THE DAY THE MUSIC STREAM DIES

In two weeks, the soundtrack of Second Life will drastically change.  Because on May 15th, royalty rates for music streamed over Internet radio will increase by 300 to 1500 percent.  The impact on independent and non-profit Net stations will be immediate: most of them will simply stop broadcasting.  And because so many of them, like Soma FM, are played on numerous parcels throughout Second Life, much of the grid will go silent.  Some landowners will switch to Resident-run streams featuring Resident-only musicians, and that will be an unintended good.  Then again, most landowners will probably just switch to corporate-owned, ad-driven Net radio, and that's-- well, that's something else.  In any case, Residents choice of music they hear in-world will be drastically curtailed, and since music streams are so crucial to the community, to define who they are, and the places they create and enjoy, SL culture will be forever diminished.

US Residents can help prevent this.   There's a bipartisan bill that will put the kibosh on these rate increases.  Here's the site where you can get involved.  Read more about the royalty increase here, and contact your Congressperson here.

Update, May 3:  SL DJ Synn Mounier sends word that the deadline has been extended to July 15.  Read more at the "Breaking News" link at this site.  Of course, this just means there's more time to rally voters to stave off the coming collapse.

Comments

[Mathieu basiat]

you can email your Congreperson here, too:

http://www.house.gov/writerep/

[Laetizia Coronet]

Maybe last.fm is an option? It is highly customizeable.

[rikomatic]

This is the craziest part of the whole scheme: even if your internet radio station only plays non-RIAA affiliated independent artists who have given you the right to broadcast their work, THE RIAA WILL STILL CHARGE YOUR STATION PER SONG/PER LISTENER. It's up to the independent musician to pay to become a member of SoundExchange to collect their royalties, even if they didn't want the CRB / SoundExchange to collect them in the first place.

It's so flipping ass-backwards.

[dandellion]

I still don't get what the RIAA has to do with european stations playing european artists?
somebody is in desperate need to face the reality and understand that internet is not the property of one single country.