From Radio & Internet Newsletter:

In a column today about the ongoing judicial appeal of the 2006-10 CRB royalty decision, San Francisco-based MarketWatch columnist Therese Poletti writes, "The dysfunctional music industry suffers from a classic case of biting the hand that feeds it.

"Over the last two years," she notes, "record companies have tried to squeeze excessive royalties from Internet-radio stations — the very stations that can help fuel future digital-music sales — and it's endangering some Web-based radio firms." Poletti argues that the exposure and sales Internet radio affords and generates are benefits, not challenges to the embattled industry.

Most who are close to negotiations seem to want to stay mum about the situation; Poletti says reps of Pandora and SoundExchange didn't want to talk to her.

But Michael Spiegelman, head of Yahoo Music, is somewhat more removed, as his company recently turned over its webcasting business to CBS Radio (as has AOL, both companies citing the rising costs of licensing as a major impetus). Spiegelman told MarketWatch, "Internet radio facilitated discovery while compensating artists and labels for their effort. They may feel in the short term (the high royalty rate) gets them a better revenue stream. But in the short term, it's driving the Webcasters out of business."

Closer to the action is Jon Potter, head of DiMA (Digital Media Association, which represents large company webcasters). He says the record industry isn't even actually negotiating. "We were presented with a take-it-or-leave-it offer from SoundExchange. It was unacceptable."

Poletti, a senior columnist for MarketWatch, concludes, "I hope the appellate court is more sympathetic to the young Webcasting firms than the CRB. But the music industry never should have let their negotiations derail this badly. Once again, the industry seems to be using artists as a cover for incessant greed. Instead, they should encourage as much legal digital music as possible."

Read the entire MarketWatch story here.

Labels: accuradio, copyright royalty board, crb, digital freedom, electronic rights, house of representatives, HR 2060, internet radio equality act, riaa, soundexchange

No, not that kind of briefs. Legal briefs, silly. The briefs are part of webcasters' appeal before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to overturn the Copyright Royalty Board's monumental March 2007 mistake raising far beyond reason the copyright royalty rate on internet radio.

From The Radio And Internet Newsletter (RAIN):

According to the timeline currently in place, the briefs of the various webcasters are due on Feb. 25.

The brief of the CRB, represented by the Department of Justice, is due on April 25, and SoundExchange’s brief is due on May 15. The reply briefs are due on June 12, but oral arguments have not yet been scheduled. Such a calendar suggests that the appeal will be decided at the end of 2008, at the earliest.

Until then, the parties may continue to negotiate and reach agreement outside of court, as has already occurred. SoundExchange, representing the music industry, has shown a desire to achieve separate agreements among the parties, rather than a comprehensive settlement that covers all parties…

The royalty rate legislation that is before Congress, if enacted, may ultimately nullify the Court of Appeals’ decision and any agreements SoundExchange has entered.

Still, what is needed is a rate structure that is technology-neutral…

Read bout it in the New York Law Journal via KurtHanson.com.

Labels: capitol hill, copyright royalty board, crb, digital freedom, electronic rights, house of representatives, HR 2060, S 1353

From SaveNetRadio.org:

Thank you once again for your support of the SaveNetRadio Campaign. On Wednesday morning, the Senate Commerce Committee will meet to hold a hearing on the future of radio in the United States. Representatives from broadcast radio, music industry, and Internet radio will testify before the committee about the current state of the radio industry and how royalty fees and other issues, like competition and innovation, affect the future of the industry. This is an unprecedented opportunity for Internet radio to explain its value to Congress, and we need your help to make sure they are listening.

Please take a moment to call Senator Boxer at (202) 224 - 3553 and ask her to attend this important hearing. The Internet Radio Equality Act is still pending in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives; this hearing will give Members an opportunity to learn more about this legislation - make sure they don't miss it. Please call now.

It is helpful when calling your congressional representatives to give the following information:

* I am a constituent, and an Internet radio listener calling to ask that as a member of the Senate Commerce Committee, the Senator attend Wednesday's hearing on the future of radio.

* Internet radio has been a revolutionary force in the music industry since its creation and now empowers artist, consumers, and music lovers of every kind. The Copyright Royalty Board's unprecedented and ill informed decision to increase royalty fees for Webcasters by more than 300% has threatened to bankrupt this important industry and we need the Senator's help.

* The real future of radio for music lovers, artists, and the music industry as a whole is online. To save this industry and allow it to prosper, there must be parity and equality between webcasters, satellite radio, and broadcast radio. Today Internet radio pays a recording royalty fee more than twice that of satellite radio, and terrestrial radio pays none at all. To fix this unfair and inexplicable inequality, please cosponsor the Internet Radio Equality Act, S. 1353, pending in the Senate today.

Again, please call Senator Boxer at (202) 224 - 3553 and ask her to attend this important hearing. Thank you once again for your support of the SaveNetRadio campaign, this issue could not have gotten the attention it has without your support and cannot move any further without your continued efforts.

Labels: capitol hill, copyright royalty board, crb, house of representatives, HR 2060, internet radio equality act, riaa, S 1353, savenetradio.org, soundexchange

This week SoundExchange, the organization created to disperse royalty payments from internet radio to artist, unveiled a new settlement offer to small webcasters. This "offer" is a joke. For a small webcaster looking to strike a fair deal it is completely useless.

The offer is a smokescreen intended to make it appear to Congress, the media, and the public that the RIAA is negotiating in good faith with webcasters. Perhaps the pre-recess threat by Senators Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Sam Brownback (R-KS) to bring the Internet Radio Equality Act to the Senate floor inspired this latest non-starter of an offer.

Such an offer is also part of a divide and conquer strategy -- webcasters big and small, interactive and non-interactivem have remained largely united in this fight. Now that the RIAA (through it's front group SoundExchange, through it's front group musicFIRST) is trying to extend this performance royalty fee to terrestrial radio, the coalition will grow in both size and power. I look forward to having the National Association of Broadcasters on our side in this battle.

Back to the "offer" at hand:

*SoundExchange insists on an annual revenue cap of $1.25 million to define "small webcaster." The revenue cap for over-the-air broadcasters to be considered a small business is $6.5 million -- why such a disparity? Why any disparity?

What this revenue cap effectively does is punish successful internet radio stations for being ...successful! If Webcaster A has revenues of $1,249,999.99 million, Webcaster A pays a percentage of that revenue to SoundExchange and stays in business. If Webcaster B earns $1 more than Webcaster A, the royalty rates increase to those set in the fatally flawed March 2, 2007 Copyright Royalty Board rate hike. Webcaster B would owe more in this one fee than was earned all year, which puts Webcaster B in debt and out of business. Damn that extra dollar earned.

This is SoundExchange insisting that webcasters accept a disincentive to grow as part of the deal.

*The SoundExchange offer only covers the music of its 20,000 members, not the hundreds of thousands of recording artists getting played on internet radio, so if webcasters play anything by anyone not on their member list, the bankruptcy-level Copyright Royalty Board rates come back into play.

*This settlement offer sunsets in 2010, at which time webcasters will have to go through all of this again and not be allowed to mention this deal as precedent when the RIAA once again attempts to gouge and ultimately control what gets played on internet radio.

Please, Congress: re-write the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or section 114 of copyright law, to update the misguided provisions written into law over a decade ago (which is forever in computer chronology -- most people didn't even have at-home access to the internet in 1998!).

Update (8/23): an interesting take on the motives for the recent SoundExchange smokescreen.

Labels: copyright royalty board, crb, house of representatives, HR 2060, internet radio equality act, musicFIRST, riaa, riaa sucks, S 1353, soundexchange

It's August. For most of you that means warm weather and cold lemonade. For me that means it's cold and foggy here on the west side of San Francisco. Truth be told I much prefer this weather to what I experienced earlier in the week when I visited Washinton DC with some friends/colleagues from SomaFM and Reapandsow. It was hot and muggy, and each day during our short walk to the Hill I shvitzed like nobody's business. Fortunately the buildings were air conditioned...

Thanks to much prep-work by Elise of SomaFM we had lots of meetings scheduled and informative printed materials to leave behind. We ran around from office to office explaining our side of the internet radio/copyright royalty issue. What piqued concerned interest again and again was that negotiations between SoundExchange and webcasters were not, as far as we knew, progressing. From some very smart and knowledgeable aides we learned a whole lot about the legislative process, the Interjet Radio Equality Act (as viewed by the Hill), and that our issue is sort of the tip of an iceberg. A massive confluence of copyright issues is coming to a head now.

We sat in on a hearing about extending the performance copyright royalty fee to terrestrial radio. All of the Representatives' opening statements assumed that this royalty rate would be extended to cover over-the-air readio. Rep. Darrell "Total Recall Election" Issa (R - CA.) said, "In my seven years in Congress, this is the first time that, in a no ifs, ands, or buts way, it's been made clear that the status quo will no longer be acceptable." The only witness called on behalf of radio was left to defend himself against the entire committee and four other witnesses. He was set-up as the piñata from the start. The debate was framed: big radio vs. artists. There was almost no mention of the big labels, who are behind this push and stand to reap at least 50% of the rewards.

The largely foreign-owned mega-conglomerates that own the major labels are not nearly as sympathetic figures as geriatric artists, hence their invisibility at the hearing.

Read more about the hearing here, here, or here. Also, check out the comments from my Wednesday blog post, including guest appearances by the wife/manager of Sam "Soul Man" Moore and a member of the board of SoundExchange.

Finally, in his blog, Wil Wheaton references and weighs in on Rusty from SomaFM's DC dispatches. Read what Rusty writes, that man is a wealth of information.

The best post-trip news thusfar is that U.S. Senators Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Ron Wyden (D-OR), the Senate sponsors of the Internet Radio Equality Act, issued a press release saying they have become aware that little progress is being made in negotiations between SoundExchange and webcasters. The press release states,

If great progress toward a fair solution for webcasters is not made by Congress’s return to Washington after Labor Day, then we plan to take expeditious steps toward passage of the Internet Radio Equality Act. We feel the Senate must take action, and we will make every effort move the Internet Radio Equality Act to the floor.

Now that's what I like to hear! (Strange bedfellows, I know, but you go to the Senate floor with the sponsors you have, I always say).

As many of you know, the next BAGeL Radio Presents... show is this Monday, August 6th at The Elbo Room featuring The Otherside, Bears, and Slings. I hope that you can make it out -- read about the bands below next to the flier for the show.

Please tune in to today's edition of "480 Minutes" which runs from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Pacific Time, and as always you can request songs:

e-mail: feedback@bagelradio.com
Yahoo IM: bagelradio
AOL/iChat: bagelradiolive
MSN Msgr: bagelradio@hotmail.com
GoogleTalk: bagelradio@gmail.com

The music will not suck.

Upcoming Bay Area Gigs of Interest:

Marnie Stern/ Sholi/ Crime in Choir @ Bottom of the Hill 8/3

Lee Scratch Perry/ Dub is a Weapon @ Independent 8/4&5

Violent Femmes @ The Fillmore 8/4

BAGeL Radio Presents...
The Otherside
Bears
Slings
@ Elbo Room 8/6

One of BAGeL Radio's favorite San Francisco bands, THE OTHERSIDE play psychedelic shoegaze. Imagine The Byrds smoking peyote with Ride and Interpol -- the contact high is worth the price of admission. Fans of Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and Stone Roses will love THE OTHERSIDE.

All the way from Cleveland OH. -- it's BEARS, in their first-ever San Francisco show! Fans of The Shins, Peter Bjorn & John, and Camera Obscura will love BEARS' catchy indie pop.

SLINGS, an OC via Gainsville FL. band, open the show with their Yo La Belle & Garfunkel Neutral Milk wash of campfire melodies backed with acoustic guitar, xylophone, melodica, and accordian sounds.

Jewish Heritage Night: Giants vs. Nationals @ AT& T Park 8/8

**HIJK (CD Release)/ The Invisible Cities/ Show Me State 8/9

*The Wombats @ Popscene 8/9

Squeeze @ The Mountain Winery 8/14

*Birdmonster @ Cafe du Nord 8/18

Earlimart/ String Dream Team @ Cafe du Nord 8/23

Psychic TV @ Independent 8/24

Beastie Boys @ The Warfield 8/24

Beastie Boys @ The Greek Theatre 8/25

Mickey Avalon @ Slim's 8/28

Gogol Bordello @ The Fillmore 8/29

Crowded House @ Mountain Winery 8/29

**Music For Animals/ Magic Bullets/ Dreamdate/ Transfer @ Great American Music Hall 9/1
Brian Jonestown Massacre/ Dimmer @ The Independent 9/3

*Okkervil River/ Damien Jurado @ The Independent 9/5

*Devendra Banhart @ Palace of Fine Arts 9/7

Wolf Parade/ Holy Fuck @ Great American Music Hall 9/12

Editors @ The Fillmore 9/20

The White Stripes/ Cold War Kids @ The Greek Theatre 9/21

Low @ Great American Music Hall 9/25 & 26

Bye Bye Blackbirds/ Statuesque @ Starry Plough 9/29

They Might Be Giants @ The Fillmore 9/30

Interpol @ Gill Graham Civic Auditorium 10/20

Of Montreal/ Grand Buffet/ MGMT @ Great American Music Hall 11/12

more upcoming shows

* = I'm there

** = I'm DJing

Labels: "480 Minutes", capitol hill, copyright royalty board, house of representatives, internet radio equality act, soundexchange