TBWAIN - AKA Jeff Svare's Blog

The RIAA's trained government attack dogs, the Copyright Royalty Board , has determined that Internet Radio Broadcasters must make increased royalty payments effective 15 May 2007, with the increase retroactive to 1 January 2006. This is action appears to be designed to force Internet broadcasters out of business, leaving only providers who sell DRM-encoded music at excessive prices. Estimates place the new rates at approximately $US 155/listener/year for Internet broadcasters compared to $US 25/listener/year for commercial radio stations. If you want to continue to have your listening options limited to mind-numbing top 40 with banal banter by talking heads, do nothing. If you want to let the RIAA know they've gone too far, go to SaveNetRadio.org .

No, this isn't another anti-DRM post. The Daleks have been voted the scariest villain on Doctor Who ! I'll confess that I had always thought the Cybermen were more interesting baddies than the Daleks. That was until I saw the Doomsday episode. I just loved the banter between the Daleks and Cybermen. The story can be found at Scifi.com .

On 16 April, the RIAA's happy group of yes-men determined not to rehear a plea from Internet Radio broadcasters regarding the proposed royalty payment structure. This means the new rate structure goes into effect on 15 May 2007, retroactive to 1 January 2006. Nothing short of legislative intervention will stop Internet music services from going silent on May 15th. Go to savenetradio.org and contact your elected representatives and ask them to take action. First they said I can only listen to music I've paid for on a single device. Now they are telling me I can't listen to music using the delivery mechanism I prefer.