consider this a pro-digital public service announcement. Today I'm here to tell you a third of a penny per stream might not be such a bad payout. Tomorrow I may set out to prove myself wrong... Meanwhile, in the continuing effort to make sure everyone who's owed a third of a penny gets a third of a penny, the NATIONAL MUSIC PUBLISHERS ASSOCIATION, which is hoping to run the new Mechanical Licensing Collective created by the MUSIC MODERNIZATION ACT, has launched a website for its proposed collective, appointed board members (including songwriter activists DAVID LOWERY and KAY HANLEY) and revealed endorsements for its pitch from across the label and publishing worlds. At least one other group, spearheaded by the POLICE's STEWART COPELAND and SONGWRITERS GUILD OF AMERICA president (and country songwriter) RICK CARNES, is pitching to administer mechanical licensing under the MMA. The US COPYRIGHT OFFICE has the final say on who gets the gig... Mastering, minus the mastering engineer... Yes, singers are "musicians"... Yes, you have a Constitutionally protected right to fire your drummer, at least according to a California appeals court... Owner of Canada's SUNRISE RECORDS buys, saves HMV... Recent TINY DESK concerts: CAT POWER. BLOOD ORANGE. BUDDY... RIP DON GRIERSON and KIYOSHI KOYAMA.