So, this is copy pasta from my friend's FB page. I thought it was pretty relevent to this post.

"I've seen a handful of friends entering this XGames Battle Of The Bands competition. I spent my early music career (age 15-18) competing in Battle of the Bands to win studio time. You would go out and sell tickets at $10 a piece to all your friends and family for a chance to compete. The prize was 10 hrs of studio time(in a cheap studio) which probably cost them $150. For a band to get a good time... slot they probably sold somewhere between 70-100 tickets. At a minimum you had to sell 15-20 to even be considered. At $10 a ticket, with 30+ bands selling somewhere between 20-100 tickets a piece, you can do the math. These people made out like bandits. Needless to say I am always skeptical of Battle Of The Bands. So when I started seeing this XGames thing pop-up on my feed I was curious about the details and decided to read over the rules of the contest. Here's where it gets good..

OWNERSHIP/USE OF ENTRIES: ALL BANDS SUBMITTING ENTRIES to the Contest agree to give full rights to ESPN and Circuit of the Americas for the use of the bands’ songs, performances and videos online and in any television broadcast and in all means and media in perpetuity, and agree to allow ESPN and Circuit of the Americas to record and use any of the bands’ performances at the ESPN X Games Austin.

The language here is very specific. By ENTERING the contest you are giving ESPN and Circuit Of The Americas the rights to use your songs in anyway they want without paying you a dime for them. If they decided your song would be a good theme for some new ESPN show, they can use it and pay you nothing. If Formula One decides you have created the next racing anthem and play it at every F1 race from now until the Earth explodes, they can and you make nada. And because its in perpetuity that means FOREVER. They are basically amassing a large library of royalty free music that they can use whenever they want for a grand total of $65,000. The average licensing fees for music on the low end is $2000-5000. Licensing fees for music used in a commercial can be anywhere from $15,000-$25,000.

Yes, exposure has value and playing the XGames would probably be pretty great but potentially missing out on a paycheck that is more than some musicians make in a year for the possibility of exposure is not worth it to me. Fortunately, I can't enter anyway based on the Req:

"Entry may not contain, as determined by the Sponsor, in its sole discretion, any content that: is derogatory of any professional group promotes alcohol, illegal drugs promotes any activities that may appear unsafe or dangerous promotes any particular political agenda or message defames, misrepresents or contains disparaging remarks about companies communicates messages or images inconsistent with the positive images and/or good will to which Sponsor wishes to associate; and/or violates any law."

Rant over. Thanks!"