Internet Radio In Trouble In England

I don't know how many of you read the comment from Mike in the previous post. He is one of those famous "Off Shore" broadcasters in England, who in the bad old days gave people something good to listen to because the BBC wasn't. He is a legit Internet radio broadcaster, but he informed me that just like here in the US, the UK is raising rates on Internet broadcasters.


Mike Said

As an artist the record companies have screwed you guys for years with contracts that allow them to keep your royalties.
But now the royalty set for internet radio in the UK is 9 yes NINE times higher than the highest rate in the USA check out http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,2129109,00.html

The link leads to an article from the Guardian, which details what is going on in both the US, and UK. Here is the part that I wasn't aware of dealing with England.

From the Guardian:

But the UK ruling, announced on Monday and effective from July 1, creates a new problem. In addition to a percentage of total revenue, for every track they play webcasters will have to pay a minimum charge which is nine times higher than the US royalty board's projected per-track rate for 2010.

The terms were originally agreed last September, in a royalty settlement between record companies and parties including mobile phone operators, music download companies and the MCPS-PRS Alliance, which collects music royalties for publishers. Three webcasters - AOL, Real Networks and Yahoo! - failed to settle.

Now, webcasters face a war with regulators on both sides of the Atlantic. Very large webcasters may be able to stomach the fees, but Pandora is preparing to shut its service in the UK - the only country served outside the US - as early as this week, says international managing director Paul Brown. The service, which had been offered informally while Pandora negotiated UK music licensing deals, was to formally launch by the end of the year, but it could never be profitable under the new rules, he says.

"We want to bring this good service to the UK, but it has to be on an economic base and if you're losing money for every hour then there's no business there," laments Brown. For Pandora UK at least, it turns out that Monday really was the day the music died.

Amazingly the rate charged to British Internet stations are NINE TIMES higher than the highest rate in the US would be in 2010!! I think this just shows that the power of the corporation is no longer just a regional or national phenomenon, but it is truly a global power. Once again it is the little guys, who will be put out of business, sure, Yahoo, Real, and Aol, will whine and cry about it, but in the end they will put up the money and the rest of us small fries, will be out of business.

I will keep you posted, and I will keep all the links to save internet radio up for now. I also am including mikes blog, The Thunder to the links section.