14 DAY TRIAL // Numerous famous companies, including MTV, Yahoo, Pandora and Rhapsody allied to fight against the "outrageous" rates set by the Copyright Royalty Board in Washington, D.C. If you didn't know, the organization imposed shocking rates, the minimum fee for webcasting being approximately $500. Because there is no way to modify the rates, numerous companies decided to protest against them by creating the Internet Radio Day Of Silence. Basically, this is an alliance of the largest Internet radio that decided to broadcast only silence to the listeners from every corner of the world. Yes, no music today, only silence!
Among the largest companies that are broadcasting only silence, we can mention Yahoo, Pandora, MTV, Real Rhapsody, WXPN and KCRW. However, there are also famous firms that refused to join the alliance, such as Last.fm but the company's officials refused to comment on the reason for the refusal.
As Ian Rogers, General Manager, Yahoo Music, said, the decision was somehow influenced by Sound Exchange, a company that imposed the fees without analyzing the consequences.
"Unfortunately the CRB made a mistake, handed Sound Exchange a loaded gun and gave them the option to shoot Internet radio dead. How the CRB came from the testimony presented to this outcome is a complete mystery to everyone involved. I'm guessing Sound Exchange is nearly as puzzled as we are at this point," he said.
And this is not all. Many of the Internet radios are analyzing the matter and it seems that they're planning to shut down their stations starting with July 15, the day when the new fees are becoming official. "Many webcasters are planning to shut off access to their streams entirely, while other webcasters plan to replace their music streams with long periods of silence (or static or ocean sounds or similar) interspersedwith occasional brief public service announcements on the subject," Kurt Hanson reported.