Comments on: Music industry offers deal to small Webcasters

Group says "small" Webcasters can escape fee hikes, but Net radio operators attack offer as a ploy to stunt the medium's growth.

[skeptik]

BS, pure and simple.

"The net result of this proposal is that small Webcasters would be guaranteed no increase in royalty payments for 13 years, from 1998 to 2010," SoundExchange general counsel Michael Huppe said in a statement."

Sounds more like 2.5 years to me. And retroactive assessments of fees are BS. How could a web radio operator make a decision on whether they can afford to operate under an unknown rate increase applied to today if they won't be told about it for 2 years?

Would anyone buy any service if they were told the seller could come back in 2 years and charge them more if they wanted? Since the buyer would have already used the service they would have no choice but to pay or go bankrupt. Sounds like extortion.

[isaacm30]

Ghosts?

I made my one and omly (so far) podcast the other day.
Most if not all of my recordings are by artists long since gone, from us.
how will the leeches disrute the royalties to these artists?
It gets stupider all the time!
How do I pay royalties when I don't have anyway to know if any one heard my podcast anyway?
How unfair that an internet radio could be charged for the listeners it has, when we hear jukeboxes blasting out everywhere. How are their listeners counted?

[isaacm30]

Ghosts?

I made my one and only (so far) podcast the other day.
Most if not all of my recordings are by artists long since gone, from us.
How will the leeches disribute the royalties to these artists?
It gets stupider all the time!
How do I pay royalties when I don't have any way to know if any one heard my podcast anyway?
How unfair that an internet radio could be charged for the listeners it has, when we hear jukeboxes blasting out everywhere. How are their listeners counted?