Pitchfork

With the impending July 15 royalty payouts looming, things had been looking awfully grim for internet radio broadcasters. Many recent legal manouevers taken by webcasters that sought to delay their impending payments to sound recording copyright owners had fallen short of their goals, and the potentially devastating royalty rate increases (and the massive monetary exchanges that go with them) seemed all but assured.

Thursday afternoon, all that changed. According to Wired magazine's blog and confirmed by various sources, SoundExchange executive director Jon Simson promised Congress that his organization-- which collects the payments on these sound recording copyrights-- will not enforce the rate increase as long as a new deal is in the works between SoundExchange and the webcasters involved in the Copyright Royalty Board hearing. Additionally, the per-channel minimums which would've potentially crushed multi-channel sites like Pandora and Live365 are off the table, and the per-station minimum will be capped at $50,000 per year.

There's still some question as to whether webcasters who didn't participate in the CRB hearing will be privy to this reprieve. But beyond that, this is fantastic news for broadcasters and fans of internet radio.

And just in case you thought this whole representative democracy thing of ours doesn't work, Pandora founder Tim Westergren's claim that "this is a direct result of lobbying pressure, so if anyone thinks their call didn't matter, it did" ought to set you straight. The people spoke, and progress was made, but you'd still be advised to contact your Congressperson and tell them to keep pushing for fair play for broadcasters. And stay tuned to Savenetradio.org for updates.

Rock on, net radio!