I covered Friday's announcement by the Copyright Royalty Board on Sunday, but now I've had time to call sources and put together a full news story with more detail. One of the more interesting tidbits in that is that even the labels might think the rates are too high. They apparently see online radio as one of the only bright spots on the technological landscape, and don't want to see it go away.
On the other hand, they've done many similar things in the past... like when they refused to license their music to Napster so that everyone went to Gnutella and Kazaa, or when they sued MP3.com for it's My.MP3.com service, which allowed you to listen to music once you proved you owned the physical CD. In other words, when it comes to digital media, the labels have acted against their own interests in the past. We'll soon see whether they have the wisdom to keep webcasters in business.
Anyway, here's the full article, with exclusive quotes from the CEO of Pandora and more:
Royalty Hike Panics Webcasters
(image from mnispi.org)
