Streaming and Copyright Laws/Fees

Ongoing decisions by the Copyright Royalty Board are making it expensive and difficult to provide streaming services.

Details:

October, 2008: Overall, we have been waiting with crossed fingers for negotiations between SoundExchange (representing the record labels and musicians) and the CPB/NPR Legal Team (representing public radio stations) to bear fruit. They are trying to come to an agreement about the royalty rates public radio stations would pay to SoundExchange for the 'performance copyright' part of streaming music over the Internet. [This page explains the big picture well]

Various Congressional efforts have been part of the environment surrounding these negotiations, you might have heard about some of them, you might have contacted your representatives about them. That's important, it has set a climate that values this kind of service, and urges a reasonable solution.

We value musicians - they are not only our bread-and-butter, they are our friends. We want to see them fairly compensated for their work. At the same time, we believe in the power and promise of online radio listening, and want to see solutions that allow the industry to grow. Cross your fingers with us.

March, 2007
To our WFUV online listeners:

We at WFUV have had some hard decisions to make. The recent decision by the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) to establish a new royalty rate for online streaming of recorded music has sent us - and every other Internet webcaster - to their calculators looking for a way to continue offering online music services.

The royalties are assessed on behalf of performing artists, and they should earn a reasonable payout for their work. But most small webcasters will be driven out of business entirely by this increase, and that wouldn't benefit anyone. Even with the support of our contributing members, it is going to cost us a tremendous amount of money to continue -- the fees are retroactive to the start of 2006, and the rate is twenty times over the previous one.

We have elected to maintain our live music streaming for the immediate future. Live music and talk-based archived programs (like Words & Music from Studio A and Cityscape) fall outside the royalty fees imposed by the CRB. We will continue to offer those, and as many of our other music programs as we can.

We will also continue to work with the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and National Public Radio in their efforts to come to a fair agreement.

What can you do? Besides your financial support for our streams, there are organized attempts to channel public opinion on the matter to the Congressional representatives in decision-making positions. Visit SaveNetRadio.org for more information on how you can help to keep music streams on the Internet.

- WFUV General Manager Dr. Ralph Jennings
and your friends at WFUV [email]

p.s. There is more information about how copyright law affects streaming on the Streaming and the DMCA page.

Thanks:

Our sincere thanks to those of you who have written us letters about the importance of this service. We know that many of you count on the web as your only way to listen.