14 DAY TRIAL // Savenetradio and those who really care about the online radio stations have won a significant battle yesterday as the Congress has passed a bill in favor of the webcasters and nullifying the most rude and obscene ruling the Copyright Royalty Board had emitted in early March. Basically, the congressmen were moved by the amount of people who called in and reported the barbaric abuse coming from CRB and decided to make a decisive move onto solving this problem and saving the webcasters from certain extinction.
Representative Jay Inslee (D-WA) and eight co-sponsors were the main group behind this providential bill and overruled the CRB decision while at the same time stating clear and fair settlement in the matter of the fees the webcasters must pay. From the outrageous CRB proposal, things came decently down to reasonable money and even more, the bill lets the webcasters choose what suits their business better: per listener, hour fees or fixed percentage from revenues.
So now things came to a halt (the good way): 0.33cents per listener hour or 7.5% from the revenues - webcasters should do their math and opt in for one of the proposed fee-plans. The current bill also rules that the minimum fees can not be higher than $500, thus closing the door for CRB and their money-hunger. No more planned royalty fee-raises until 2010 and all the salvage crap CRB hurried to instantly adopt as SoundExchange initially proposed.
As I've said before, SoundExchange sniffed ahead and learned that their rudeness will not be forgiven by the mass of Internet radio listeners and there will be trouble. Their last release claimed that they were willing and open for discussions with the webcasters and wanted to talk things over... Bulls**t! They had just released such crap because it was their only possible "insurance" for the moment the s**t would hit the fan, namely Jay Inslee's yesterday announcement.
Savenetradio managed to raise consciousness in the matter of the webcasting fees and now all the efforts are concentrated in Internet radio supporters still contacting their congressmen and asking them to co-sponsor the Inslee bill. Still no word from CRB or Sound Exchange but I presume there isn't much happiness at their headquarters...
And finally, the actual happening of the "Day of Silence" scheduled for May 8th is still unclear, even though RAIN (Radio and Internet Newsletter) are still gathering forces and stay put. CRB you've had it! Congrats to Mr. Inslee and all those who stood by. The war isn't over yet, though...