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Small Webcasters get Powerful New Ally
An anonymous reader writes "On, Sunday, October 20, 2002, the RIAA's subsidiary, SoundExchange, was set to introduce draconian new fees on small internet webcasters - fees that were designed to drive those webcasters out of business and preserve the RIAA's monopoly on the distribution of music in North America. One of those small webcasters is the Triangle's classical music station, WCPE - quite possibly the finest classical music station in the world. Now it turns out that WCPE has an 800 lb gorilla in their corner, and he's set his sights on the RIAA."
If you read the full article, you'll notice that Helms' office mentions that they heard from Religious broadcasters in the area that felt that the burden would still be too great on them.
Nevertheless, nice to see that even the Religious Right is "getting the idea" in terms of dealing with the RIAA...
Folks, if you dislike the RIAA's tactics and would like to listen to some alternative music, please give classical music a try...there's nothing like listening to some good ol' music.
The article says that the bill was DESIGNED to ease the financial burden on small webcasters, but in all reality, it probably would not have.
.07 per person per song in royalties. Instead, at this point they can pay $500/yr (from 1998 to present, IIRC) to cover their costs.
.07/per song+person could raise some HEFTY fees.
They were to be charged
The small webcasters themselves had not been consulted when the original law was drafted and therefore felt that they would be put out of business by these "small" fees.
The Religious Right, incredible as it may seem, can be the killer ally of the digital freedom movement, just like Stalin was in WWII. Remember that morality vs. copyright case? (the right to edit movies to the customer's content)
When talking to any individual with such orientation, we have to stress that the current copyright fundamentalism is made to favor Hollywood - you know, that big, unholy, pornography-peddling anti-God collective in California. Mentioning Scientology might help too. YMMV.
Now THAT is an 800-lb. gorilla.
The best trance stations on the internet went down because of this law.
I hope you're referring to the DMCA and not HR5469 (the one that Helms killed in the Senate). The latter would have kept DI on the air permanently and probably would have brought TTT back on the air (I'm sure he could have raised enough in donations to pay the proposed fees).
Everyone here seems to be under the misguided impression that killing this bill was a good thing because it didn't do enough to ensure that small webcasters could continue broadcasting. But people fail to realize that the alternative to this bill isn't likely to be a new bill. It'll most likely mean that CARP rates will go into effect (should SoundExchange choose to enforce them) and the stations that would have been able to be financially viable under the proposed bill, will no longer be.
"Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos!"
The legislation that Helms blocked would have charged small webcasters a fee that, frankly, seems pretty trivial. If your margins are so thin that $500 per year makes the difference between making money or losing it, well, what you're running is not a business, it's a hobby. And, for that matter, I can easily see even hobbyists being willing to pay that much money. Heck, it's going to cost them more than that just for the data connection capable of supporting a half-dozen streams.
Now, I think small webcasters who broadcast their own material have a legitimate beef if the bill requires them to pay the RIAA, but for webcasters who are broadcasting a significant amount of RIAA music, then, frankly, it seems like a pretty decent deal.
I also think the artists have a legitimate beef, because practically none of this money will make it back to them. Since there's no accounting for individual songs required, there's no way to decided how much of the money should go to which artist. To record labels, that means the artists get none of it.
In summary, there seem to be problems with the way this is being done, but they're the same problems that exist with the Audio CD-R taxes -- the money goes to the Established Labels, regardless of what music is actually webcasted/copied, and the artists don't get any of it. But the amount of money is so trivial that I can't see it causing any real problems, even for semi-serious hobbyists.
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So. . . confused. . . cannot pick. . . side. . .
Welcome to the Real World, where nothing is black or white, no one is evil or good and nothing is _ever_ as simple as it seems.
Glad to have you.
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I think the difference is that Quarex has never tried to forbid the "churchies" from listening to their music, but the churchies have a history of wanting to censor things that they find objectionable.
Ironically, the last parts of your post did describe the attitude of organized religion, though.
Murphy was an optimist.