So, you’ve got a band with a catchy little song, and maybe even a decent little video you can post on YouTube to pique viewer interest. Now all you have to do is sit back and wait for the money to roll in, right? Think again, my pathetically callow friend. I suggest you learn from the experience of Pete Waterman, who co-wrote perhaps the most overplayed song of all time. (At this point I really ought to throw in a link that would roll you to a link which proves to be horribly misleading and disappointing, but I think we’ve all grown past that.) Waterman noticed that the video for “Never Gonna Give You Up” had been viewed–briefly–by roughly 154 million gullible yokels, and figured YouTube owed him a hefty royalty check. So his agent contacted YouTube, and guess what? Waterman got Rickrolled:

There was I sitting at Christmas thinking, ‘I must have made a few [shillings] this year with the old Rickrolling,’” said Waterman. “I rang my publisher and they said ‘You’ll be all right,’ until I saw the royalty statement: £s;11 [approximately $16].”

This works out to a pound for every 14 million views, which makes YouTube the online equivalent of a Nike sweatshop in Burkina Faso. Minus the daycare facilities. A spokesthing for YouTube assured everyone that YouTube is committed to resolving this problem in a way that respects artists’ rights to compensation for the use of their material, but in the meantime those hoping to strike it rich online should probably pass up YouTube in favor of something less iffy, like selling herbal penis enlargement supplements.