RIAA Boycott

I’m sick and tired. Sick and tired of the RIAA, the Recording Industry Association of America, their methods, their pressure against their customers, their inability to cope with a new situation, their stubbornness and their greed. Instead of listening to their customers and possible customers they cling to their old ways of distribution and show an unbelievable ineffectiveness to cope with new technologies and ways of spreading music.

Their latest stunt ? New royalty fees for Internet Radio stations. The price per performance rose from $0.0007 in 2006 to $0.0011 in 2007 which is a mighty increase. This means that radio stations have to pay $0.0011 per song that has a listener. This does not seem much but if you do some basic math you soon find out that this is indeed to much for many small radio stations.

Let us assume that a radio station plays 20 songs in an hour. This would mean that they would pay 0.0011 * 20 each hour multiplied by the number of listeners per hour. A station with only 100 listeners would have to pay $2.2 per hour, $52,8 per day and $19272 per year. Keep in mind that this are only the costs for the rights to play the songs, this does not cover bandwidth and other expenses.

The costs per performance are going to be raised to $0.0014 in 2008 and $0.0018 in 2009. The site Save Internet Radio states that over-the-air stations do not pay such a fee for performance rights.

I could continue writing about other things but thankfully a blog called the Wandering Student has expressed everything that I wanted to write down. Pay him a visit and read what he has to say, it is well worth the time.

So, what is the consequence of the boycott ? I will not purchase music that is published by a member of the RIAA. This includes online sales, eBay and all other forms. I will support local bands, independent bands, DRM and RIAA free websites, free internet radio stations and every other possibility that supports independent music.