Hello everyone, I am QforQ, owner and founder of Vanguard Radio. Vanguard Radio is an online radio station dedicated to the Vanguard: Saga of Heroes community and operates 24/7, broadcasting both music and unique content.
On March 2nd the Copyright Royalty Board announced the new rates that internet radio stations will be charged between 2006 and 2010. These rates will rise every year, to 300-1200 percent higher than what it is now. They now want to charge us per "performance", which is one song per listener. So for instance if we have 50 listeners and play one song, that's 50x we're charged at a flat rate.
These increases in costs could sky rocket our costs from about $600 a year to between $6,000 and $12,000 a year(just some simple math I did). This would make it a HUGE burden to keep operating under these costs, and a rise like this will put most internet radio stations out of business.
So please, we do and stations just like us need your help! Please go to http://www.SaveNetRadio.org and contact your congress representatives today! They need to know important this is to you and people like you! 50-70 million americans listen to internet radio every month and this could be the last month that they will be able to!
Comments
Could be a great way of income for a small country. Put the rates at 10000$ for song/listener, get few goverment ppl online and then demand the money from US stations. Would that work? Ofc not.
Even if the servers are housed outside the united states, station owners have to pay these rates if they have listeners INSIDE the united states. Sadly, it's not that easy to just move a server :(
I guess many radio stations will have to play their music from servers outside USA and pay local rates or nothing at all. Another great move from the american recording industry.
I've heard this being talked about a lot on internet radios (outside of gaming) as well. I suggest anyone who enjoys these express your opinion.
omg, that rate increase is crazy