SoundExchange, the digital royalty collection organization that convinced the Copyright Royalty Board to set royalty rates high enough to drive most innovative webcasters out of business, released a statement (PDF) in which it claims the royalty rate protest site SaveNetRadio.org is an astroturf campaign run by AOL, Yahoo, and other large-scale webcasters.
Who cares. It does appear that SaveNetRadio was set up by DiMA, which represents a number of large webcasters. But its members include Pandora, which allows users to create customized artist radio stations, Live365, which allows individuals to webcast, and NativeRadio, which webcasts Native American content. More importantly, when DiMA fought in Washington for the rights of webcasters during the CRB hearings, it represented all webcasters large and small.
Still, SoundExchange executive director Jon Simson's statement attempts to paint SaveNetRadio as a sham:
Evenif SaveNetRadio were some sort of front for large webcasting corporations,
consumers favor independent services such as Pandora anyway, accordingto a poll
conducted here over the past few days. Besides, the fact that somewebcasters are also in other profitable businesses shouldn't matter;
the point is to figure out what sort of rates will "grow the pie,"
enabling creators and distributors to grow.
It should be clear that U.S. citizens are better served by a healthy,
thriving webcasting market such as the one we are starting to seetoday. Government agencies like the Copyright Royalty Board aresupposed to represent these people, not the corporations on one side orthe other of the debate.
(image from tennpolitics)
