Days of Silence
There's still time to save U.S.-based radio on the Net. Right now I see four ways:
Yesterday was a Day of Silence for thousands of U.S.-based Internet radio stations that make their livings playing music. It wasn't the first. That one happened back on May 1, 2002, following a decision by Copyright Arbitration Royalty Panel (CARP) to impose a set of royalty rates that threatened to put many stations out of business. That November, guided by retiring senator Jesse Helms (no doubt acting to protect his friends in the religioius broadcasting community), the Small Webcaster Settlement Act was passed. This gave surviving stations enough breathing room to stay alive and grow over the next few years.
So, you might say, the Day of Silence worked. Or at least helped.
That was the idea this time around as well — only now all U.S.-based stations are effected, including noncommercial ones associated with the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which had negotiated their own deal or "carve out" with the recording industry the first time around. Both Days of Silence were organized by Kurt Hanson of RAIN (Radio And Internet Newsletter), which has been covering the topic like a rug for the last six years or more.
A piece titled Internet Radio on Death Row detailed the whole matter back in March. To sum it up, the Copyright Royalty Board (CARP's replacement) weighed cases made by both webcasters and SoundExchange (the body that collects royalties), and sided almost entirely with SoundExchang. It set July 16 of this year as the deadline not only for stations to start paying the new higher royalty rates (which will continue to increase through 2010), but to pay retroactive fees as well.
With help from PRX.org and Jake Shapiro (Executive Director of PRX, guitarist with Two Ton Shoe and a fellow Fellow of mine at Harvard's Berkman Center), KCRW has been is running interviews with Internet radio notables (including Kurt) throughout the day. Running in the credits are PRX.org (see here) and its executive director (and fellow Berkman Fellow), Jake Shapiro. (Jake is also a rock star with the band Two Ton Shoe.)
Today thousands of Internet radio stations are observing a Day of Silence to bring attention to the death sentence they face when new royalty rates come into effect on July 16.
| The day is organized by Kurt Hanson of RAIN (Radio And Internet Newsletter) and led by KCRW in Los Angeles, which is running interviews with Internet radio notables (including Kurt) throughout the day. Running in the credits are PRX.org (see here) and its executive director (and fellow Berkman Fellow), Jake Shapiro. (Jake is also a rock star with the band Two Ton Shoe.) |
| I'm writing something up about this for Linux Journal right now. Meanwhile check out the above links, plus BagelRadio, Radio Paradise, SaveNetRadio, SomaFM, YahooLaunchcast, Pandora, WCPE, Live365, NPR and links at any of those places. |
| By the way, these royalty rates apply to music licensed through the RIAA. (That would be most of the music you know.) Music licensed differently (for example through Creative Commons) is not effected. |
Internet Radio has been on Death Row for going on nine years now. It was first sentenced by the DMCA in October 1998, which required "the initiation of voluntary negotiation proceedings for the purpose of determining reasonable terms and rates of royalty payments for public performances of sound recordings by means of eligible nonsubscription transmissions and transmissions by new subscription services"