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Not ASCAP,SoundExchange. SoundExchange collect royalties even on non-member music, and hold onto the money until the non-member becomes a member. And if they never become a member, SoundExchange can "expire" the royalty and spend the money however it wants.

My family runs an internet radio service and I have to do the accounting for them each month. The article is referring to the fact that royalty accounting is handled in a way which makes it specifically designed to not work on the internet.

Congress created SoundExchange corporation to make sure that "artists" get paid for internet radio use, however royalties on the net are astronomically higher than broadcast. For a commercial broadcaster, you owe SoundExchange $0.0021 for EACH SONG that EACH USER listens to. It's a royalty of $0.0021 / song*listener. This actually makes it so that your royalty costs scale completely linearly with increasing number of listeners (high variable cost, low fixed cost), which is basically the complete opposite of terrestrial broadcast where your fixed cost is your giant antenna and royalties are estimated and often fudged (high fixed cost, low variable cost). This makes economics of scale much more difficult for the commercial webcaster than the terrestrial broadcaster. With all the influence the RIAA has over Congress it would seem that this was intentional. It seems like a classic case of regulatory capture.

Note that this is IN ADDITION to annual fees that go to performing rights groups such as ASCAP and BMI. Those fees are paid annually, but they are generally lower than the SoundExchange fee.

Perhaps doubters will find SoundExchange's own list of unpaid artists more convincing.

Tell me what is fraudulent about collecting royalties for public performance - 45% of which go straight to the featured artist.

5% to the session players.

50% to the sound recording copyright owner, which can be an Indie label or the artist himself.

Most artists don't get paid anything because they haven't bothered to register.

lol. soundexchange is the fraudulent operation, albeit one abetted by congress.

Tell me what is fraudulent about collecting royalties for public performance - 45% of which go straight to the featured artist.

5% to the session players.

50% to the sound recording copyright owner, which can be an Indie label or the artist himself.

If you want to know who pays royalties to SoundExchange, the full list for 2010 can be found here.

CBS, Clear Channel, Music Choice, Muzak, Pandora and so on. Muzak has been around since 1936.

"Performance Rights" issues - wired and wireless - are nothing new.

One of the first telephone exchanges in the states had an "on demand" phonographic music service in the 1880s.

Subscribers could ask Central to play Edison cylinders over the line for an additional monthly fee.

I remember reading about sound exchange, on how they collect royalty irregardless whether they have any rights to collect the royalty at all.

You remember wrong.

The Library of Congress, as an agent of the Congress of the United States, has authorized SoundExchange as the only group that can administer government sound recording licenses.

General Questions

You do not have to a member of SoundExhange to collect your royalties. You only have to register. Registration and membership are both free.

It is a little more compex for the (unlogged) session player - SoundExchange pays out his share to AFTRA and AFM for distribution.

SoundExchange is a non-profit corporation that collects and distributes the statutory royalties for performances in new media:

- Digital cable and satellite television services (Music Choice and Muzak)
- Non-interactive 'webcasters" (including original programmers and retransmissions of FCC-licensed radio stations by aggregators)
- Satellite radio services.

The split looks like this:

50% to the sound recording copyright owmer.
45% to the featured artist. (which can be a group or ensemble)
5% to non-featured artists.

The payout to date: $614 million.

To about 46,000* registered performers and 6,000 SCROs - an SCRO can be an artist owned "label," of course.

Registration is free, "membership" is free, but membership is not required. SoundExchange

____

* In a population of 300 million, this may give you some notion of what it takes to become a professional musician with significant national exposure.

What does being 'legit' have anything to do with things? We are talking the RIAA here.

We are talking about digital performance rights - and it means that that SoundExchange may have some money for you:

The split:

45% to the lead performer (s)
5% to other performers
50% to the recording's copyright owner.

FAQ: What is a featured artist?

45,619 performers registered
5,881 copyright owners
$537 million dollars distributed.

The 50/50 split between the performing artists and the copyright owner is some light years removed from the Slashdot stereotype.

The performer and the copyright owner can, of course, be one and the same.

"Going legit" makes the IPO possible.

"Going legit" puts the Pandora "app" on every Internet enabled audio and video device sold in the states.

That immeadiately sets you apart from all but a bare handful of the 20,000 or so audio streams accessible through your PC's Internet radio tuner.

Because of draconian content distribution licensing schemes. Buying a license to stream over the internet is probably per-device, so computers require once license to distribute, handhelds/phones need another license fee, set-top boxes need another fee...

That doesn't seem to be correct.

The rates seem to be based on the kind of service you provide and the amount of content you stream.

You'll pay more if you honor specific requests - streaming tiles from a catalog like Rhapsody's. Less if you look more like a radio station - building playlists around user-defined artists or themes. Licensing 101

There does seem to be an "enterprise cap."

The license will be a more or less a fixed and managable expense for something the size of Last.fm or Pandora.

But distribution costs and the general user experience will differ. The Berlin Philharmonic streams its concerts as a commercial free HD video subscription service with audio quality as high as 320 AAC.

You get what you are willing pay for.

You've got it backwards. All stations - Terrestrial and over-the-air - pay royalties to the copyright holder of the song itself. These royalties are paid to organizations like ASCAP and BMI, who then distribute the money to the songwriter. The royalties this article discusses are collected by SoundExchange on behalf of the copyright holder of the "performance" of the song (ie the recording the radio station plays). This copyright is generally held by the record company.

Terrestrial stations have so far been exempt from paying the performance royalties, but it looks like that may change.

I apologize if this is a dumb question but does this whole shitstorm impact Internet radio stations that play only completely independent stuff (ie. non-label content)? Or is SoundExchange trying to extract a pound of flesh from anyone running their own station regardless of what actually plays?

In a word, yes. Technically, *if* the station and artist sign an agreement, and *register* it with SoundExchange, then no royalties will be taken. However, lacking an agreement that is registered with SoundExchange, the station *is* liable for standard royalty payments to SoundExchange, and the artist must then register with SoundExchange to receive said royalties (minus SoundExchange fees).

This places a burden on both stations and artists to manage and archive copies of agreements. There is no central clearinghouse to which independent stations and artists can turn to, to assist in streamlining this process, akin to a 'Indie-SoundExchange'. This might be a good idea, if a way were found to pay for it, and if the RIAA doesn't litigate or legislate it into illegality.

Here's the scoop from the SoundExchange site:

http://www.soundexchange.com/ Click on the "Licensing 101" link in the right-hand column.

Cheers!

Strat

http://www.soundexchange.com/ that is Corp domain not and originations domain.

The Recording Industry Association of America (or RIAA) is a trade group that represents the recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of a large number of private corporate entities such as record labels and distributors, who create and distribute about 90% of recorded music sold in the US. It is involved in a series of controversial copyright infringement legal actions on behalf of its members.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_RIAA_member_l abels

  I am looking studying to be a recording engineer. I want to strive to be fair with my artist.

SoundExchange is an independent, nonprofit performance rights organization that is designated by the U.S. Copyright Office to collect and distribute digital performance royalties for featured recording artists and sound recording copyright owners (usually a record label) when their sound recordings are performed on digital cable and satellite television music, internet and satellite radio (such as XM and Sirius). SoundExchange currently represents over 3,000 record labels and over 20,000 artists. Its members include both signed and unsigned recording artists; small, medium and large independent record companies; and major label groups and artist-owned labels. http://www.soundexchange.com/

  I am looking studying to be a recording engineer. I want to strive to be fair with my artist.

Do you have to be hit by a bus before you learn not to cross against the light?

if I find a piece of music on the Internet and I want to use it in something that I'm creating, how do I know if I can? Who do I contact? What if I don't even know what the song actually is?

One place to begin is with the rights agencies themselves, ASCAP, BMI, SoundExchange, and so on. There you are likely to find FAQs - Licensing 101 - search engines and other resources.

Simple answer, the Copyright Royalty Board gave SoundExchange a legal monopoly which prevents it, so I understand. The broadcasters, in order to avoid paying standard royalties to SoundExchange for some unsigned indie band or artist, must obtain an individual license from each band or artist.

Umm... you *do* realize that your second statement kinda contradicts your first, right? As you say yourself, nothing "prevents" a broadcaster from securing rights with a copyright holder. Yeah, it can be costly and time consuming, but it certainly can be done. And if SoundExchange comes after a broadcaster, just wave the license in their face... they have no legal authority to prosecute (that's up to the copyright holder, who's already agreed to a license), so I fail to see the risk, there.

As such, I'm not at all convinced that the independant artists couldn't form their own NPO to act as a licensing clearinghouse. The problem is it costs money, both in initial startup and long-term administration, and independant artists are, by definition, not what I would call rich.

If the artist and broadcaster doesn't file (hmm..filing fees?) a license, the broadcaster must pay standard royalty to SoundExchange, and the artist or band may collect it, *if* they pay a fee and join SoundExchange.

Umm, no... membership to SoundExchange is free and open to all **sound recording copyright owners (SRCOs) and featured recording artists." Honestly, where the hell is this misinformation coming from? I keep seeing it parotted over and over, but the truth lies a mere Google search away. Are people just that fucking lazy?

First did anyone even watch the Congressional hearin on this matter? Its up on you tube to see what what stated. Second has anyone even looked at Sound Exchanges website? They have offered for any webcaster making under 1.2 Million a year to cap the rates for small webcasters http://www.soundexchange.com/documents/07_06_29%20 Fee%20Cap%20June%2029%20release%20FINAL%20_2_.pdf They are trying to hit the Big webcasters (Yahoo, AOL etc) with this rate increase and are trying to work with the smaller ones and Public Radio. Do I agree with any of the increase, not really, but in the same respect, I can understand why they want to do it. I would much rather see them use the 7.5% of revenues like they do with satellite. Add on that any webcaster can make individual agreements with any label/artist that will allow then to play their songs without touching Sound Exchange. Why are the smaller artists who don't want internet radio to be shut down going to the big stations at least if not the smaller ones and promoting this fact? The one sided look at it all really make me disappointed in a community that has a lot of intelligent people on it. *puts on flame retardant underwear* Go head, flame away, Oh and yes I do DJ for an internet Radio Station that is extremely small (average of about 35 listeners) So I have been watching all of this very closely.

It seems strange that this organization is allowed to collect on other people's work, especially since I've been given to understand that SoundExchange will not pay out royalties to the artist unless the artist in turn pays for a SoundExchange membership...

Umm... who told you membership for artists costs money? As far as I can tell, you just have to follow their membership process, which involves signing some forms. Hell, the website explicitely says "Membership is free and open to all **sound recording copyright owners (SRCOs) and featured recording artists."

Honestly, did you research *any* of this at all?

The SoundExchange website has links to the relevant laws and the "Notice of Designation As Collective Under Statutory License": http://www.soundexchange.com/about/about.html

Yes, SoundExchange is basically run by the RIAA, so I have my doubts as to whether their collection and payout methods are fair to non-RIAA artists (or even RIAA artists, for that matter). But as a practical matter, who else was going to offer to take on this responsibility? I haven't checked, but I have a feeling that when the Copyright Office needed to figure out who would be responsible for collecting and paying these royalties, the RIAA lobbyists were right there, and no one else had the money or clout to suggest a plausible alternative.

But here, maybe these Modern Music Industry Lightbulb Jokes will cheer you up.

It's easy, and fun! Here we go:

It ain't SoundExchange that's deciding they should collect those royalties, it's the *government* deciding they should, and it's actually not a bad idea.

Of course it's not a bad idea - if you're the one collecting the checks. And just because the government says it should, that doesn't mean it represents what the people want. Let me introduce you to a concept called a Lobbying Group. Just because you can lay down big bucks and effect a change in the legal system does NOT mean it's what the people want. It's what the industry wants, and they are radically different things.

They can simply sign some forms and demand their cheque.

It's as simple as that! No...actually it's more like this. You must join to collect your money. Resistance...is useless.

It is, as it happens, *particularly* good for the small and independant artists, as radio stations would have a hell of a time tracking down and dealing with every random garage band they decided to play.It is, as it happens, *particularly* good for the small and independant artists, as radio stations would have a hell of a time tracking down and dealing with every random garage band they decided to play.

Provided of course that the band in question actually wanted to get paid. Some of us make music just because we like it, you know. It was art before it was a business. Some folks think of it still as art. Not everything amounts to a "cash flow opportunity".

Without compulsory licensing, I'd bet the vast bulk of college, independant, and web-based radio stations would shut down completely, thanks to the overhead of negotiating licensing deals.

And yet, these are the exact same groups compulsory licensing are shutting down. Wow, what a surprise! The people who promote indie music are the ones being nailed, all the while the shill says that these are the people he's trying to help.

Sure, pal. Sure.

The fees are hardly "flat", see http://www.soundexchange.com/rates.html. You can pay per performance or by the aggregate hour.

The thing is, the existence of a statutory license is only a maximum that you would have to pay. If you were to hunt down the original owner of the material, you are still able to negotiate a smaller fee. You would do this if you wanted to make someone's music the theme song for a TV program. It would be hard for you to pay the standard rates everytime your program was shown in syndication, so you'd negotiate a better arangement. The music owner would make this deal in order to get a direct payment from you, and so you don't go with some other music. Alternatively, you can broadcast 100% original music, and not have to pay anyone.

When I was in college radio in the '80s, the music companies would send us around 70 albums per week for free. All we did was publish our play lists, we didn't have to pay anyone. If a record company wanted money from us, we'd simply stop playing their stuff, while playing everyone else's. If you consider the expense record companies put into getting their stuff played on the air, you'd realize that it doesn't make sense for record companies to charge stations to play their stuff. Record execs over the years have regularly broken the law to get their stuff on the air, why would they start charging for it?

It interesting to note that in the SoundExchange FAQ under "Public Domain" and "Fair Use" they basically say "It's too complicated for mere mortals, please talk to a lawyer". Ack, the law, especially the law for something as important as fair use should never be too complicated for the ordinary citizen to understand. What happens when they start suing the Girl Scouts for singing around the campfire, or someone for whistling while walking down the street?

What's happening here, is that the record companies are worried that there sales are headed for zero. Thus, it doesn't matter whose stuff is played on the airwave, people are just going to copy it off digital radio or the internet. They're scrambling to have a revenue stream codified into law before their current revenue stream dries up. I don't think that's true. If there's good music, there will always be people willing to pay for it. Of course, in the future, there may not be a music company between the artist and the listener.

Not really.

Statutory licensing works by creating an exemption to copyright law for services (webcasters for example) who meet certain requirements. The service does not have to negotiate with the content owner who owns rights to the song/recording--they play whatever music they want and pay a flat fee. I'm guessing the "license" for regular radio will work the same way.

Looking at the soundexchange.com website disturbs me even more.

With all the thousands of labels they are harvesting, they advise that they will not pay out royalties for amounts less than $10. At a rate of $0.000762 http://www.soundexchange.com/rates.html per performance that means most of the lower level people can't even collect on their royalties. Now this in itself probably doesn't mean much to the artist... but thousands of accounts of royalties under $10? It all adds up...

Maybe I've misssed something (I know nothing about the industry, just fitting pieces together)...

oh, and soundexchange.com doesn't work properly with firefox .... gah!

i too think that this looks like racketeering plain and simple, which should automatically classify the R.I. Ass of A as a corrupt organisation as definded by the RICO act of 1970:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racketeer_Influenced_ and_Corrupt_Organizations_Act

http://www.ricoact.com/ricoact/
criminal activity: checked: collecting money for copyrighted works you don't own. (doesn't RIAA always claim that copyright infringement and piracy is a crime ?? here's that claim thrown right back at you dudes)

long term: checked: they have been doing this for quite a while now

statute of limitations of 4 years: checked (for most artists only though, some of them have let too much time to pass): there are surely at least a few artists that have only launched in these past 4 years, and are being 'milked' with this 'protection' tax by the R.I. Ass of A

quote from the article:
--------------
Go to the SoundExchange site: http://plays.soundexchange.com/... and take a look at the hundreds of indie labels for whom SoundExchange claims they have collected royalties. Enter some of those label names on http://www.riaaradar.com/... and notice how few are actually members of the RIAA. Contact the label and ask if they are a member of RIAA and they almost certainly aren't and may not even be aware that SoundExchange is collecting royalty fees on their music.
------------------

You can easily research the rates on soundexchange's website. They even have an FAQ.

You can negotiate your own (noncompulsory) license with radio stations, you just can't have a collective other than soundexchange collect for you. This, however, isn't a big issue if you're using a royalty-free license (such as CC). They do, however, claim that you have to register your agreement with them. (( Does this mean that we should build a database of internet radio stations so that I can send them a list of 10,000 different sites that are allowed to broadcast my music for free ... for each sound recording that I have released? ))

From the Soundexchange website

If I join SoundExchange can I still negotiate a license with a webcaster if I want to?
Yes. Although membership in SoundExchange prohibits you from licensing your sound recording copyrights to another royalty collective for purposes of collecting and distributing Sections 112 and 114 statutory royalties on your behalf, your membership in SoundExchange does not in any way limit your ability to enter into direct (i.e., nonstatutory) licenses of any sound recordings that you own, whether with webcasters or other potential statutory licensees. SoundExchange simply requires that SRCOs notify it of any direct licenses entered into with statutory licensees or digital music service providers so that it can ensure that payments received from services that hold direct licenses to certain recordings are calculated correctly and allocated properly.

Actually, they do collect royalties for Internet streaming. This covers the right to perform the songs. The composers own the copyrights to these songs, and this is (in theory) how they get paid.

This would be sufficient to make an Internet radio station legal if they only played live music, but most don't. Instead, they play pre-recorded music. The record companies own the copyrights on particular recordings of songs. This is where SoundExchange gets into the act. They collect royalties for the recordings of songs, not the songs themselves. See SoundExchange's Licensing 101 for more information.

Of course, broadcast radio is exempt from paying royalties on sound recordings, so they only have to pay ASCAP/BMI/SESAC, unless they also stream online. See 17 USC 114 for more information.

According to the SoundExchange FAQ,
this only applies if you want to rely on SoundExchange to get you a statutory license.
So stations willing to negotiate directly with the artists and get nonstatutory licenses,
wouldn't have to pay SoundExchange royalties. (Although that said, they apparently forbid
SoundExchange members from granting separate licenses, so this would only work with artists
who are willing to boycott SoundExchange...)

(ObDisclaimer: me am not copyright attorney though)

Not true, the RIAA is completely behind this. The fee that this new hike collects goes directly to the RIAA and not the performers which is what the fee's for terrestrial radio go to.

A recent article from BetaNews has analyed facts and figures on royalties currently paid by terrestrial radio stations to the three major performance royalty organizations (PROs) -- ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC -- and has determined that, under the new rates proposed last week by the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB), Internet radio stations operating in the U.S. would have to pay $2.3 billion in performance royalties annually, compared to $550 million for the more than 14,000 terrestrial radio stations combined.

As far as the retroactive royalty fees go, I hate to disagree with you, but while I think it will cause some chaos, I also think that it will be fought tooth and nail, and I don't think the RIAA is going to come out on top of this one.

I'm sure a lot of Internet broadcasters are hoping that is the case. Watch for appeals to come from the National Association of Broadcasters, and the Digial Media Association on behalf of the big media companies. They are the only ones with the resources to fight this. Whether their appeals are successful, and whether they will benefit smaller, independent stations, remains to be seen.

I hate to point you back to the link in the summery, but the rates are right at the top, including those for 2006. The Copyright Royalty Board fully intends to collect these royalties, and are well within their mandate to do so. If your station played copyrighted works in 2006, you will pay royalty fees for the use of that material (although the fees may ultimately be reduced, as they were in 2002. Scroll down to the bottom of Kurt's page for coverage of that go-around).

'm rather wondering why you think this would require us to turn our back on the last hundred years of culture.

This was in response to the notion that this will somehow be of benefit to independent artists.

First of all, this royalty is collected on all performances, even those of works by non-RIAA artists. The RIAA lobbied hard for these rates, and are licking their chops at the prospect of collecting them, but don't make the mistake of thinking fees will not be collected for all songs played, even those of "independent artist." The "sound recording copyright owner" is entitled to compensation, and anyone can apply to Sound Exchange for their cut, just like Sony or EMI or whomever. The only problem is the allocation of these royalty payments is based on aggregate totals from the industry as a whole, meaning all those Clear Channel stations that stream their FM broadcasts skew the numbers in favour of established artists. The independent artist is unlikely to see any money, even if they are getting airplay on stations not so beholden to the RIAA marketing machine.

So why don't Internet broadcasters play only "free music," licensed through Creative Commons or something?

Many do, and some even get a few listeners I'm sure. But there are other costs associated with running a radio stations, including the cost of maintaining your music catalog (even if you don't "pay" for the music, you need to acquire it, sift through it to separate the good from the bad, store it etc.), bandwidth costs, on-air talent, the cost of maintaining a website that offers features that will attract listeners, BMI/ASCAP royalties (still gotta pay those, don't forget) and sundry costs incurred by any small business. Attracting a listener base sufficient to offset these costs while exclusively playing independently produced, Creative Commons licensed, music by artists nobody has heard of is a heavy lift. Not saying it can't happen in the long run, but I don't see independently run Internet radio stations with no other source of revenue surviving long enough to make this a reality.

But the 'big media' companies who stream their FM broadcast will be subject to these fees too, so what's the problem?

Frankly, they will probably lose money as well. That doesn't mean they won't use Internet streams as a "loss leader," to get people who listen to them on their commute to tune in while the're at work, all the while bombarding them with on-air commercials, ads on their website and compiling marketing data that can be sold to offset some of these costs.

The small, independent station can

I already pay royalties to BMI, ASCAP and SESAC. Why do I have to pay royalties to SoundExchange also?

Every musical recording embodies two distinct copyrighted works. The first is the underlying musical composition, comprised of the written notes and lyrics (for purposes of copyright law, the musical composition is referred to as a "musical work"). The songwriter and/or his or her music publisher usually own the copyright in the musical work. The second copyrighted work is the actual recording itself - the sounds, including the recording artist's interpretation of the musical composition, and the creative efforts of the producer, sound engineers and background musicians. (This is referred to in copyright law as a "sound recording.") The copyrighted recording brings to life the written notes and lyrics of the musical work. A record label typically owns the copyright in the sound recording.

SoundExchange collects and distributes royalties associated with the public performance of sound recordings made by services operating under one of the compulsory licenses. By contrast, ASCAP, BMI and SESAC collect and distribute royalties associated with the public performance of musical works.

Observe: http://www.soundexchange.com/rates.html (down at the bottom of the page, the last entry)

As far as on the front end - SDARS providers (XM in particular) have not exactly been acting in good faith. For example: XM has deployed a network of terrestrial repeaters that theoretically could be used to deliver local content - the NAB agreed to allow this provided XM committed not to deliver local programming... then turned around and set up local traffic service for dozens of markets.

More info: http://www.techcentralstation.com/011404E.html

I suspect the RIAA feels the same was as the NAB did about local programming - it was far outside the scope and spirit of their existing agreements, hence their panties being in a wad.

When I first saw this headline - I assumed it was because the RIAA was going after XM and Sirius for their flagrant DMCA violations. The DMCA is utterly ludicrous in terms of what it requires (particularly in regards to the "performance complement" restricting the number of songs by the same artist or on the same album in a given time period - but it is in fact the law and the SDARS don't appear to even be trying to conform to it. I wonder how long until the RIAA goes after them for that.

I wonder what this "music mogul" thinks of compulsory licensing and statutory license fees (http://www.soundexchange.com/rates.html) and Harry Fox and the averaged/staticstical licensing model employed by ASCAP and (afaik) BMI, and 1000 other circumstances in which averaged pricing for content is used.

$0.99 per song is an average price, and comprehends both Top 40 and Bottom 100,000. The music industry simply wants to get this average price in addition to a premium on the Top 40 stuff that's already rolled into the average. If they want to re-negotiate the average price, that would be "reasonable" (in music industry terms, anyway), but this is blatant double-dipping.

Jobs is right: they're being greedy.

Actually, this brings up a good question:

Is this "ZETA Corporation" actually tasked by the government to collect license fees for copyrighted works, or are they just making that up as well?

If they are, it might be interesting to see where this ends up, since that puts them in the same position as RIAA's own SoundExchange.

There is already a compensation scheme in the United States as well. The Audio Home Recording Act provides that 3 percent of the price of "music CD-R" media goes to the SoundExchange royalty clearinghouse, which is obligated by law to distribute a share of the royalty fund to anyone, even smaller labels, that makes a legitimate claim. Makers of blank CD-R media have begun to sell only "music CD-R" media because the 3 percent levy is cheaper than the cost of maintaining another SKU.

There are 2 ways to get music

Congratulations! You have fallen into their trap. The RIAA desperately wants you to believe that you have to buy music from them, and heck I bet they'd even settle for you stealing music for them (hey, if all that unchecked windows piracy got MS where it is now...)

But they don't want you to know about the other way to get music:

Make it

Yeah. Independent music will be the death of the RIAA yet. When you've had enough of britney spears strutting around on stage and crooning the same old same old, turn to the indie scene and see what people are making. Nobody good enough? Pick up an instrument and see if you can do better.

Don't expect to get a giant audience. Once the RIAA has convinced everyone that its illegal to share music online, they'll steal the copyrights of all the music and have the government declare themselves the sole recipient of any money for distribution of music, like they have for webcasting. Once that happens, you'll be hard pressed to find anything to let you record and distribute your songs for free, even if you wanted to.

So, just sit back, enjoy the canned music, and don't mind the RIAA as they wheedle and lie into the monopoly position.

I have a few specific questions relating to this same topic:

1.In Canada, downloading music is legal, while uploading is not. What is REALLY the case in the US? If I own a cd, but say it's become unplayable by too many scratches, is it legal for me to get a copy from someone else? What if someone stole my cd's? Has anyone ever been sued just for downloading?

2. What about a peer to peer network where there is no distribution, only performance? It could be like a humongously massive jukebox, with secure DRM streaming of any song someone else hosts. User's pay performance royalties managed through Sound Exchange. or royalties are paid by the people that maintain the infrastructure with money they make from forced advertising in either the stream clients or audio ads before streamed songs.

Someone must have thought about this before?...
comments?

Someone must have thought about this before?...
comments?

Ummm...no...not even close.

Radio stations pay royalties to ASCAP, BMI and SESAC.

Online webcasters, in addition to paying ASCAP/BMI/SESAC fees, pay royalties to SoundExchange.

The notable difference between what you've said and the actual situation is that the RIAA has a limitted membership consisting of only the larger labels. However, membership in the groups that collect royalties is basically unlimitted. Royalties are distributed to labels/artists based on statistical sampling done at random to determine what percentage of the pie each label/artist is entitled to. It might end up favoring the big labels, but doing it differently would make the whole process incredibly complex.

Actually, it wouldn't.

The RIAA's subsidiary, SoundExchange, is currently the sole designated agent for collection distribution royalties, as per the U.S. Copyright Office.

What this means is that SoundExchange, a.k.a. the RIAA, is authorized to collect on behalf of all copyright holders. Even those who aren't members of the RIAA proper.

To put it another way, even if I were to start a band, and a Shoutcast station devoted solely to my band, or to local unsigned bands throughout my city, the RIAA (as SoundExchange) could knock on my door and demand royalties! And since none of us are members of the RIAA, we wouldn't see a red cent!

This is just a taste of the asinine legislation currently binding webcasters thanks to the RIAA's powerful lobbying power.

Can you substantiate this claim?

Easily done. The law that enforces the royalties on streaming music (originally CARP, now the Small Webcaster Settlement Act) declares that Soundexchange (A division of the RIAA) to be the official receiver and distributor for all noninteractive digital performance royalties (from their FAQ).

What I would like to see would be for some small bands to set up their own streams, pay Soundexchange their $500 minimum yearly royalty, then sue Soundforge in small claims court, if Soundforge refuses to pay the full $500 back. In the absence of a contract permitting Soundexchange to keep any of the money, there is no reasonable expectation that any of that money belongs to Soundexchange.

From those judgements against soundexchange (maybe if enough showed up, a class action suit could be had?), it would be interesting to see where it could go next... perhaps some kind of action against them being the Royal Royalty Collector since they have been shown (by the lawsuits) to be behaving in bad faith, and that an independent company should be responsbile for royalty distribution.

They are going to begin collecting a $5/month Royalty Administration Fee from all stations, including personal stations which have previously been free. They are collecting it regardless of broadcaster's location or broadcast content (news, talk, non-label acts). The fee is for more than just royalty payments and the mention a suggestion from SoundExchange to indie artists to get registered to collect royalties.

The parent post is not inforamtive, it is wrong.

Tha actual rates are here. A commercial Internet only radio station would pay $.14 (the site actually says .14cents, but I assume they mean 14 cents) Wolf would have to play 3,571,429 songs to owe $500,000 That's 408 songs every hour for a year.

If a commercial Internet only station plays 10 songs an hour (average 4 minute songs 10 minutes of commercials each half hour) and broadcasts 24 hours a day 365 days a year they would play 87,600 songs a year. Their licensing bill would be a _whopping_ $12,264. A non-commercial station broadcasting 8 hours a day would pay $2,190. That seems quite fair to me.

Simulcast stations pay less because they are already paying licensing fees on their broadcasts.

...There's also The Enemy.

This site is replete with RIAA whining about the fact that webcasters are "orchestrating a campaign of misinformation" about the fees. There's also proposed fees themselves and the RIAA's rebuttal to common arguments made in letters to editors...