Copyright office issues final internet radio ruling

SaveInternetRadio.org, US Copyright Office & KurtHanson.com | 6.20.02 | Kurt Hanson

[mhking]

The US Copyright Office has just issued their new ruling on the copyright fees internet broadcasters wil be forced to pay. Though the fees for web-only broadcasters have been cut in half to match those of broadcast stations, some webcasters will be forced out of business by the fees which will have to be paid retroactively to 1998.

No word from the RIAA, but one has to imagine that Hilary Rosen and her crew are applauding the death of yet another competing medium.

Additional details are due later on with the release of a late edition of today's Radio & Internet Newsletter.

[mhking]

Excerpts from the decision:

"The Librarian is required to accept the CARP’s determination unless he concludes that the determination is arbitrary or contrary to the applicable provisions of the copyright law. When aspects of the CARP’s determination are found to be arbitrary or contrary to law, the Librarian may substitute his own judgment for that of the CARP, but he will still give deference to those aspects of the CARP’s determination which were not arbitrary or contrary to law.

"Applying those principles, the Librarian accepted the CARP’s conclusion that the RIAA/Yahoo! agreement represented the best evidence of what rates would have been negotiated in the marketplace between a willing buyer and a willing seller for a license to engage in webcasting of radio retransmissions and Internet-only transmissions...."

[mhking]

"Significant error re: promotional value..."

"However, the Librarian concluded that the CARP misinterpreted some aspects of the RIAA/Yahoo! agreement. One of the most significant errors by the CARP was its conclusion that the parties must have agreed that radio retransmissions have a tremendous positive promotional impact on sales of phonorecords – an impact that it did not find Internet-only transmissions have – and that this promotional impact explained the decision of RIAA and Yahoo! to set a higher rate for Internet-only transmissions.

"In fact, both the broadcasters (who benefitted from the CARP’s conclusion regarding promotional value) and RIAA agree that there was no evidence in the record to support the conclusion that RIAA and Yahoo! considered and made adjustments for promotional value for radio retransmissions. The Librarian agreed with the Register of Copyrights that the CARP’s conclusion about promotional value was arbitrary and was not supported by the evidence in the record, which provided no basis for concluding that radio retransmissions provide a promotional value that Internet-only transmissions do not provide..."

[Lazamataz]

Well, on the other side of the equation, this will force many internet webcasters to charge a nominal fee (unless commercials can fund it) and if this is the case, I would consider paying such a nominal fee for clear and uninterrupted performances, since radio reception is impossible in my building.

Additionally, if there is a webcast to a 'repeater' and people tune into the repeater, they only need to collect .0007 cents per performance no matter how many people tune into the repeater. Therefore, commercials are very likely to be able to support it.

[mhking]

Well, on the other side of the equation, this will force many internet webcasters to charge a nominal fee (unless commercials can fund it)

As a hobbyist looking at launching my own server, I'm watching the analysis play out on this very closely. For most who do this as a hobby, we have no extra money to pay Hilary Rosen and her cronies just because she says so. If it comes to that, I'll locate a server in Canada or something.

[Lazamataz]

I would be interested in working with you on this venture.

[Lazamataz]

Well wait a minute.

24 hours a day * 60 minutes = 1440 minutes.

Assume no commericials and no announcements, and that each song is 3 minutes long.

1440 / 3 minutes per song = 480 songs.

480 * $0.0007 = $0.336 per day.

The cost would range from $9.41 to $10.39 a month.

This is certainly a nominal cost.

[agitator]

Unless I'm mistaken, the rate is per song, per performance, per listener.

[THEUPMAN]

The cost would range from $9.41 to $10.39 a month.

what private school did you attend? ... or was it home school?

[rwfromkansas]

Wow.....that isn't going to be putting people out of business.

[Lazamataz]

Unless I'm mistaken, the rate is per song, per performance, per listener.

They say this cost is similar to broadcast listeners, and there is no way to reliably know how many broadcast listeners there are. Therefore I assume (perhaps erroneously) that this is per broadcast and not per broadcast, per listener.

[Lazamataz]

Neither. Public school. ;^)

[B Knotts]

I've heard repeatedly that this is per listener.

[Lazamataz]

Wow.....that isn't going to be putting people out of business.

Unless I am mistaken about the particulars, I don't think so. Of course, this is retro to '98, so that is 4 years * about $120 a year, or $480 ... so for SUPER low budget webcasters, yeah, it could snuff them.

[AAABEST]

PUSH BACK. BOYCOTT THE RIAA

[July 4th]

Some of the best music I have downloaded recently has been from websites of the bands themselves. They make their own CD's and sell them, or they allow you to download MP3's from the album.

The era of big record companies is dead. Artists used to need them - they were, in essence, venture capitalists. Production cost a lot, and there was no way to distribute music on your own. Artists needed the support.

Now, recording studios are everywhere, while the quality of home recording systems has made great gains. After you're done recording, you can burn your own CD's or make a website. With cheap digital video equipment and a PC, you can make your own music video.

The record companies are helplessly trying to hold on to something they've already lost.

[Lazamataz]

I have confirmed that this is, indeed, per listener. Therefore if you have 100 listeners on average all day long, this would become $1000 per month.

There will be a lot of pirate and bootlegging going on. This is pretty bad and will shut down internet radio outright.

When legislation kills technology, look for extreme rebellion.

[general_re]

You beat me to it, but I was going to correct you - it's definitely per listener. They use the Arbitron numbers in regular radio to estimate listenership, and they'll find something similar for this, believe me...

[Lazamataz]

Well there goes internet radio. It's gone. They killed it.

F***ing RIAA. I will now make it point to boot as many songs as possible. I cannot remember when I last purchased a industry CD.