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BY PAUL MALONEY
RAIN has learned from at least two sources that the Librarian of Congress's final determination for webcasting recordingcopyright royalties will be posted on the U.S. Copyright Office's website Thursday at 4p CDT (5p EDT).

Our sources say the involved parties will then have a few days to redact portions of the actual decision for proprietary/confidential data before it is posted in its entirety next week.

The Librarian, James Billington (right), late last month rejected an arbitration panel's suggestion for a royalty rate that Internet radio webcasters would be obliged to pay the owners of sound recording copyrights (which are usually record labels). He is now obligated by law to create the royalty rate himself.

In his brief announcement of his decision, Billington gave no indication of his reasoning for rejecting the proposal, nor insight into how his determination may turn out.

"I don't want to be optimistic and then be really let down," SomaFM.com founder Rusty Hodge told CNET News (here). "Just because (the CARP rates) were rejected doesn't mean that they were too high. So all things being said, there could be a 50-to-50 chance that he could even make the rates higher."

The process by which copyright rates are set by arbitration panels -- called CARP for Copyright Arbitration Royalty Panel -- has been the subject of heavy scrutiny and criticism from the industry and government alike. Last week, a subcommittee of the House Judiciary held a hearing to examine the matter (RAIN coverage here).

The testimony from that hearing is available on the committee website here.

Former Hiwire CEO Warren Schlichting has taken a new position as VP/Business Development for AT&T/Comcast, the recently-formed merger of Comcast and AT&T Broadband, which has over 22 million cable subscribers and is the only cable company with over $1 billion in ad revenue.

Schlichting will be heading up strategy and new business efforts for AT&T/Comcast's advertising division, exploring the viability of advertising opportunities in such areas as broadband, new media and interactive gaming, among others. He will be reporting to Comcast president Charlie Thurston, former CEO of Adlink and a longtime Hiwire
advisory board member.

xx Last week in a piece on webcast ratings (here), it was inferred in an article that the Measurecast does not offer traditional radio audience metrics such as AQH. While not part of the public report, the service does in fact offer this measurement to subscribers. Xx

From Salon.com: "Because it was lip-synched by George Clooney in the movie, and, therefore, held some celebrity cachet, [Dan] Tyminski's 'I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow' received some airplay on a handful of country stations last year. Otherwise, the only place to hear cuts from the soundtrack was on NPR, college and alt-country outlets...

"Plain and simple, 'Oh Brother' and nearly every artist enshrined at the Hall of Fame in Nashville are too 'country' for country radio. Help, however, has arrived in the form of two new satellite radio services.

"New York-based Sirius and XM Satellite Radio propose to fill a void created by a radio industry dominated by profit-driven conglomerates, ratings-obsessed programmers and hit-driven playlists. Fans of country music aren't the only ones suffering. Based on content and the frequency of commercial breaks, today's pre-programmed FM stations are virtually indistinguishable from the uninspired AM outlets they drove into the ground in the '70s...

"After sampling both companies' products for about a month, several things became apparent to this reporter.

"(1) Sound and service were impeccable. From Los Angeles, through Death Valley, and up to the Continental Divide, the only interruptions came when driving through tunnels for longer than four seconds. The audio quality was comparable to that of any CD played through existing speakers.

"(2) Most of the 100 channels offered by each company appear to be programmed by human beings who have a history with the genre, and actually take their listeners into account...

"(3)...Blessedly...Top 40 channels are in the minority.

"(4) The disc jockeys are low-key, informative and personable...

"(5) There have been times when this motorist drove around the block a couple of times, instead of pulling into his driveway, just to finish listening to a song he hadn't heard in 30 years...

"Artists will benefit in several different ways, including having their names and song titles appear on the tuner when their songs are played. Besides being paid royalties for music that otherwise might never have been heard, they should experience a boost in album sales and concert dates as a result of their exposure to a potentially huge audience of uninitiated listeners.

"'We service both companies with CDs on all our clients for radio airplay,' said Mark Pucci, an Atlanta-based publicist for alt-country acts. 'I've scheduled XM interviews for both Eliza Gilkyson and the Flatlanders. The artists I represent are rarely heard on mainstream radio, so any opportunity to gain airplay and visibility is worthwhile. Also, the programming and on-air jocks are just so much more receptive and knowledgeable about this music.'"

Read this entire article in Salon here.

From Washington Post writer Jonathan Krim: "Maybe the Internet thrill isn't gone, but is that it over there pulling on its jacket and heading for the door?

"The Net promised to let consumers read everything, hear everything, play anything. Any David with a computer could elbow aside the most gargantuan Goliath. No matter the question, the answer was yes, sure, it's possible, do it.

"Today, the Internet is messy, dangerous ground. Viruses and system break-ins are on the rise, while vested interests battle over what isn't allowed.

"In truth, the tech industry needs Napster-like services to jump-start demand for broadband access, which in turn would lead to purchases of new software and hardware...

"Meanwhile, a group of legal academics and consumer activists has been fighting on another front, arguing that Congress's repeated extensions of copyright terms is unconstitutional. The group, led by Stanford University law professor Lawrence Lessig, won a stunning victory recently when the Supreme Court agreed to hear their challenge to the most recent extension...

"The purpose of copyright law, Lessig believes, is to spur innovation and creative work by providing short-term protection to the copyright holder. But protection in perpetuity defeats that purpose, preventing artistic works from springing from existing works.

"So far, the entertainment industry's clout in Congress has been strong. But Rep. Rick Boucher (D-Va., pictured) is among a handful of legislators who believe that the Digital Millennium Copyright Act needs to be amended to give more protection for fair-use rights.

"'What we are now seeing in the policy sphere is . . . an effort on the part of the content community to exercise an unwarranted amount of control,' Boucher says.

"Others argue that the entertainment industry simply needs to find a business model that works in the digital environment.

"'Everyone believes they are entitled to at least as much money as they made before,' said Bill Raduchel, chief technology officer of AOL Time Warner Inc., which is in an especially tricky position as both an Internet company and a movie studio. 'Everyone wants someone else to take the haircut.'"

Read Krim's entire column in today's Washington Post, or online here.

"Threaten a lucrative model of exploitation and greed..."

In the present model it is the labels

"And I've seen them..."