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AUSTIN, Texas — “Respect my art.”

Those words from Miami graffiti artist/filmmaker Ahol Sniffs Glue resonated Tuesday at the South by Southwest Music Conference.

The artist was part of a panel discussing how corporations and even other artists (with deeper pockets) “appropriate” street art, from murals to music, to drive their businesses and marketing.

In 2014, Sniffs Glue filed an infringement lawsuit against a retail store that incorporated the artwork from one of his murals into its store design. The $3 billion corporation settled with the artist out of court.

“Get a good lawyer,” the artist said. Sniffs Glue’s lawyer, Andrew Gerber, advised other independent artists to register copyrights for their work (the fee is a mere $35) to avoid or minimize costly litigation. But the deeper issue raised by Sniffs Glue’s plea is one that addresses the whole notion of how easily art can be distributed, abused and monetized in a world ruled by the Internet and its ability to spread images and sound worldwide in an instant.

In another panel addressing the intersection of music and technology, music executive Jennie Sager called the music industry a latecomer to the digital party. “Music conversation is driving” social media platforms such as Twitter, she said. Music has vastly untapped potential to affect countless businesses by drawing audience, spearheading marketing and driving sales, the panelists agreed.

“We have to look at music as a multimedia product,” said Vince Bannon of Getty Images. “In the future we will talk to a flat screen about the music we want and it will have everything available,” including video and other visuals, liner notes and the music itself in a variety of iterations. Music, he said, has always been an “experience,” but only now are corporations figuring out how to exploit digital technology to make money off it.

Former Rdio executive Jim Rondinelli noted the difficulty of developing any kind of music service because of the maze of licensing deals that need to be negotiated, a process that can consume a minimum of 18 months and usually more. The “assigning of economic value” to music remains a huge challenge, especially when “you have 86 countries and each has a different way of seeing the relationship between rights holders” and businesses that want to license those rights.

It goes back to the notion of respecting art. What of the creators? How do they stand to benefit from this potential money-making valhalla, if at all? Answers were not quickly forthcoming.

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