Erm,.. i found this on another site... http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18384667/site/newsweek/... and it;s about the internet radios.. and personally.. i think yu shud read.. and does it affect PA users or any ways!?
basicaly.. they are like stopping online radio'in.. and copyrigtstuff.. i aint read all of it.. but it sounds bad! April 30, 2007 - As you read these words on your monitor, there is a decent chance that you’re also streaming a little online radio. After all, with an estimated listenership of approximately 50 million Americans per month, Internet radio has become a go-to destination for a fuller spectrum of music, an alternative to FM’s mind-numbing monotony. And if you are one of those listeners, mark May 15 on your calendar: it might well be the day that the music dies. Last month the trio of Library of Congress judges that oversees copyright law’s statutory licenses decided that May 15 will be the date royalty fees owed by Web radio operators will be recalibrated. The Copyright Royalty Board changed rates from a percentage of revenue to a per-song, per-listener fee—effectively hiking the rates between 300 and 1,200 percent, according to a lawyer representing a group of Webcasters. "If this rate does not change, it will wipe out the vast majority of Web radio," Tim Westergren, founder of the music discovery service Pandora, tells NEWSWEEK. "If this stays, we’re done. Back to the stone age again." (Royalty Board Chief Justice James Sledge declined to comment on the case, which lawyers say they intend to appeal.) The fee hike will only affect Internet radio, not terrestrial AM and FM, because of a strange wrinkle in copyright law: broadcast stations pay royalties only for the composition as a piece of intellectual property—these are the fees that go to songwriters through ASCAP, BMI and SESAC. But in 1995 the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) lobbied Congress to pass a law that would require an additional performance fee specifically on digital music. So Internet radio stations pay both the composition fee plus an additional royalty for the performance of the song—the actual act of streaming it online. This fee goes to record companies and artists through SoundExchange, an independent body set up by the RIAA to collect and distribute digital royalties. This is the fee that the Royalty Board has proposed raising. That there is a different fee structure for Internet and terrestrial radio strikes both Webcasters and SoundExchange boardmembers as inherently unfair—though for different reasons. Webcasters don’t want to have to pay more than their FM counterparts, while SoundExchange executive director Jon Simson would like to see terrestrial radio start paying the additional royalty. "The discrepancy doesn’t make sense," he says. "Terrestrial broadcasters should be paying performers." Last month the trio of Library of Congress judges that oversees copyright law’s statutory licenses decided that May 15 will be the date royalty fees owed by Web radio operators will be recalibrated. The Copyright Royalty Board changed rates from a percentage of revenue to a per-song, per-listener fee—effectively hiking the rates between 300 and 1,200 percent, according to a lawyer representing a group of Webcasters. "If this rate does not change, it will wipe out the vast majority of Web radio," Tim Westergren, founder of the music discovery service Pandora, tells NEWSWEEK. "If this stays, we’re done. Back to the stone age again." (Royalty Board Chief Justice James Sledge declined to comment on the case, which lawyers say they intend to appeal.) The fee hike will only affect Internet radio, not terrestrial AM and FM, because of a strange wrinkle in copyright law: broadcast stations pay royalties only for the composition as a piece of intellectual property—these are the fees that go to songwriters through ASCAP, BMI and SESAC. But in 1995 the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) lobbied Congress to pass a law that would require an additional performance fee specifically on digital music. So Internet radio stations pay both the composition fee plus an additional royalty for the performance of the song—the actual act of streaming it online. This fee goes to record companies and artists through SoundExchange, an independent body set up by the RIAA to collect and distribute digital royalties. This is the fee that the Royalty Board has proposed raising. That there is a different fee structure for Internet and terrestrial radio strikes both Webcasters and SoundExchange boardmembers as inherently unfair—though for different reasons. Webcasters don’t want to have to pay more than their FM counterparts, while SoundExchange executive director Jon Simson would like to see terrestrial radio start paying the additional royalty. "The discrepancy doesn’t make sense," he says. "Terrestrial broadcasters should be paying performers." and it continues!....
ehhhh so technically everyone is just shutting it down eh.... why cant we just have like a little place where only certain ppl can access
If they keep going at this pace by raising new fees and laws, we won't have much fun on internet anymore. Imagine this: wach time before you enter a site you have to pay first because the the site owners have to pay RIAA/SoundExchange and the likes for using copyrighted stuff. Internet should be a place of freedom of information (to a certain extent; I don't claim it should be like the Wild West where everyone can do whatever he likes) and not become a new economic space for companies only.
