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Please Join Us In Honoring Today's Internet Radio 'Day Of Silence'


DudeAsInCool

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Ars Technica sums up our sentiments exactly:

"Today is June 26, and that means that it's the Internet radio Day of Silence. The Day of Silence was organized by Radio Internet Newsletter publisher Kurt Hanson in order to protest against retroactive royalty rate increases that could end up putting many Internet radio stations out of business. The rates are due to go into effect in less than a month, and with no significant help from Congress as of yet, Internet broadcasters are resorting to silence to demonstrate what will happen if the proposed increases go into effect.

In response, thousands of Internet radio stations today are broadcasting static, silence, a message explaining the Day of Silence, or are simply not accessible at all. Yahoo! Music agreed to shut down its roughly 200 Internet broadcast stations in honor of the Day of Silence and only offers links to savenetradio.org. Real Rhapsody displays a message on its site when anyone tries to access its channels, urging readers to visit SaveNetRadio as well. Pandora went so far as to take down its entire web site to offer a message about the Day of Silence, and Live365.com shut down some 10,000 of its Internet radio channels today with a message on its web site asking listeners to contact their senators and representatives about the Internet Radio Equality Act.

Smaller-name broadcasters are participating in the Day of Silence too. LoudCity shut down 500 of its own stations today, and one of my personal favorites, .977 Music, is broadcasting silence as well. There are no 80s hits for me today. Noticeably absent from today's protest is popular Internet broadcaster Last.FM, however, despite the fact that the CBS-owned broadcaster will be required to pay the same fees as the others."

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I'm surprised I had no idea about this. I found out the hard way when I tried to sign into Launchcast. As a music fan, I think if they successfully shut down many of the sites, it would impact me greatly. Guess I'll have to load up a new thumb drive for work or something.

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We have an ad for save internet radio on the bottom of the front page...and a couple articles in digital news if you want to read more

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The San Francisco Weekly reports that there is a hidden dark side to the Copyright Royalty Board's ruling:

The increased royalties set by the Copyright Royalty Board on March 2 came with a distinct catch. Webcasters are free to ink direct licensing deals with labels for a lower rate than the one set by the board. Direct licensing allows major labels to apply economic pressure to Webcasters who were formerly concerned with playing the best music.

If Net radio stations don't win their fight, playing whatever they want will become prohibitively expensive. Playing crap, however, won't be. Under the new rules it would be economically logical for cash-strapped Webcasters to take discounted rates to play music the labels want them to play. Instead of the labels paying the Webcasters, the Webcasters pay the labels less. Dark payola.

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