Wow -- SoundExchange Does Something Reasonable, Says It Won't Enforce New Webcast Royalties Yet
from the now-here's-a-change dept
On Thursday, an appeals court denied a stay of the new (and significantly increased) royalty rates webcasters would have to pay to stream music online. However, as pointed out in the comments on that post, a Wired blog reports that SoundExchange says it's won't enforce the new rates as discussions/negotiations with webcasters continue. The founder of streaming service Pandora says that this development came about as a direct result of Congressional lobbying by webcasters and their listeners -- and hopefully those efforts will lead Congress to take a look at the proposed legislation that would establish much more realistic royalty rates. However, this shouldn't be seen as a victory for webcasters. It's not clear if the SoundExchange reprieve applies to webcasters that aren't part of the Copyright Royalty Board hearings, or what will happen if negotiations don't produce an acceptable outcome for SoundExchange and its RIAA friends -- a demand for retroactive payments would seem the most likely outcome. In any case, internet radio won't die Sunday night; hopefully the reprieve will give a reasonable solution a chance to surface.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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not yet ?
but i bet they'll start gathering data from day one, and later on they'll use it as "evidence" for suing. It's the classic R.I.Ass A. business model these days. Or should i call it racketeering model ?
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You can bet on retroactive...
And since the recording industry likes to claim they are doing this in the name of the artists I wonder if the artists have a hand in these negotiations. I doubt it.
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and it keeps adding up
Let these guys know where we stand. Let them know that, if they do this, we will turn off our radios, and tell everyone else to turn off theirs. And let the advertisers in our area, the local radio stations and anyone else that will listen that we WILL NOT listen to anyone that uses such methods.
I, for one, have plenty of mp3 and CD's to listen to.
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Re: and it keeps adding up
All that will do is hurt local radio stations and local businesses who advertise on the radio stations. And obviously the royalty companies still get paid whether or not the radio stations suffer.
I do like Pandora radio though, I listen to it everyday commercial free. I hope they don't go under because of unrealistic royalties.
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Problem
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it's just a matter of time
as for soundexchange, they are only doing this in a thinly veiled attempt to head off likely congressional legislation which will tie their hands and force an equitable compormise.
while I hate to see the "government" get involved in what is normally a free market issue (if we had a truly free market we wouldn't even be having this discussion), in this case I fully support the proposed legislation (Internet Radio Equality Act) as I don't believe that soundexchange will ever agree to anything reasonable - their goal is unquestionably to have total control (fiscally and programmatically) over all these stations and if the stations won't submit, then they will do everything to shut them down.
so, please contact your legislators and urge them, respectfully, of course, to please support the Internet Radio Equality Act.
*stepping down from soapbox now*
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Can't have any innovation unless it's from big corporations or big government. So much for "Freedom", it's just another nail in it's coffin.
I certainly hope they like the world they are creating.
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Perhaps this is not a Problem, but an Opportunity.
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Re: Perhaps this is not a Problem, but an Opportun
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listen to the world
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Re: listen to the world
Just because we only hear about strong arming in the US does not mean that it is not happening elsewhere.
If the RIAA had its way it would get a cut of broadcasts from internation sites (mind you the RIAA would have nothing to do with this internation music but would expect to get a cut of it anyway) as well.
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the true irony
according to the shill, new rates would be set for satellite, internet and terrestrial, which have typically been set at $0.0000 per song per listener... because, up to this point, the industry has seen terrestrial radio as a vessel to market new music.
not only were radio stations not being charged anything to play the songs, there was that whole payola scandal where labels were getting busted for paying radio stations to play certain songs... this new idea says that money should be flowing the opposite way.
confused? me too.
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Re: the true irony
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Irony is the word of the day
Stop people from getting access to music and you get less sales.
Stop people from wanting to purchase music and you get less sales.
Stop competing with every other form of entertainment and you get less sale.
Like Ouborous eating it's own tail.
Jon
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Royalties
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Royalties
Can you do anything to put a stop to the dishoest piracy.
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vampires and the RIAA
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fairs fair
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