Liberal Talk Radio

There may be a slight reprieve for internet radio broadcasters:

In the wake of an appeals court’s decision not to delay the imposition of a new, expensive royalty scheme, Internet radio broadcasters got an unexpected bit of good news from an unlikely source. During a Congressional roundtable initiated by Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA), SoundExchange executive director Jon Simson said that the licensing group will not enforce the new royalty scheme. Instead, the rate hikes will be postponed indefinitely while SoundExchange and the webcasters attempt to hammer out a more equitable rate schedule.

Right after the court’s decision was announced, SoundExchange released a statement saying that the ruling meant that “recording artists and content owners can move forward confident that they will receive fair pay for their hard work in producing music for all to enjoy.” There was no inkling that the licensing group would do anything other than go forward with the concessions it had previously offered—concessions that were heavily criticized by webcasters.

The specter of Congressional action in the form of the Internet Radio Equality Act of 2007, along with Rep. Markey’s unexpected roundtable meeting, which fell under the aegis of the Small Business Subcommittee instead of the more copyright-friendly Judiciary Committee, apparently forced SoundExchange’s hand.

Webcasters large and small are pleased with SoundExchange’s change of heart, and one webcaster said that the outcry from fans of Internet radio was a major factor. “This is a direct result of lobbying pressure, so if anyone thinks their call didn’t matter, it did,” Pandora founder Tim Westergren told Wired blog Listening Post. “That’s why this is happening.”