Help save Internet radio and streaming

[Spudman]

Apparently there is pending legislation to make every streamer pay royalties.

This would kill much of Internet radio who's stations operate on shoestring budgets. We as listeners would loose a lot should this pass. All those classic gems that we never get to hear on mainstream radio, but are played on the Internet, would disappear.

Please help save Internet radio!

http://www.savethestreams.org/

[sunvalleylaw]

Yep, doin it now. I love my internet stations. I mostly play the iTunes ones, just cause I know them, but like a lot of the other stream links posted here too. It makes me so mad that the money folks control so much. We have power too though.

[Spudman]

Hey!
Everybody on this forum needs to sign this petition. The greed machine will take away all free music from the Internet unless we all pitch in. I personally don't want to see this happen. If it does then all those stations that play your music, your friends music and the band that your neighbor, cousin, old classmate etc. is in will be gone. WE CAN'T LET THIS HAPPEN!

Please sign it. It is the gold box at the top right.

http://www.savethestreams.org/

[tot_Ou_tard]

Will do, I hope it does some good.

[Spudman]

Thanks tOt.

Who else? Come on people. Step up and be heard.

I signed.

[t_ross33]

Doesn't look like it'll do any good for a Canuck to sign up :( But I got yer back, brothers!

STICK IT TO THE MAN! :R POWER TO THE PEOPLE :R

hope that helps

[Spudman]

Labatts to you t_ross.:DR You're a good man to watch our backs.

Any Yanks want to save their future?

[sunvalleylaw]

Here is a link to Rain, a site by KurtHanson.com that supports this fight. Today's newsletter sets forth and then discusses the views of those supporting the higher royalties.

http://www.kurthanson.com/archive/news/031907/index.shtml

If you are in the United States and listen to internet radio, please take a few minutes and educate yourself, then choose to sign the petition or not as you see fit.

[Spudman]

Judging by the replies to this post, I'm guessing that not many of you are checking this out.

Please do. It's really important and will affect us greatly as musicians and music lovers.

Please be sure to sign the petition.

[SuperSwede]

I would gladly sign up if it were available to users abroad. I listen a lot to internet radio, and most of my fav channels are from the US.

[Spudman]

So it's up to us Mericans to get er done.
Thanks SS.

[marnold]

Even though I'm not a big fan of NPR, it appears that they are getting quite worked up about this, as is Clear Channel. Clear Channel has all the money and NPR has all the hippies so hopefully they can get these rates reconsidered.

[sunvalleylaw]

So it's up to us Mericans to get er done.
Thanks SS.

Yeah, I was thinking about that. I am not sure how this legislation would affect a site that originates outside of the United States. One of the stations I listen to once in a while is a Dutch alternative station I found in the iTunes list of stations. I don't see how the US legislation will hurt them. Still, US college radio stations are favorites of mine, along with lots of other smaller independents. It is still wrong.

[sunvalleylaw]

Here is a link to a fun college jazz station I listen to during the day. It is from Pacific Luthern University, a school near where I grew up. It plays both known jazz artists, and local jazz artists from the Pacific Northwest. I hope it stays online.

https://secure.kplu.org/whatson/indexlisten.cgi

I normally access through iTunes, but I posted this link for those that don't do the iTune thing. :)

[sunvalleylaw]

This in from a friend of mine in the music industry I emailed about this issue:

NPR Motion Seeks Rehearing of Streaming-Royalty Rates

National Public Radio has filed a motion for rehearing of the Copyright Royalty Board's recently set streaming royalty rates that forces smaller webcasters and public outlets into a per-stream rate for each song. In the 9-page document filed this afternoon, NPR says the new rates will multiply its license costs several-fold, making its make cost-prohibitive.

According to the motion, NPR says the revised rate structure would make impossible "any systematic effort on NPR's part to continue its prior commitments to enhance online music discovery and education opportunities for its listeners and to provide more exposure for emerging and non-mainstream artists via streaming."

The Small Webcasters Settlement Act, which let small webcasters pay a percentage of revenue, expired in 2005. With the CRB now deciding new rates for 2006-2010, commercial webcast and simulcast rates were set at $0.0008 per stream (up from about $0.0007), with a minimum of $500 per year for each channel or station. NPR called the $500 minimum "an arbitrary and insupportable annual minimum fee."

According to NPR VP/Communications Andi Sporkin, "The board's decision to dramatically raise public radio stations' rates was based on inaccurate assumptions and lack of understanding of the issues. The new rates inexplicably break with the longstanding tradition of recognizing public radio's non-commercial, non-profit role, while the procedures we're being asked to now undertake for measurement are non-existent, arbitrary and costly."

She continued, "In its decision, the Board has attempted to equate public radio with commercial radio, which we are not. Instead, public radio is driven by a public service mission on behalf of underserved and unserved audiences; in our Internet music efforts, those audiences include both listeners and the music community that seeks public radio to reach those listeners. We hope the Board will reconsider."

NPR also says the motion is the first step in its efforts to reverse the decision, and it will be followed by an appeal of the Board's decision to be filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.

AND

The Copyright Royalty Board announced late yesterday it is considering "Motions for Rehearing" filed by various parties affected by the Board's recent webcast royalty determination.

Previously, both Radio & Records and CNet News had mistakenly reported that a rehearing had been granted by the CRB in the royalty rate case. While it is promising that the Board is agreeing to hear motions, no rehearing has been granted at this time.

Many advocates of Internet radio see the decision to hear motions as a "first step" toward the resolution of problematic issues surrounding the royalty rate decision.

In a brief issued yesterday afternoon [.pdf], ChiefCopyright Royalty Judge James Scott Sledge wrote that crbthe Board "desires to hear the positions of each party on each of the issues raised in these motions." The brief also notes that the responses to the motion must be filed by April 2nd.

Since the CRB's March 2nd announcement of the proposed royalty rates there has been a swift and massively negative response to the decision stson behalf of journalists, advocates, webcasters and listeners alike.

Over the past number of days, tens of thousands of fans have poured into petition signing sites like SaveTheStreams.org and SaveOurInternetRadio.com, while press outlets from the Wall Street Journal to Salon.com have been quick to give the issue a continuing spotlight.

Should be interesting.

by the way check out our online radio station at www.americanaroots.com, click on Roots Radio and then Listen Now in the drop down box.

See ya.

Ray

[Spudman]

Thanks to all who wrote or called their congresmen.


Online Radio Is Saved (for Now); SoundExchange Will Not Enforce New Royalty
Rates on Sunday

By Eliot Van Buskirk (Wired) July 12, 2007

At thursdays's Congressional hearing about the new rates for online radio
that would essentially destroy it (as readers of this blog already know),
SoundExchange, which was scheduled to receive the new royalty payments on Monday
morning (since the enforcement date falls on a Sunday), made a startling
statement.

The SoundExchange executive [Jon Simson, executive director] promised -- in
front of Congress -- that SoundExchange will NOT enforce the new royalty
rates.? Webcasters will stay online, as new rates are hammered out.

I just spoke with Pandora founder Tim Westergren, who expressed relief that
Pandora wouldn't have to shut down on Sunday in response to the new rates.? He
said, "It was getting pretty close.? I always had underlying optimism that
sanity was going to prevail, but I was beginning to wonder."

He said everyone who called their Congress person about this should feel that
they had an effect on the process: "This is a direct result of lobbying
pressure, so if anyone thinks their call didn't matter, it did.? That's why this is
happening."? The flyer DiMA distributed to Congress today probably helped a
bit too, but overall, it appears Congress intervened due to pressure from web
radio listeners.

Funnily enough, Westergren told me this mere hours after a representative of
SoundExchange said that the new rates are "etched in stone."? Evidently not.

-----

Update: Another source -- close to the situation although not inside today's
closed-door hearing? -- confirmed the following: Pandora was there; "progress
was made"; the minimum fees are indeed off the table; and SoundExchange and
the webcasters that were part of the Copyright Royalty Board hearings are going
to have another chat about the rates.

However, the source said the big question right now is whether webcasters not
part of the CRB hearing might still have to pay the rates set by the board,
minus the minimum fees. Basically, this news qualifies as a reprieve, but
internet radio won't be truly saved until negotiations result in a workable royalty
rate.

------
Another Update: This story has been confirmed by Kurt Hanson of RAIN.

Westergren had more to say, lending insight into a process that was largely
opaque to non-participants.? Apparently, the per-channel minimum fees mandated
by the Copyright Royalty Board were never taken very seriously by those
involved.? They've now been taken off the table completely, saving Pandora, Live365,
and other multicasters from their most imminent threat.? Instead, per-station
minimums will be capped at $50,000 per year.

"No one thought those per station fees were remotely rational.? It only makes
sense that they're being taken off the table."

As for the Copyright Royalty Board?? They're entirely cut out of the process,
having set the rates and then refused a rehearing.? Going forward without the
royalties being collected, SoundExchange and webcasters will negotiate a new
royalty rate with Congress looking over their shoulder -- "and last but not
least, the public looking over Congress's shoulder."? Alternatively, Congress
now has time to consider the Internet Radio Equality Act, which would set
webcaster royalties at 7.5 percent of revenue and allow them to continue operating
pretty much as they have been.

Either way, this is a big win for webcasters and their listeners.? Again,
this is a reprieve, and internet radio can't be considered saved until new rates
are set that everyone can live with.

[SuperSwede]

Spud, thanks for the update.
I wonder if they will also realize that the internet is a global phenomenon and open up sites like Pandora for non-US listeners again.

[sunvalleylaw]

Cool! But it's not over til it's over! A follow up letter at least is in order for me.