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Internet Radio's "Last Stand"
We've been discussing the plight of Internet radio for some time, as the Copyright Royalty Board imposed royalties that industry observers predicted would prove lethal to the nascent industry. We discussed Web radio's day of silence in protest, which won the industry a reprieve, and the futile efforts to find relief in Congress. Now it's looking as if the last act is indeed close. Death Metal Maniac sends along this Washington Post story with extensive quotes from Pandora CEO Tim Westergren, who said: "The moment we think this problem in Washington is not going to get solved, we have to pull the plug because all we're doing is wasting money... We're funded by venture capital. They're not going to chase a company whose business model has been broken." The article estimates that XM Satellite Radio will pay "about 1.6 cents per hour per listener when the new rates are fully adapted in 2010. By contrast, Web radio outlets will pay 2.91 cents per hour per listener." That's 70% of projected revenue for Pandora; smaller players estimate the hit at 100% to 300% of revenue.
I love Pandora. I listen to it almost constantly while I'm in front of my computer. I've found a ton of new bands that I love, and after discovering them, I've often purchased their music, either on CD or from iTunes. Shutting down Pandora would really suck.
ZuluPad, the wiki notepad on crack
Thats really unfortunate. Corporations and the government can be thanked for limiting competition due to greed and in effect slowing down the potential rate of our innovation. I can only imagine what our country would be like if we had invested into our country just a portion of the money spent on war. Massive revamp on transportation with maglev trains across the country, and increased standards of living without the devaluation of the dollar. Pandora is innovation, and even its results (wide array of music tailored to each individual) can inspire creativity in individuals and further propel innovation. Those looking to maximize profits beyond what is necessary seem to have their sights set too narrow and either do not see or care that people across the internet can develop something better as a community.
What if I'm the owner of an internet radio station that plays only music that has become public domain through the consent of the owner or the expiration of copyrights?
Or perhaps I only like to play songs by artists who sell their CD's for less than the industry standard. Say, $5 a CD. Will my fees be lessened?
The artists really need to get involved. Laws like this are taking away more revenue than they are generating. For example, last.fm will recommend a group based on what I've been listening to. More often than not, I will listen to more of that group's music. If I like it, I find out if they are coming to a venue nearby. I go to the show and buy merchandise, because I know that's the best way to get money into the right hands.
It's kind of what I imagine FM radio used to be, but we all know what happened to that.
You know, it seems that we need to try to take lessons maybe from the Pirate Radio stations of the past and present that operate on the fringe, or in areas untouchable by the powers that be.
Too bad we can't do some kind of distributable P2P type application, that would allow anyone to run streaming music/video into the ether....but, is untraceable as to origin. Some type of freenet type thing for streaming content. That way, anyone could set up a Pirate Internet Radio Station (PIRS ?).
Is anything like this possible I wonder?
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
They obviously haven't worked out the model yet - traditional broadcasters don't pay nearly as much - in Australia the equivalent body takes less than 4%.
Listening to SomaFM Lush as I sit at my computer. Sure, they ask for money once or twice an hour and there's definitly some repeating (but I love 95% of the songs, so who cares), but I can't imagine what it'll be like with no internet radio. Sad, just sad.
I am more concerned about SomaFM. I love the Perl scripted robotic RJ.
This is just yet another example of how the current copyright regime is prima facia unconstitutional.
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries
Copyright is not a property right; copyright is an agreement between the public and authors & inventors creating a privilege of limited exclusive right as incentive for dissemination of ideas because otherwise authors & inventors have only the choice of keeping their inventions secret or sharing them that the recipient does what he or she will with the information without limitation, which is the natural right of the recipient.
Any mechanism of securing exclusive right to the author or inventor must meet two tests to be constitutional:
An attempt was made to test the absurdly long exclusive term against the "limited" requirement and that failed because any finite term is by definition limited.
The test that must now be made is against the requirement that copyright laws "promote the progress of science and the useful arts." The burden of proof should be on demonstrating that the laws do promote the progress of science and the useful arts because copyright is a limitation on the rights of the public and therefore intrinsically a burden on society. In granting copyright society temporarily yields their natural right to a privilege offered authors & inventors, a privilege that may be revoked at any time.
Current copyright laws do not pass the test of promoting the progress of science and the useful arts; they are a burden on innovation and have systematically retarded the progress of science and technology, strangling many significant innovations, once again with internet radio. Current copyright laws are therefore unconstitutional.
I'd like the RIAA to become extinct but I have a serious question. Is there anything the RIAA does that is good? I'm not looking for any negative replies - I know all the negatives. I'm just wondering if someone can tell some of the positive things that they do. There has to be at least one thing positive.
You're missing the point -- they aren't thinking in terms of "half of something is better than nothing" -- they're thinking in terms of stream rippers. They WANT internet radio to die.
Right aim, wrong motive... Streamed internet radio is ok on a pair of PC speakers... but hardly full quality like a good CD rip. Especially once it is put into a new format, and compressed even further. What is much more dangerous to the big labels is...UNSIGNED OR INDEPENDENT ARTISTS!
Internet radio can play anything and everything. No predefined time slots, no specific genres, and each listener can have something different. And if it is tagged and suggestion based like Pandora or LastFM, then it can suggest artists that don't make the labels any profit. This not only gets in the way of saturating the airwaves/tubes with the latest boy or girl band or whatever current one hit wonder is being milked, but unsigned artists are almost as bad as pirates. They take away money that belongs to the recording companies by selling music they don't get a cut of, and they have yet to think up a law that stops this happening.
If enough people start listening to internet radio stations, then the label is not needed. distribution is not a problem any more. the internet has wrecked that justification. Manufacturing CDs or vinyl, again not really essential. The one thing they have to justify their existence is promotion, and internet radio attacks that reason.
It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.
By donating to pandora you're effectively donating to SoundExchange...
just a thought
(please don't mod me troll =) )