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Webcasters Have To Pay
penguinradio writes "News.com is reporting that the Copyright office is going to require webcasters to pay fees for the songs they choose to play over the net. This has been a grey area of law for some time, but now it seems that this decision will move the case into the courts (where both sides were hesitant to enter for fear of losing the case)." Basically, this means that radio stations have to be pay an additional fee to broadcast over the Internet, as well as their current payment for "on-air" broadcasting.
they are going to make you pay a fee for playing a cd in your car while your windows are down.
Yeah, I can see why you're angry and frightened.
The question you should be asking yourself is: how much freedom can they take from you before you will stop obeying them?
They appear to be operating under the assumption that if a station plays any of their music, they owe them for all their music you could potentially pay. That's what really bugs me about stuff like this and other things, like taxing CD-Rs on their behalf in some countries, under the assumption that the only stuff worth burning or boadcasting is their own. Even when small independent artists sell cds they burned themselves, the record companies still get a cut.
My understanding is that the taxes for on-air broadcasts is to fund the FCC so that transmitters stay on the frequencies they are supposed to, stay within assigned bandwidth, and make sure they don't run too much power, causing their signal to bleed into other bands, etc.
I am glad that the FCC does this! Wouldn't it really stink if you are flying from Chicago to Atlanta, and some hick country music station decides to squeeze out a few more watts from their transmitter causing their signal to bleed into the Air-traffic controller's freq. or worse yet, to skew an ILS approach? That is what the FCC is for.
However, can I conclude that the same will hold true for the internet equiv? Is the FCC going to ensure that a radio station's packets do not perform a DOS on some remote network?
Another question: Isn't the internet in the USA primarily funded in the private sector? Is the government putting any substantial amount of money into the citizen's internet service?
Just my two pennies this afternoon.
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Sig Return: 204 No Content
does that mean we'll have to listen to 50 minutes of beer commecrials every hour instead of 45, so they can afford the fees? Or will advertisements make up 99% or their websites load-time instead of 90%?
Maybe instead of playing less songs to make room for more ads, they'll do less of the "xx.x fm...your ONLY new rock/alternative/whatever station"...or maybe they'll stop wasting the 15 minutes every hour they spend telling us about their commercial-free-14-song-blocks?
Cripes, I hate radio stations these days.
"It is well that war is so terrible, lest we grow too fond of it."
Time is fun when you're having flies.
-Kermit the Frog
I'm not sure the DMCA so much changes the rules, as it applies the old rules to the new, digital, age.
On-air radio stations are not technically "exempt" from paying the record companies for anything more than buying the album. On-air radio stations don't have to pay the the copyright holders (almost always the record companies) anything because they do not copy the copyrighted work. The fees on-air radio stations pay to ASCAP and BMI are for performance of the copyrighted works.
Unfortunately, the only way internet radio stations can perform a copyrighted work is to transmit a copy to every computer "listening" to the work. A perfect, digital copy that you can retain and play as many times as you want, at your leisure. It is the copying done by internet radio stations, which is not done by on-air radio stations, that make internet radio stations liable to record companies.
Further, from the viewpoint of the record companies, play of a record by an on-air radio station serves only to stimulate album sales. Very, very few people record songs off of the radio instead of buying the album.
The relationship between internet radio and album sales is much more complex. Some people will listen to an internet radio broadcast and then purchase the album. However, others will simply retain the mp3 (or other digital format) file to play at their leisure. This relationship will be come much more problematic as portable, auto, and home MP3 players become more common.
Only Women Bleed (Sex, Sharia remix)
Not to mention the total amounts of possible listeners for a song. Real radio, song played once, no real way to know how many people heard it (Arbitron is a joke, but they use those numbers so I guess you can guess how many people hear it). In larger markets this can be upward of 1m people. With Internet radio you know exactly how many streams are connected per song. That's a big difference, and even the most popular mp3 streams are currently under 1000 users.
Of cource, even if you play all independent or live music, my guess is that you will end up having to pay the RIAA, or go to court. I can smell the DMCA from here.
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+&x
This is pretty depressing for me. I was talking with the systems administrators at my school the other day, and they were talking to me about how they were going to run a streaming audio station from the school's T-1, kind of like a school radio station (this is a high school, btw.). However, they had decided against doing it, because of the legal "grey area" that existed there. I was really looking forward to some decision that was more or less the opposite of this. They taught a class for the last two weeks of school last year that was on the history of modern music. They had a very eclectic collection of music, and I rather enjoyed the course, and the music in particular.
It's really too bad about this, but I guess streaming music can be recorded on the recieving end, and the record companies/artists should be paid for that kind of use. Its just so damn depressing. There's no way that a school radio station can start now, my school's tech department is already overbudget for the year :-(.
Friends don't let friends use multiple inheritance.
The rub is that this problem -- that Internet users might save their digital stream and thereby copy the music -- is exactly the same problem that is faced by broadcasters! As a teenager, I certainly took great delight in compiling off-the-air cassettes of all my favorite songs. What's different? As near as I can tell, nada.
I have a question. If we keep allowing the big media companies to make laws (OK, so this is a rule that isn't yet a law, but lets face it, with enough money you can push through any law you want) at what point do independent bands have to start paying a "you should use us" fee for publishing their music without using the traditional methods.
Example: I and my band record our music in my home studio. We then buy CDRs and a good quality CD printer (they aren't that expensive) for the labels on the CD and print out CD covers for the jewel case. We make our music available for download off the net, or available on CDR for a small fee (less than standard priced CDs). Now it would be unimaginable for the RIAA to come to us and say, "You have to pay us a fee because you aren't using us as a distribution method." But the way I see things going right now, I fear that it won't be long before this happens. Are people really going to let that happen? Or is my paranoia getting the best of me?
I really don't fully understand how the currently entrenched companies think that every new distribution method that comes up has to be under their control, but it seems that "the law" backs them up in this. Why? Why do the controllers of the current method of distribution have to have control of all future developments for distribution? As an independant musician, this sort of thing just scares the hell out of me.
Come on people, the RIAA didn't invent music, and they sure as hell didn't invent the ability to enjoy music. So why should they always be in control of all distrobution methods?
Sorry, but this angers and frightens me like you would not believe.
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It doesn't seem clear why these broadcasters should pay a premium over the normal on-air fees. The only reason I can think of is that, theoretically at least, they could have a much larger audience than your average crappy radio station.
Any thoughts? (Apart from the standard capitalist running dogs milking the pennies from the poorest, etc etc)
--Remove SPAM from my address to mail me
I used to work for a streaming provider that streamed both radio stations and their own in house stations, and I always wondered why real radio stations had to pay every time they played a song and the streaming providers didn't. That looked like an advantage to the streaming companies. Now they are trying to level the playing field. Even with the advantages of not paying the royalties the streaming companies couldn't stay alive though.
The Internet is such new and fresh technology were I though we be able to take a new course of human history with it. Yet again it seems society is just imprinting the old world into the new one.
The limitations until recently were twofold. Up until the popularisation of the Internet, there was no legal way of broadcasting without Government permission - permission that generally took the form of buying a small slice of a limited resource in a particular area. That restriction has been swept away by the Internet (kindof, still hard to broadcast to somebody's car stereo at the moment, but with Satellite IP, maybe that will change in time.)
The other is the lack of a legal way of making use of third party content. Until this case, you would have to negotiate directly with every third party content supplier (ie artist/agent/publisher, etc), or else generate the whole of the content of your station yourself.
Now this is changing. The copyright office is implying, though through a method that might at first seem to be negative to the status quo, that it's going to drop the latter restriction. Henceforth there will be a mechanism by which you can pay for third party content to play on your "radio" station.
It's not as great, to a publisher, as getting it for free, but getting it for free was never legal to begin with. The major issue now is for webcasters to find financial models that allow them to pay those funds - something which may, at first, seem to be yet another hassle, but given the fact that a good broadband connection capable of hosting webcasting services, already puts a price on webcasting capabilities, anyone who wants to do this is going to have to work out a source of funding anyway.
Across the Internet, web banners and micropayment services such as the infamous adult check systems, are already being used to make credible economic models available to people who want to put out their own sites. Perhaps ultimately, the same types of resource will be made available to people who want to run their own, private, amateur broadcasting services. One can but hope.
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You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
I work for a college radio station that also broadcasts on the Internet, so I've been watching this area closely. Radio stations already pay royalties to the songwriters, mostly through the two organizations ASCAP and BMI. But they do not have to pay royalties to the performers of the music, whose copyright is usually held by a record label. Live broadcast is considered a performance itself, so the people who performed on the recording don't get paid for our live "performance" of their music.
Now, with Internet broadcast we are still required to pay fees to the songwriters through ASCAP and BMI. But what is at dispute here is whether we now have to pay fees to the record labels as well. Of course, the RIAA says we should pay. They are trying desparately to convince Congress that Internet broadcast is not the same as airwave broadcast, since it is essentially "copying" digital data from one computer to another. NAB, the national association of broadcasters, is the most outspoken group against this legislation, unsurprisingly. Their stance is that Internet radio should fall under the same laws as broadcast radio.
The issue is not as black and white as both sides claim. What if I set up a server on the Internet to stream my favorite mp3's to all my friends, where they can save them on their computers. If I claim I am just an "Internet radio" station, then I have used a loophole to get around my blatant copyright infringement. I don't have a good answer for what should be done in cases like that. Comments?
Radio stations play music to entertain, and that's why people listen to radio stations. You may want to buy a CD after listening to a song on the radio, but you might very well want to buy a video after watching a movie at the cinema. Something that has, as a by-product, increased familiarity, is not advertising.
And CD sales may be a byproduct of radio listening, but that is not the same as saying it's advertising, any more than eating a particular type of food for the first time is advertising (gosh, you might like it so much you'd want more!)Artists are funded by a system whereby they receive royalties charged directly or indirectly to those who enjoy their music, directly from CD sales, indirectly via advertising from those who listen on the radio. The natural response to a system whereby one of those sources of income is cut off is that that CD prices rise beyond their already ridiculously high rates. That means the few people left who end up buying CDs are paying for those who don't's entertainment.
That's not fair.
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You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
http://femmefatale.nu/dmca/freedom%20in%20webcasti ng3.htm
editors are for wimps
once you start programming using cat, you never
go back
cat > t.c
#include
main(){printf("goodbye cruel world\n");}
http://rareformnewmedia.com/
Lets say that I stream an mp3 playlist from the media server in my living room to a workstation in the garage so that I can listen to my music while I fix my car. Is that an internet broadcast?
What if I pick up the stream on my workstation at work? Is it only an "Internet Broadcast" if I share it with my friends? I can give my CD to a friend without violating the law. How is this different?
I wish the RIAA would concentrate their efforts on seeking restitution for commercial piracy that has actually occurred instead of trying to do an end-run on our civil liberties in advance of any violation of the law. They seem to hold the mistaken belief that, left to our own devices, we will all become criminals at the first opportunity.
I am innocent of bringing down the record industry until proven guilty!
They may be able to customize the stream depending on the listener location. The technology to do that isn't that extreme. Look up the IP address, look up the provider, switch to the appropriate ad stream at the right time. If not now, soon.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Ok, I can see this if a station is charged based on audience. For instance, if two stations in a given metropolitan area (Station A and Station B) play the same song, but Station A has a more powerful antenna then Station B, does Station A pay more since Station A is reaching (potentially) more of an audience?
Furthermore, would a station pay less if they mixed in country music since that will decrease the number of listeners??
I am serious here, does anybody with knowledge of the industry have the answer??
All it is is a different transmission medium. Only idiots with nothing more to do will listen to the radio and the webcast at the same time.
So the radio station can reach worldwide on the Internet. BIG DEAL! A station with a transmitter on a high mountain will broadcast farther than an 'in city' radio station. Doesn't change the charges they each have to pay to play the same songs.
I can understand charges for Internet only radio, but not for good ol' FCC licensed broadcasters who simulcast.
Move the radio stations off shore.... Really heat up the debate. It's legal to broadcast anything you want via the Internet while offshore, but who pays when the signal 'strays' into US LAN-space, ISPs?
Sounds like a Microsoft 'pay twice' policy to me.
It seems that people do not realize that things like this are going to hurt broadband access.
This will probably stop spinner.com from being a free service. It may eng up going subscription to make up the costs rather than more ads. Other services may follow suit. There is already talk about portols like yahoo going subscription too. For some of there services.
So after you pay for your ISP, and in some countries your phone connection, you'll have to pay to access any of the services on the internet through some sort of ASP. All thouse things you used to get for free you'll have to pay for. This is probably what they are going for. Lets face it on the internet advertising just does not work to make up the money. Many business that are relying on this as sole income are failing. Radios and TV it works cause usually they are charging a lot more money than banner ads. A typical banner ad is like 100000 impressions for 2 to 5 dollars where as 1 commercial during prime time will cost 1000000 (maybe not that much but if you are intelligent you'll get the point).
So what does this have to do with paying to broadcast over the internet. It will make it less viable a service. We all have radios (well most of us at least) so you'll use your radio or cable access to hear music when you want to.
I do , at work listen to netscape radio, but if they add more commericals or less channels or make it subscriptions I think I'll bruing a radio to work. They are cheep these days like 10 USD.....
I don't want a lot, I just want it all!
Flame away, I have a hose!
Only 'flamers' flame!
It counted towards their ratings. However, the ratings are sorted by location, so the effect was that you influenced the ad rates that your (example) Atlanta station can charge for advertisers in Seattle. In other words, not much impact.
...phil
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
Hey, let's just drop the whole music gig altogether. Why listen to music when you can hum to yourself in the shower?
The reason the cost of living is so high these days is because guys like these people have been staying up late at night thinking of ways to extort money out of people. Heck, I don't blame them - it's their job. And they do it well. Of course, every penny paid for this kind of crap comes out of our pockets. I run a business. I know. If I get charged a fee to bring a product to a customer, that customer is going to pay for it. Otherwise I go out of business. So all those obscure patent agreements over the infamous Rambus and all the way down to the obscure fees charged for playing music end up coming out of our checkbooks every time we buy a product of any kind.
For example - I advertise on the radio. That's how the radio makes money and how I get my name out to the public. But suddenly the radio is faced with staggering fees out of the blue. What do they do? Come contract time, my advertising rates go up. How do I pay for it? By raising my own prices. So, a computer business is affected by this kind of thing - something with no obvious relationship with music. And it's not just me - other stores and industries will have to pay increasingly expensive advertising rates to cover this and they pass the buck on to their customers - you. Okay, it's fair that the music industry wants to see a return on their investment - but some of their tactics seems almost criminal...
That, my friends, is the science of trickle down economics - these guys make their victims pee their pants and it trickles down onto us...
Mike
--
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We have fought the AC's, and they have won.
Um.. shouldn't this be Score:5, FUNNY?! Insightful my ass. It's funny, dammit! FUNNY!
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CitizenC
My name is not 'nospam,' but 'citizenc'.
Now I won't be forced to hear ear-drum popping bass and crappy-ass dance music while I walk down the street!
Pope
Freedom is Slavery! Ignorance is Strength! Monopolies offer Choice!
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
This has no effect on your ability to operate a "radio" station on the internet. You are quite free to jabber endlessly into a mic and stream that out to the masses. You are free to line up several hosts and thereby have a 24-7 operation. You are free to offer a webcam into the studio. You are free to host live performance of original music. You are free to play music by artists who have retained control of their music and give you permission to play it without royalty. Freedom impaired? Not at all.
As for "legitimate" radio stations having to pay twice. Well, in effect they are operating two stations, one on the radio and one on the internet. If they use central recording, and feeds to play the same songs on multiple radio stations in different cities, do you think they end up paying only once for that (many stations and national shows like Top-40 work this way)? Is this going to affect big stations, most of whom are owned by the media conglomerates anyway? No. Is this going to hurt small community stations and college stations? Maybe. But again. They are effectively creating two broadcasts, so I don't see this as a problem.
I do not have a signature
The article is not clear on the motives of the copyright office. Are they really worried about internet-only radio stations that currently don't pay BMI and ASCAP. Could this really just be a play for dominance by existing radio stations who seek to protect their dominant position. Having a radio station is expensive and radio is risk adverse. It seems that maybe they and the record companies are just protecting the status quo here...
I know that there's some rules that, if followed, allow things like Shoutcast and other Internet-only music broadcasting to be legal (in theory). I'm not aware of Shoutcast stations being required to pay fees to RIAA members. Will this change that (or at least the legal status of Shoutcast?)
The most fees a single listening of a song is charged for...
Broadcast fee
Streaming fee
Streaming Playback IP fee
Hardware fee
Media fee
Eyes fee
Bleeech!!!
humor for the clinically insane
great comedy company.
How much freedom can they take from us before it becomes too much?
--brian
If you do, someone's paying the radio station to play the ads.
Teh radio station is making money off the webcast, so obviously, the recording industry will want their share, too.
Of course, when you listen to a webcast from 2000 miles away, most ads aren't very useful. Gee, free hot dogs for the kiddies at a used car lot, I only have to drive 2000 miles to get them.
They are already banned from broadcasting sports games live over the internet, for example the BBC in the UK cannot broadcast football games live over the internet, even if it is simply a simultaneous broadcast of their on-air radio coverage over the internet. This is just an extension of it. I can't see it becoming a problem really - maybe I'm wrong.
Just amused. Yes, the internet is 'new and fresh' technology, but there's nothing saying that it's a new and different world.
If it truly were a new and different world, most people would not be able to function in it, and until they can create new constructs to suit the new technology, they have to rely on baggage brought from the old world...
That's just human nature, I think.
Geek dating!
GPL Deconstructed
Does this mean that, if I call a radio station and they put me on hold, and they are simulcasting the broadcast over the phone while I am one hold, that they have to pay an extra license fee?
Ridiculous.
Oh NO Please no! this means KNAC.com might go out of business. So sad.
I listen to them all the time. I was always afraid They would disappear leaving me with my overplayed MP3's and dead silence but now it might be true.
I am very against steaming companies because they appear to have retards in control. I used to listen to a station (who will remain nameless, WAAF!) that was awesome till one stupid day there retards in charge said "Gee I have a great idea lets change our streaming provider to a Microsoft only company. That way we'll loose 50% of out listeners and piss off anybody who do not have media player. Sales will drop! what a great plan!" Well F* them >:-|
"Remember, who is the boss of you!"
> SELECT * FROM brain_cells WHERE synaptic_rate > 0
0 row returned
Now webcasts are to be charged to advertise somebodies product online... me thinks the record companies want sole webcast rights... Fat Free Radio is a good example but it is hardly radio music.
Next is a micropayment charge for breathing in, then out... thats what implant chips are all about.
illenium.net - ultimate sk8 shop online
A while ago I wrote Live365.com about requiring users to pay fees and I received their response:
http://www.cetan.com/live365-response.pdf
I'm hoping that they'll stick to this policy
In Soviet Russia...michael would be rotting in Siberia!
I think Live365 already has an agreement with the RIAA to handle the royalities with the caveat that you can only play the same songs with in a certain time period and no more than two songs from the same artist in a certain time period yadda yadda yadda.
What about people who broadcast for non-profit motives?
Internet: Some kid in the United States can use some ISP in the UK to upload his mp3's to a web page in Russia, all using a false name.
On top of all this, good luck busting some kid on DSL broadcasting his "Greatest 80's hits" to the world with IceCast.
This is nothing more than sabre raddling. Problem is, they are sabre raddling at a paper tiger, while an elephat is sneaking up behind them.
Burn Hollywood Burn
As a recording artist myself, whose work is probably more likely to get played on internet radio than on real-life radio, my question is this: do the artists see any of this extra 'air' charge?
If so, it's potentially justifiable, for the vast increase in availability of the artist's work.
If not, it's another unjustifiable move from "the man".
Anyone got any ideas?
arnald
What about the individual people who might use icecast or something to broadcast to a total of 8 people? Are they going to have to pay too? If so I like to see how that one gets enforced.
-Psyanide-
It's quite easy to create a player that doesn't allow saving. (Vivo free version, RealPlayer Basic, etc.)
Second hello peopple can tape radio as well on their stereos.
The message on the other side of this sig is false.
What about those of us that have Live365 stations?
tcd004
Tired of election coverage?
How about some UNCOVERAGE!