Sunday, August 1, 2010
Internet Radio
There have been many things going on with this side of the business model that the average listener has, perhaps, been unaware of. For example, Sound Exchange recently decided that radio stations on the Internet should be held accountable for royalties and retroactively.
Naturally, there were parties who had disagreements about the fairness of this. On one hand, it seems like the fair thing to do for independent artists. On the other hand, the amount of royalties due from major providers of Internet radio such as Pandora would be in the millions of dollars and, for smaller Internet radio broadcasters, this would threaten to wipe them out.
A bill known as the Internet Radio Equality Act was introduced and rallied for, but the net end result of all of this was that the price of being a broadcaster went up.
It would seem that, sadly, the Internet is just absorbing the old business models and that these ways of doing business are what makes it difficult for the average listener to find and listen to new music, new independent rock and other alternative music.
Another example of this is that many Internet radio stations are so purely business that they charge the artists for airplay. The artists either pay a one time fee for airplay or can purchase a certain number of plays. This, of course, inflates the idea of just how popular the artist really is.
Even by voting, such as is done on some radio stations and music websites, the artist or band can more or less 'stuff the ballot box..'
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