Last year I arranged with my college radio station and ITS department to webcast the radiostation using icecast. The webcast has been a wonderful success so far. My problem now is not technical, but political. A few days ago I recieved the following message from the station director: =================================================================hey josh, i talked to [faculty advisor] today and was told we must stop our online streaming. reasons for this rash decision involve around a new law that was put in place over the summer saying that stations who broadcast online have to pay royalties, but the amount to be paid has yet to be specified. apparently, a number of college stations have stopped streaming in fear that the royalties will involve a huge amount of money. within grinnell, because grinnell college got in trouble with the FCC and fined 20,000 dollars last time they were here, the college lawyers are unwilling for us to risk getting in trouble again by broadcasting without paying - and they're scared the money we'll have to pay will be lots lots. so until some mystical nationwide beaucracy tells us how much royalties we have to pay (a few months, says [faculty advisor]) we're not allowed to broadcast online. this sucks a lot, i know, but i think we need to obey. so, i'm hoping that you can stop by the station tonight and get the streaming computer turned off and whatever else it takes to make sure we're not streaming when we start broadcasting tomorrow. if you have questions, ask me or [faculty advisory] directly...he's more familiar with the law than me. if you want to mention that on the website too when you get time.... thanks and sorry about this shitty decision, [station manager] ======================================================================== Now, from my inderstanding the the DMCA and recent events, it is possible that we will be made to pay some royalties to the record labels. However, we are a very small radio station with a very small webcasting audiance. We don't pay any royalties to broadcast over the air. My belief is that we should not halt our webcast for fear of future fees. I can't imagine that the record companies who send us their CDs for free will send us a bill for our webcasting since October 1998. I have a meeting with the faculty advisor tommorow. If anyone has any thoughts or advice on what I should say during this meeting I would greatly appreciate it. josh -- Joshua Vickery Grinnell College 14-21 Grinnell IA, 50112 vickeryj@grinnell.edu --- >8 ---- List archives: http://www.xiph.org/archives/ icecast project homepage: http://www.icecast.org/ To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to 'icecast-request@xiph.org' containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body. No subject is needed. Unsubscribe messages sent to the list will be ignored/filtered.
Xavier Montero
2004-Aug-06 14:22 UTC
[icecast] DMCA and webcasting and a political QUESTION
For the QUESTION go directly tot he bottom. I don't know there in the US. Here in Spain, responsible for author rights is called SGAE (Sociedad General de Autores de España) and it takes money from everywhere if controllable and stations must provide a list of all broadcasted themes. They place random monitors and check against the list to see if it coincides. You never know if you are being checked or not, so your list must be reliable to prevent surprises. Local small stations (where I work), are impossible to control. The procedure is that we are obligated to pay on a listener-basis and the proportions to the artists are averaged monitoring 1 every 100 stations chosen at random starting on 1 jan and monitored over the whole year. It is assumed that, even existin gthe possibility of a station being a lot mono-thematic, the average will give a semi-reliable of what will the stations have broadcasted in average over the te whole nationa territory. That "averaged" proportion is then applied tot the sum of all money income by the local stations. The tax is more or less 10 pta per year and per citizen. For example, my town is about 50.000 people, SGAE assumes that not all the people is listenig, of course, but doubling citizens, probably you double audience, so this data is taken as the basis. 10 pta / year / person = 500.000 pta (= a total of $2.777 per year for 50.000 people, it is about 6 cents per person and year). Some response to your post said that authors seem not to receive the corresponding money. Here in Spain they _do_ receive the money. I know some authors, and SGAE sends personally a "payer" who goes phisically to meet the author and gives the money in hand along with some official papers (receipts and so). The "payer" also provides the author with a complete description of the details of the revenues. A list could be: ---------------------------------------------------------- TV broadcasts Day xx/xx/xxxx, broadcasted "n" seconds on TV4 at hh:mm Day xx/xx/xxxx, broadcasted "n" seconds on Tele5 at hh:mm Total seconds = xxx, price per second = xxx, Total = xxx ---------------------------------------------------------- Big Radios Partial Day xx/xx/xxxx, broadcasted "3" times on Radio 3 Day xx/xx/xxxx, broadcasted "2" times on Onda Cero Complete Day xx/xx/xxxx, broadcasted "3" times on Radio 3 Day xx/xx/xxxx, broadcasted "2" times on Onda Cero Price per partial = xxx, total partials = xxx, Total = xxxx Price per complete = xxx, total completes = xxx, Total = xxxx ---------------------------------------------------------- Local Stations Share: 0.0035% Total Income: xxxxxxx Your income = xxxxxxx ---------------------------------------------------------- Record Company Sells Price per copy = 20 pta Total Copies: 325.000 units Total due to sells: xxxxx ---------------------------------------------------------- Phone answering machines: Total registered: x Price per machine: xxxx ---------------------------------------------------------- Blank Tapes and CDR: Total Sold: x Price per unit: xxxx ---------------------------------------------------------- ...[etc]... ---------------------------------------------------------- TV is computed on a "second" basis Big radios base on a "partial" (<1 min, for ex, commercials) or "complete" play (scheduled music) Local stations base on the explained proportion. They also give a report of the sells (wich authors already knew) a complete list of answering machines using the titles for waiting- music and the report of the taxes paid due to "blank-tapes" assuming people is going to pirate music (SGAE gets money from blank-tapes manufacturers and blank CD-Rs sold in Spaing assumin that people here is going to copy music). They provide more details that I cannot remember now, but a very complete list. They provide a report per each title you or your company have registered and sucessfuly was not classified as "copy" of any other composition. I suppose they simply will provide a new entry in the report and add "internet access" and just show the list and the ammount. That ammount is the ammount to be charged to the internet station. I remember that somebody told me that SGAE money accounts are open-public and you can track _every_ monetray unit which enters and leaves SGAE to check for a correct administration of the rights. QUESTION: Radio stations usually are quite "local" to their countries and usually got their audio sources directly from the record companies (promo CDs), but in Internet it is different. It is a fact that, for example I'm located and based in Spain, and my Icecast is phisically running in Spain. Then I play a record which authors are German and some listeners are from US. Which autority will charge me? US? Spanish? German? I think In this example it seems, it should be Spanish or German. But Spanish people will not take care of interests of German authors and German people cannot "obligate" to spaniards to do things. Internet delivers the information thru the globe and that escapes any manner of control stablished until now. How will they act? --- >8 ---- List archives: http://www.xiph.org/archives/ icecast project homepage: http://www.icecast.org/ To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to 'icecast-request@xiph.org' containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body. 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Forewarning... this is my understanding and advice. I am not a lawyer. First off, Jamie Zawinski has an article about this here: http://www.dnalounge.com/backstage/webcasting.html> =================================================================> hey josh, > i talked to [faculty advisor] today and was told we must stop our online > streaming. reasons for this rash decision involve around a new law that > was put in place over the summer saying that stations who broadcast online > have to pay royalties, but the amount to be paid has yet to be specified.First off the DMCA was enacted in 1998. I believe you are also exempt for it if you also broadcast over-the-air. _That_ part might have changed, as certainly the RIAA will be after money from traditional labels.> so until > some mystical nationwide beaucracy tells us how much royalties we have to > pay (a few months, says [faculty advisor]) we're not allowed to broadcast > online.A few months? It's been going on for years, and no one is sure when it will end. It's likely not to for a good long while still. There was a wired article about the rates being discussed. You might want to look that up.> this sucks a lot, i know, but i think we need to obey. so, > i'm hoping that you can stop by the station tonight and get the streaming > computer turned off and whatever else it takes to make sure we're not > streaming when we start broadcasting tomorrow. if you have questions, > ask me or [faculty advisory] directly...he's more familiar with the law > than me. if you want to mention that on the website too when you get > time....Doesn't sound like [faculty advisor] knows this law at all and just read some email from some friend at another university.> Now, from my inderstanding the the DMCA and recent events, it is possible > that we will be made to pay some royalties to the record labels. However, > we are a very small radio station with a very small webcasting audiance. We > don't pay any royalties to broadcast over the air.Then in other words, you're stealing music even for your online broadcast. You _must_ pay ASCAP, BMI, and/or SESAC in order to broadcast _anything_ over _any_ medium. If you're not paying that, then you are in dangerous trouble of litigation from those companies. They can and will go after you. hell, they sued the girl scouts and won for them singing around campfires.> My belief is that we should > not halt our webcast for fear of future fees. I can't imagine that the record > companies who send us their CDs for free will send us a bill for our > webcasting since October 1998.They will. ASCAP and BMI and possibly SESAC will also send you a bill. You are being naive about the way this works: Performance royalties are paid to songwriters. That's where you money to ASCAP and BMI go. In other words, this goes to somone who deserves the monday. So you _want_ to pay this fee (typically 2.5% of revenue with some minimum fee in the range of 200-500$ a year). DMCA royalties go straight to the fucking big five labels. Artists will probably never see this money. This is basically the same type of license as if you would be pressing and selling CDs. This is quite simply an internet tax. On the air stations don't have to deal with the DMCA and, at least to my knowledge, do they have to deal with it even when they broadcast online. Technology royalties for MP3 (if you are using that and not Vorbis), are $15k a year minimum and some percent of revenue if your station generates revenue (do you sell ads?).> I have a meeting with the faculty advisor > tommorow. If anyone has any thoughts or advice on what I should say during > this meeting I would greatly appreciate it.Sounds like you are in a bad position, as you're not paying the correct royalties anyway, and if you push the situation, they are likely to just shut it all off. Explain the royalty situation. Show him jwz's page on broadcasting. Good luck. jack. --- >8 ---- List archives: http://www.xiph.org/archives/ icecast project homepage: http://www.icecast.org/ To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to 'icecast-request@xiph.org' containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body. No subject is needed. Unsubscribe messages sent to the list will be ignored/filtered.
On Thu, 13 Sep 2001, Jack Moffitt wrote:> > =================================================================> > hey josh, > > i talked to [faculty advisor] today and was told we must stop our online > > streaming. reasons for this rash decision involve around a new law that > > was put in place over the summer saying that stations who broadcast online > > have to pay royalties, but the amount to be paid has yet to be specified. > > First off the DMCA was enacted in 1998. I believe you are also exempt > for it if you also broadcast over-the-air. _That_ part might have > changed, as certainly the RIAA will be after money from traditional > labels.Everything that I've come across and it is my understanding is that traditional radio stations are not exempt if they broadcast via the web. In short, the RIAA and the labels it represents are greedy individuals and will take their money whereever they can get it. If the money is green they want it. I believe it is AFTRA that has raised a stink about webcasting commercials, many stations have either pulled their webcasts or have silenced their webcasts when AFTRA artists provide the voice over. This in particular applies to national ads, ie for GM, IBM, or some other major company w/ a nationwide push. The point is that don't discount the RIAA from broadcast stations w/ a web broadcast.> A few months? It's been going on for years, and no one is sure when it > will end. It's likely not to for a good long while still. There was a > wired article about the rates being discussed. You might want to look > that up.In short, anyone broadcasting RIAA artists via the web are required to register *NOW*. They have yet to determine the rate / fee structure, but failure to register because the rates are not in place is not an excuse. Plan on them making you pay pro-actively once the fees are decided upon. Failure to do so will put you in greater financial jeopardy.> > Now, from my inderstanding the the DMCA and recent events, it is possible > > that we will be made to pay some royalties to the record labels. However, > > we are a very small radio station with a very small webcasting audiance. We > > don't pay any royalties to broadcast over the air. > > Then in other words, you're stealing music even for your online > broadcast. You _must_ pay ASCAP, BMI, and/or SESAC in order to > broadcast _anything_ over _any_ medium. If you're not paying that, then > you are in dangerous trouble of litigation from those companies. They > can and will go after you. hell, they sued the girl scouts and won for > them singing around campfires.It depends. That was my initial reaction, however upon giving it some thought, it already might be covered by the University license. Definately consult with the University lawyers and make sure that your ASCAP/BMI/SESAC agreement covers your college station. As I recall, our station was covered under the University's agreement, but then again we already had an NPR affiliated Jazz station on campus before our student run station went on the air.> DMCA royalties go straight to the fucking big five labels. Artists will > probably never see this money.Agreed. And the artists are already taking it up the ass with the sales of CD's.> This is basically the same type of license > as if you would be pressing and selling CDs. This is quite simply an > internet tax.I've never looked at it that way, but tis true. An Internet tax that lines the pockets of massive corportate conglomerates who only care about their stock options.> On the air stations don't have to deal with the DMCA and, at > least to my knowledge, do they have to deal with it even when they > broadcast online.Again, I'm not sure. I'd imagine the RIAA is going to cover their bases on this one. They've been pissed off long enough that they've been unable to obtain money from the broadcast stations (ruling long ago) and this is their way (IMO) of getting back.> Technology royalties for MP3 (if you are using that and not Vorbis), are > $15k a year minimum and some percent of revenue if your station > generates revenue (do you sell ads?).Generally charters of college stations cannot sell ads. YMMV. However, mp3 streaming is going to die once Thompson and Fraunhoffer start bullying people.> Sounds like you are in a bad position, as you're not paying the correct > royalties anyway, and if you push the situation, they are likely to just > shut it all off. Explain the royalty situation. Show him jwz's page on > broadcasting.I agree, make sure you cover all the bases and definately take a look at jwz's page. Again, it has been my experience that most Universities pick up the tab on on the PRO's, I don't ever remember our station management having a discussion regarding budgeting for the PRO's (I was a PD at one time). YMMV, IANAL, Drive Safely. Sean... -- WWJD? JWRTFM. -ASO/. _-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_ KG4NRC www.rimboy.com <-- Your source for the crap you know you need. --- >8 ---- List archives: http://www.xiph.org/archives/ icecast project homepage: http://www.icecast.org/ To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to 'icecast-request@xiph.org' containing only the word 'unsubscribe' in the body. No subject is needed. Unsubscribe messages sent to the list will be ignored/filtered.