Music Streaming PSA

Christofer Smith • November 3, 2025

A campaign poster taking a stance against music streaming, Christofer Smith, 2025

My Commentary

Hey there! I wanted to point out some of the behind-the-scenes decisions that made this PSA feel more akin to an actual campaign.

Colors

The biggest piece of any poster that immediately catches the audience's eye is color. I wanted to keep it simple, as anything too bright would detract from the main message. The blue was chosen early in production, meant to model Amazon Prime, but as the actual project evolved to focus on music streaming specifically, the simplistic blue stayed. A YouTube-reminiscent red was chosen to draw the eye to the two most important stylistic details — the Access Denied bar, and the Call to Action. White was chosen to make the word DON'T stand out while also allowing the Call to Action bar and some text to remain visually distinct. The last color, a slightly golden yellow, was used to make statistics and quotes stand out — no other color would have worked nearly as nicely.

Font

The font that dominates the composition (and is the same font as this webpage) is bolded Poppins. Using a sans-serif font was important for legibility, and the size of every word is directly tied to its importance in the frame. This is why the top slogan and the Call to Action bar use the largest text, as well as the 75% of Americans text being larger than the rest. On the phone screen, Roboto was used, as this is the standard web font that Google (and by extension, YouTube Music) utilizes.

Layout

Pretty early on, I figured that I wanted a large section of the top of the frame to say YOU DON'T OWN THIS, as it would be eye-grabbing and legible from much farther than my astigmatic eyes could read. Similarly, I knew the bottom would be the Call to Action, since you would reach the bottom of the composition only after reading everything above it. The phone came next, and with it seeming to make more sense on the left side, facts and statistics took the right.

The Phone

This was my favorite part to workshop, with me doing a couple of rounds of A/B testing with my mom and a friend. The phone was meant to have the aspect ratio and home button of a device before the glass slabs of today, as it would make the "phone" part more obvious, despite being dated. Next came the design of the streaming app UI. It had to not be tied to any one streaming platform in particular, as that would defeat the message, so the top rounded buttons and search bar were based on YouTube Music while the blocky genre selectors came from Spotify. The locks placed on the visible cover art were designed to not obscure the art, but rather, allow you to stil see it — thereby reiterating the fact that you can see that you really don't own anything. The choice to use real song titles and album art was, in my opinion, the most deliberately-made decision of the entire production process: by using real songs and not generic blank slates, it allows the audience, you, to see that real songs are at stake.. that it could be your favorite songs up there, locked behind a paywall. It is worth noting, however, that the songs you see are actually copyright-free tracks that I've used as background music before. Just a neat little thing. The Access Denied and Subscribe bar came as a result of needing a way to tie this all back to corporate interests — they want your money, after all.

The Facts

The part of this assignment that mattered most to my AP Lang teacher was the use of strong evidence to support my clams (see, I even sound like her!), so I wanted to develop a line of reasoning that goes like this: you are included in something, that thing is a problem, evidence of the problem, call to action. Coincedentally, the weekend before we were assigned this, I bought a hardcover copy of Liz Pelly's Mood Machine, and it worked out perfectly, as the powerful quote you see up there was included within the introduction of her research. Good read, too! I recommend it if you're interested in how the music economy is being shaped today.

Works Cited

Kays, Adam J. The Sound of Disruption: The Effects of Music Streaming Services and Technological Change on the Music Industry. 25 Apr. 2025, p. 17, https://red.library.usd.edu/honors-thesis/365/. Accessed 3 Nov. 2025.

Pelly, Liz. Mood Machine. Simon and Schuster, 2025, pp. ix–xi.

Richter, Felix. “Physical Music Is Endangered.” Statista, Ströer, 11 Apr. 2025, https://www.statista.com/chart/28016/share-of-respondents-not-listening-to-music-from-physical-media/. Accessed 2 Nov. 2025.

Song, Jonah. “The Evolution and Impact of Streaming Services: Changing the Media Landscape.” Global Media Journal, vol. 22, no. 72, Dec. 2024, p. 2, https://www.globalmediajournal.com/open-access/the-evolution-and-impact-of-streaming-services-changing-the-media-landscape.pdf. Accessed 31 Oct. 2025.

Page updated

Google Sites

Report abuse