Web radio stations have 60 more days to try to reverse a ruling that many say will shutter thousands of Web radio broadcasters. A rate increase against Web broadcasters will not go into affect May 15, as expected. Instead Web broadcasters will have until July 15 to pay up. Web radio supporters see this as good news giving them more time to fight the rate hike.
The Copyright Royalty Board made a rule official on Tuesday that forces commercial Internet radio stations, regardless of their size, to pay a new, higher flat fee to the record labels each time a song is played. Because the final ruling on the rate increase was issued in May, not April as originally expected, by law the Web broadcaster do not have to pay until 45 days after the end of the month the rule is issued, according sources at the Copyright Royalty Board.
Royalty rates for Web-casters - starting retroactively at $0.0008 per song in 2006 will climb to $0.0019 per song in 2010. That nearly triple the amount of royalties Internet radio broadcasters pay to copyright holders for playing a song, says Jake Ward, spokesperson for SaveNetRadio.
Ward says Web broadcasters need this time to re-double their efforts to fight the rate increase. Ward and others are pinning their hopes on legislation that has been introduced to Congress that will nullify the CRB's rate hike.
"This Titanic rate increase is simply untenable for many Internet radio broadcasters," said U.S. Reps. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.). Inslee and Don Manzullo (R-Ill.) filed the legislation last month that could reverse federal Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) rule issued May 2.
Ward says that the Inslee-Manzullo bill, called, Internet Radio Equality Act, has already received enormous support in Congress with 33 co-sponsors.
It's widely believed a similar companion bill will be introduced to the Senate by Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) within weeks.
Actually, moving the due date from May 15th to July 15th gives about *60* more days, not 30 more days, if my math skills are correct.
I guess I don't get it? .0019 is still extreamly cheap. There are 1,440 minutes in a day assuming each song is avg 3 minutes long and there are no commecials, commentary, or pauses you would get to play 480 songs a day. The royalty at .0019 for 480 songs is only 91.2 cents per day? That equal $332.88 per year? Am I missing something?
-Tonboc
Tonboc...you're fogeting that your calculation every listener that connects to the sight....
Tonboc...you're fogeting that your calculation must include every listener that connects to the sight....
With those calculations, someone stands to make a great deal of money. My question is who get's it? Does the artist recieve it, the label, managment, or does the person who collects the money get the majority of the cash. It seems to me the only people who can afford to pay those kind of royalties are the big music companies that have mega budgets.
Also. I am a small time musician. Lets say I release a cd and one of the local Internet radio station picks it up and plays one of my tracks. I know the guys and give them permission to do this. They have to pay for every song they play. Does this mean I will get money for my song?
MrCrystalball
As a happy Skype subscriber (I found it takes up the slack nicely since I abandoned my landline 3 years ago), I'm rooting for Joost.
But I do have to say that I was seriously underimpressed by their initial line-up of content/channels. And the fact that they're having trouble keeping up is kind of surprising, given the pants-on-two-legs-at-a-time reputation of the founders.