ACT 2. The Tariff, The Tune and The Truth Bomb

The Plot to Save the Soul of (the music) Business

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INT. CONGRESSIONAL HEARING ROOM – DAY

Cold. Ceremonial. Its stillness broken by the quiet shuffle of papers and low murmur of aides and legal counsel. Behind the dais, a semicircle of SENATORS.

SENATOR WEXLER, Committee Chair. Late 60s. He taps his mic.

SENATOR WEXLER
Mr. Nash, for the record, please state your name and professional background.

A sharply dressed FORBES NASH JR. leans into a microphone.

FORBES NASH JR.
My name is Forbes Nash Jr. I was the CMO of a company I’ll henceforth be referring to as ‘disgracebook’.

A few muffled laughs from the gallery.

SENATOR WEXLER
Mr. Nash, during your time as Chief Marketing Officer—

FORBES NASH JR.
Correction, Senator. Not Marketing. Chief Manipulation Officer.

The gallery erupts—laughter echoing off the marble walls. Even a few aides stifle grins.

SENATOR WEXLER (banging gavel)
Order. This is a formal hearing, not open mic night at the Apollo.

He leans forward.

SENATOR WEXLER
Mr. Nash, help this committee understand: how does your experience in social media qualify you to speak on the issue of fair compensation for creative labor?

FORBES NASH JR.
I designed the algorithms that turn attention into currency. Culture into collateral. That same system now reroutes the profits of art to the hands of shareholders who had no hand in its creation. While the real power belongs to society’s true stakeholders: the creators.

The gallery’s intrigued. The senators, bankrolled by the monopolies in question, less so.

SENATOR WEXLER (skeptical; dismissive)
And how do you propose to do that, Mr. Nash?

FORBES NASH JR.
It starts with a question. An opportunity, really… How do we save the music industry, finally make Spotify give a sh*t, all while paying down the national debt?

Now it’s the Senator’s turn to lean forward, intrigued.

FORBES NASH JR.
We tariff the algorithms.

Cut to: MONTAGE — A CHORUS of AMERICAN MUSICIANS
Testify before Congress on C-SPAN, like war veterans from a forgotten battlefield.

-BIG WALTER, 78 year old bluesman from the Delta, grips the mic.

BIG WALTER
I had 1.2 million listens on Spotify last year. I made $2.87. Tell me how the hell soul music, and the soul of this country, got licensed to the highest bidder?

-LENA MESA, 36 year old session musician, testifies.

LENA MESA
My voice is used to train AI models that I didn’t consent to—and that now compete with me for gigs. They call it innovation. I call it theft.

-SIENA RUE, 25 year old, pop artist and TikTok star, speaks.

SIENA RUE
Three million streams a month, and I still can’t afford a dentist—if algorithms make the money, why don’t they pay the bill?

The C-SPAN cam pans over the gallery and senators, all moved.

FORBES (V.O.)
Let’s get real. America may have lost the manufacturing war, the textile war, the artisanal pickle war—but dammit, we still own music, movies, memes, and middle-aged writers.

The CSPAN feed glitches. Channel changes. A CABLE NEWS BROADCAST cuts in.

ANCHOR (V.O.)
BREAKING: The White House is considering a new Byte Tax. Foreign companies using American-made algorithms, IP, or musical notes will face a 30% tariff… unless they pay artists. In cash. Company shares. Or an honest contract written in plain English.

INT. SONGA RECORDING STUDIO – NIGHT

WYOMING, Forbes’s half-brother in his fifties, who abandoned a capitalist empire to change the very system he left behind, leans over the sound mixing booth toward Forbes.

WYOMING
You think tech bros are gonna pay for art?

FORBES
No. But if they don’t, we’re going to slow their streaming speeds to 1997 levels.

INT. MIDDLE AMERICA FAMILY HOME - BEDROOM - NIGHT

The flickering glow of a smartphone screen illuminates a 13 year-old TEENAGER lying in bed, his worried face staring at the endlessly spinning Spotify wheel.

TEENAGER (yelling out)
Mom, why is Spotify buffering?!

MOM pops her head into the bedroom.

MOM
Because America’s finally standing up for musicians, sweetheart!

Teenager sets his i-Phone down on his nightstand.

MOM
That means your dad’s not stuck gigging all the time.
More money means more live shows—and more time with us.

PATRIOTIC MUSIC swells. Eagles cry. Teenager joins his mom in the living room as they ready to spend an evening together. As we hear…

FORBES (V.O.)
This isn’t just about royalties. This is about justice. For every jazz player, gospel grandma, folk weirdo, and indie kid who got 100,000 plays and couldn’t buy a burrito.

INT. SONGA HEADQUARTERS – WAR ROOM

Cluttered hive of creativity and strategy. Whiteboards burst with equations, diagrams, and cryptic notes. Monitors flicker with data streams and legal briefs. At the center, a massive screen reads:

Operation: Save the Soul of the Music Business

Forbes sits on a chair, speaking into a Songa headquarters camera:

FORBES
Welcome to SONGA—where social media makes us more social, not less.
We don’t just manipulate media. We rewire it. With heart.

Forbes’ collaborators enter the room, getting to work. He smirks.

FORBES
Along with a team of multidisciplinary artists, rogue economists, conscious capitalists, healing clinicians, copyright lawyers… and overworked baristas.

SMACH CUT TO:

THE DISCLAIMER

What you just read may sound like fiction.

But try telling that to the 73-year-old funk bassist who made less money than a middle schooler selling slime on TikTok.

This plot is real.

And it’s just getting started.

Join the Resistance @ The xBillionaires.org

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Meet some of the other minds shaping this movement:

🎧 Lewis Blews — musical producer at The "Happy" Musician
🏕️ Wyoming — my brother and resident myth-maker at The Millionaire’s Campfire
✍️ Jack Ebstein — the screenwriter chronicling The World of Songa

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