I recently was in discussion with a number of artists about how they felt that they were gaining little for their music when licensed at some locations online.
I believe the way forward, and what is more useful for businesses needing music, is to have all resources integral to a production process.
So, for example, take a business niche that is looking to promote themselves online
They would need a range of content and help to get a promotion completed. Rather than looking out across the internet for all the components from a range of sources, if they could create the work more effectively without having to search for each component thus avoiding time searching through the different libraries (in this case) and different ways of purchasing.
Whilst businesses such as AudioBlocks ($99 for unlimited downloads) and even small TV channels now using royalty free music I believe there are some opportunities to make repeatable earnings from content artists can produce by leaving the commodity side of the business to race itself to the bottom and go the route of offering higher value services for which music licensing is part of the whole solution to businesses.