Prior to these changes, (92)
webcasters were exempt from paying
The
webcasters in question include AOL, Clear Channel, iTunes, Live 365, MSN Music, Napster, Pandora, RealNetworks, Rhapsody and Yahoo ("Subject
Webcasters").
Small
webcasters have a variety of economic arrangements with third parties, the most common being agreements with bandwidth providers and advertisers.
Under the latest proposal, new commercial
Webcasters like Blake would have more than one option in choosing how to pay royalties over the next two years.
The two sides had reached a compromise a few weeks earlier that would allow small
webcasters to pay a percentage of their revenue or expenses, with the hopes that Congress would pass it into law before payments were due.
Alma Media's share in the company, Intervisio Oy, is to be 34% while
Webcasters is to hold a 66% majority share.
Commented Miles, "Over 200
Webcasters, and others who attend our meetings in different cities and direct us via email and teleconferences with their concerns and issues (including advisors from regulatory and licensing bodies and competitors), join us in the feeling that if we can bring issues of global importance to this group, we can look for the strategies to strengthen the industry which will help everyone in the long term.
The suite's components collectively extend viewing times for live-streamed events, with consumers,
webcasters and advertisers benefiting from more engaging interaction," said John Petrocelli, vice president of sales and business development for AEG Digital Media.
The review of 2006 royalty payments conducted by SoundExchange demonstrates that, through Savenetradio, the big
webcasters are painting a highly distorted picture in an effort to maintain extremely low rates and high profit margins.
Facing a financial crunch as a result of retroactive royalty fees that initially counted each song and each listener as individual payment due, thousands of independent
Webcasters simply threw in the towel.
Battle lines have been drawn up between the US recording industry and
webcasters who stream music online in a dispute involving copyright-protection on the Internet.
Like any international entrepreneurs,
Webcasters also face such traditional business considerations as international taxation, antitrust regulations, consumer protection laws (including those related to advertising) and other issues of commercial law.
