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Webcaster Alliance Threatens To Sue RIAA
detroitindustrial writes "The Washington Post reports that the Webcaster Alliance is threatening to sue the RIAA under the Sherman Antitrust Act. In their letter to the RIAA, the Webcaster Alliance alleges that the RIAA and the Voice of Webcasters negotiated in collusion and, 'were apparently intent on either eliminating their competitors and/or raising barriers to entry in the market for small commercial webcasting.' It goes on to say that the RIAA also wanted to eliminate smaller webcasters, who tend to play more independent material, in order to maintain their monopoly on music distribution."
It's about time. The subject line refers to an article on The Onion about RIAA's intolerance for FM radio stations giving away music. Unfortunately, it is a very real problem here on the Internet. Hopefully this, in conjunction with the backlash noted on The Register today (it's on Slashdot's "Register" sidebar), even Joe Sixpack will wake up to the RIAA's ridiculous behavior.
OMG! Wau!
Monopolistic Corporations sue you.
Oh wait..
It's about damn time. They should have been stopped when they extorted royalties from webcasters who would never play any pop filth that they 'represent'. Why should someone have to pay royalties to a body that doesn't hold any of the rights to the content that's being played?
SomaFM forever!!
because if you don't behave, I too will write a letter I won't show you threatening to sue you.
And then I'll tell slashdot. Muahahahaha!
From the article:
"...the RIAA negotiated with a group called Voice of Webcasters, which represented fewer than 15 Internet radio stations..."
This is classic RIAA. IT's funny becuase they wouldn't have so much trouble selling people on the idea of good behavior regarding the copying of music if they themselves were more honest brokers.
Sherman Anti-Trust Act nothing, I bet it wouldn't be that hard to come up with a RICO complaint against them. They sure sound like they're about to cross the edge to me. Do what we tell you (don't download stuff) or we'll make you regret it (erase your hard drive) sure sounds like racateering to me. Do they do anything to try to stop indie lables? If you can't make a RICO complaint against them now, at the rate they're going, I can't help but wonder how long it will be before they do qualify.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Do all radio stations have to pay royalties, or only commercial radio stations? I think it's the latter, since our college runs its own non-commercial radio station and they don't have to pay any royalties that I know of.
A majority of the online radio stations are non-commercial, as in, they don't run radio stations for money. Most are run by shoutcast and other hobbyists anyway. So, why should these radio stations have to pay royalties, if their real-world (pardon the expression) counterparts do nt have to?
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
While their intentions are noble,(Read: It's about time someone went after the RIAA)I don't think that they'll have the money available to pull off an anti-trust lawsuit against the RIAA. The RIAA could probably throw enough money into the lawsuit to keep it in courts for ages. These independant webcasters are going to need some help if they have any chance of pulling this off. I may sound negative, but it's the truth.
If you're looking here for something insightful or thought provoking, you're probably looking in the wrong place.
Hobbyists should pay for their hobbies; unless that hobby contributes something to society. A hunter hunts for himself, usually. A photographer takes pictures for his own enjoyment, usually. I am a Paid on Call Firefighter. That's my hobby. And I get 9 dollars an hour when I'm on call and 7 bucks per hour for training. The independent broadcasters contribute to society, too.
The RIAA should be subsidizing them.
Not to sound like trolling but looking at the number of lawsuits being filed these days, legal profession seems very appealing compared to IT and so far it hasn't been affected by outsourcing either !!
The RIAA has gotten out of control. This suit looks like ond of the best counter attacks that has been launched against the RIAA. Now I want to give some of my hard earned money that would have otherwise (according to the RIAA) gone for recorded music to help support the legal fees of their oppostion.
Yes..start calling them the Webcaster Alliance ;)
| Unlike traditional radio it is easy to make copys [sic] of songs that have been webcasted
As others have pointed out, this is not at all unlike traditional radio. Capturing from an FM radio station probably gives you better quality.
| and then place them on peer to peer networks such as bittorrent and napster
Neither of these are presently peer-to-peer networks.
| What inevitably happens is that people will record internet radio stations all day
History tells us that this is not what inevitably happens. Nor do people spend all day scanning in library books and thus putting book publishers out of business.
| and then put all the CD quality songs up for download
| thereby harming the music industry.
Possibly, but I'd like to see more evidence that the distribution of crappy MP3s really cuts into record company sales.
Underground subcultures are very much aware of this situation. It's generally regarded as a hostile act meant to destroy our culture.
Allow me to explain. Sometimes a government body's political boundries encompass two very different cultures. In a case where a smaller culture is regarded as a potential threat, problem, or nuisance the government may attempt to breed them out of existance. Sort of a peaceful genocide, it's quite simple. Noone gets killed, noone's locked up, or harmed in any way. However the government creates incentives for businesses to set up in this particular area of the country. Thus the mainstream population moves to this area in pursuit of jobs. Over the years the two cultures interbreed until the differences that once seperated the two cultures are spread so thin that, for all intensive purposes, that culture no longer exists. This is a very real problem that anthropologists are constantly attempting to combat.
The recording industry, or at least the RIAA, is attempting to do the same thing. They're taking mainstream music, tweaked to sound more punk, metal, gothic, hip-hop or what have you. In the mainstreams pursuit to be an "inDUHvidual" they cling to this facade and claim to be what we are. Over time start-up bands attempt to imitate these fake bands, the media begins to depict this coincidentally (hah) more media-friendly subculture as the true subculture, and over time what we really are and what we're really about is lost in the stream of time.
For the most part, we've lost punk to this crap already. Oh don't get me wrong I'm sure there's still a few bands and a few isolated groups which fit the original ( and political ) description of punk. However most of the punks I knew became disheartened. Their clothes, music, literature, EVERYTHING, became very difficult to find amidst this mainstream regurgitation.
Metal's suffering from the same onslaught as we speak. Nu-Metal threatens to destroy another subculture very near and dear to me in time.
My subculture sees the beginnings of the same thing for us. On the gothic front, the media appears to have chosen a multi-faceted attack with television and the popularization (helped along with a little advertising) of dark television series. Buffy was a very good example. Fashion's a little less hard to pick apart amidst the season's change of fashion obsessions so I won't speak of any direct threat there. Honestly I doubt I could pick those things out if I tried. And, though it seems to have taken them a while, I've heard the RIAA finally has a band calling themselves "gothic" that they're parading around MTV.
Some might be happy to be rid of us. Indeed there's a great many selfish people who can't see beyond their own form of living. To these people I would express my regret that they could not understand what we are. We're nothing more than a culture which holds valuable its traditions and similarities. By departing from mainstream into the gothic subculture I've learned a lot about society. And despite what mainstream sources will tell you, goths, punks, metal-heads, rivet-heads, etc., are NOT anti-cultures. That is to say, we're don't join the groups we do because we oppose mainstream in its entirety. Rather, we join these groups as they better fit our lifestyle. It was easier for me to make friends amongst goths than it was at random.
In any event, here's how it relates to you, the reader, if you're not part of a subculture. I mean, if you're totally mainstream this isn't going to hurt you. Are you christian though? Do you like christian music? Yeah, that won't survive if the RIAA gets its way. Actually anything that mainstream, pop/rock advertising doesn't cover will eventually be destroyed if things continue as they have been.
If you've ever liked something besides pop/rock, I reccomend you invest a bit more in ANY alternative source of music. Be it web distribution, independant labels, classic radio stations, whatever. Support everything that isn't mainstream.
When will everyone wake up and realize that when they buy cd's, tapes, etc. that they are indirectly supporting the RIAA? Yes we all love music but we risk our musical freedom buying the products the RIAA sells. I have almost 1000 store bought cd's but I can no longer buy them from such a monopolistic, evil diety as the RIAA.
They want to dictate who, what, when, where, why and how I buy and listen to my music. It's my fucking choice and they have forced me to boycott all they sell. I can get anything I want free so I'll go back to that method.
Sueing your customers into a lifelong debt is unjustified and narrowminded bullshit in it's basis. By setting examples in ruining the avergae person's financial life is completely uncalled for and I will not have any part in supporting these fucks in buying their products.
If anyone has any self-respect or ethics then they'll also refuse to support this ridiculous entity called the RIAA. We stop buying they start to get the message.
Fuck the RIAA...you can't shit where you eat...unless you're Hilary Rosen:)
You aren't free to do anything, until you've lost everything.
More importantly, they're the most anal retentive paperwork carrying of any broadcaster out there. Try to escape fees and you're going to have to be able to sit down and show EVERY song you played since you went "independent". I should know I worked for one. We had an entire room that was devoted to nothing BUT proving we were 100% legal. Yes you can do it, but you better be prepared to not only fight but have the ammo to figh in the first place.
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they are not lobbying for the rights to play the RIAA's product... they are demanding that they not pay the "RIAA webcaster surcharge fee" if they don't play RIAA music. they are doing exactlly what you are bitching about them to do. the RIAA basically got the government to believe that if you are playing music over the airwaves, it must be the RIAA's music and thus they deserve a cut of the fees. with airwaves that is easy, the FCC charges you to broadcast and gives some to the RIAA. with the internet there is no FCC getting paid so the RIAA wants the same money from the web caster even if they aren't playing RIAA music.
The college stations don't have to pay because colleges are a state protected institution.
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