400,000 Call Congress for Net Radio

Written by Frank Smith

Thursday, June 28. 2007 at 04:49 PM EDT Post a comment

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Tuesday's Internet Radio Day of Silence, drew support from over 14,000 stations and 400,000 people who flooded Congress with phone calls.

A hearing was scheduled for earlier today with the House Small Business Democrats ("Assessing the Impact of the Copyright Royalty Board Decision to Increase Royalty Rates on Recording Artists and Webcasters"), which you can watch here. (Pour yourself a strong cup of coffee before settling in for this one.)

The summation of the meeting is that no one is sure if Congress is the best place to settle the royalties dispute, especially if it leads to bankrupting webcasters, which will only make it even more difficult for artists to be compensated. (Commitee chairwoman Nydia Velazquez: "I really don't think that Congress would be the best vehicle to resolve this type of issue.") 

Finding a middleground between webcasters and the U.S. Copyright Royalty Board is, perhaps, webcasters' best hope.