The SoundExchange Billion Dollar Administrative Fee 127
palewook writes "On June 7th, Yahoo, RealNetworks, Pandora, and Live365 sent letters to US lawmakers emphasizing they owe SoundExchange 'administrative fees' of more than $1 billion dollars a year. These fees would be paid for the 'privilege' of collecting the increased CRB royalties effective July 15th, unless the Internet Radio Equality Act passes Congress. SoundExchange, the non-profit music industry entity, admits the levied charge of $500 per 'channel' is supposed to only cover their administrative costs. Last year, SoundExchange collected a total of $20 million dollars from the Internet radio industry. Under the new 'administrative fee' RealNetworks, which hosted 400,000 unique subscribed channels in 2006, would owe an annual administrative charge of 200 million dollars in addition to the retroactive 2006 rate hike per song played."
Just like a cancer (Score:5, Insightful)
What's not mentioned... (Score:5, Insightful)
Only Americans will be silenced (Score:5, Insightful)
We'll still be able to listen to Russian stations.
Where's you're "In Soviet Russia..." joke now, bitches?
no love lost with Real Networks, BUT - (Score:5, Insightful)
While I don't advocate someone blowing their office to flinders with a bomb or some other evil terroristic act, I am surprised that it hasn't happened yet (one would think that with all the loosely bound people in the USA, one of them would have freaked out by now and targeted them...)
What I DO advocate is that the RIAA and the MPAA and their associated organisations be banned and eliminated and the music and film artists and industry re-organise itself along more open and egalitarian lines.
RS
Re:I'm so conflicted (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What's not mentioned... (Score:5, Insightful)
This is always touted as one of Microsoft's lessons learned - be involved in the government. Part of this is probably due to a belief that the anti-trust lawsuit was a vendetta brought on by more politically savvy sour-grapes competitors. I don't agree. But I do think it was only a matter of time for Microsoft to get involved anyway.
Microsoft is a large entity with a vested interest in how the market behaves. And the market itself is large enough to touch on almost every aspect of our lives (its what "we" always knew would happen back in the '80s with our little hobbiest microcomputers waxing poetic about the future). With the market so important, Congress is going to get involved eventually... mainly at the prodding of lobbyists from other industries touched by the expanding IT market. It makes sense that Microsoft would decide to have its views put in the ears of Congress as well.
Does this mean Congress-critters are demanding payouts? I'm not so sure its exactly that (although I would expect it is accurate in some cases). But I am positive you're not going to be well represented if those that would represent your view are unaware of what that view is. Or even worse... people with an opposing view have managed to convince your favorite Congress-critter that reality lines up with their viewpoint (queue this post's theme song [youtube.com]).
Re:My heroes (Score:1, Insightful)
If it would be 99% administrative costs then we have to share a very small part of the remaining 1% with artist! That would make no sense at all.
Re:Only Americans will be silenced (Score:4, Insightful)
Privacy in the US isn't what it was anymore.
Re:Just like a cancer (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Just like a cancer (Score:5, Insightful)
Creative Non-Violent Protest: Don't Effing Pay (Score:2, Insightful)
just use internet media outside USA? (Score:2, Insightful)
for the American media consumer to listen to internet radio from provider outside the USA?
The US GOV and commercial media can certainly herd the mass, though for the computer literate
it is possible that they go outside USA while sitting at home in USA?
Either way, the USA is turning into terrible place with much economic stagnation, not to
mention that general intellect is simply absent there.
Re:The Net Is Almost Too Disgusting Any More (Score:1, Insightful)
Well then do us all a favor and stop doing it.
The Fee is Per Channel... (Score:5, Insightful)
If Pandora has ten thousand listeners like me, that's twenty thousand stations times $500 per station is ten million dollars. That's probably enough to kill Pandora and any other customizable channel internet radio site. But if the internet radio site only had say five channels, that's only $2,500, easily affordable by a commercial site.
My conclusion from this little exercise is that the RIAA is out to kill customizable channels. They don't want you to learn about music on your own. They only want you to listen to whatever the latest pop sensation is. They want to eliminate choice and the extra expense of having so many artists. If they can make it so all you ever hear is the generic artist of the moment, that's all you'll know and all you'll buy.
This is all about control. RIAA wants to make sure they control not just your access to their artists but your ability to discover new artists not under their contracts. Internet radio is a growing force and a growing threat to their ability to pick what music you buy.
I can only hope that they have overreached; that the huge amount of money involved here makes their motives visible to Congress. And that Congress cares. That sure makes it sound like a lost cause, doesn't it?