Wednesday, July 18, 2007
On July 12, Tim Harris sat at the Lawrence Public Library with his headphones plugged into his laptop computer and listened to classic jazz playing from the Web site of a small radio station from his native Memphis.
“It makes me feel like I’m back at home, even when I’m hundreds of miles away,” he said.
Unfortunately for Harris and other Internet radio listeners, the amount of live streaming music available online could soon be drastically lessened.
Laura Lorson, KPR All Things Considered host, practices during an off-air break Monday afternoon at the KPR Studios located on campus. KPR recently upgraded its Web site as part of an effort to drive traffic to the site and gain online listeners.
On March 2, the Copyright Royalty Board announced new regulations that would force Internet webcasters to pay greatly-increased fees to record companies for the rights to stream music online. The regulations do not differentiate between commercial radio stations and non-commercial stations like the University-run Kansas Public Radio.
“As a small station, it’s more than likely that this could hurt our online listenership because we can’t pay the fees,” said Janet Campbell, director of KPR, which has its studios located at 1120 W. 11th St, near Memorial Stadium.
The Copyright Royalty Board’s decision requires public stations like KPR to pay royalties on a per-listener basis.
Campbell said that the station’s live stream had about 7,400 listeners in June, and the site averaged more than 1,500 hits a day. The station had developed a plan to limit their stream to only 250 listeners at a time, as opposed to the 4,000 listeners that the stream is equipped to handle.
“That is how we’re going to keep listenership under the allotted time so we don’t go over and have to pay the fees,” Campbell said.
But in the week leading up to the implementation of the new regulations, which was originally supposed to take place on July 15, those enforcing the regulations were pressured by industry groups and policymakers and delayed implementing the fees.
As of press time, KPR had held off on making any changes to their online stream as they waited for official word on the implementation of the new fees.
For KPR, any limit in the number of online listeners it can allow could cause a shift in the direction in which the station pushes its listeners. The station recently upgraded its Web site as part of an effort to create more traffic on the site and gain more online listeners.
“We try to drive people to the Web, so ultimately this will hurt us,” Campbell said.
Members of Congress are trying to take action to stop small radio stations from being damaged by the new regulations. On April 26, Representatives Jay Inslee (D-Was.) and Donald Manzullo (R-Ill.) introduced the Internet Radio Equality Act in the House of Representatives to nullify the Copyright Royalty Board’s action. On May 10, Senators Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) introduced the bill in the Senate.
In a press release on his Web site, Rep. Manzullo said that “our legislation overturns the huge rate increases and sets up a system that is fair to webcasters, Web users and the artists whose music we all enjoy. And most importantly, it will keep music playing on the Internet.”
The two bills are still being discussed in Congress.
Harris said he was not afraid of not having his favorite internet stations to listen to, no matter what happened.
“It might take a little while, but eventually they will all be back on the air,” he said. “There are just too many people out there who will do what it takes to bring it back.”
—Edited by Ben Smith
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