THU 7AM CT UPDATE: Senate set to reconvene this morning Apparently the "Small Webcasters Amendment Act of 2002" DIDN'T make it to the Senate floor on Wednesday night. On the other hand, it looks as if the Senate didn't go into its end-of-the-season recess, either: They are scheduled to reconvene at 11AM ET today. (See Senate calendar here.) Details to follow in RAIN.

8PM CT UPDATE

RAIN's sources among webcasters indicate that Sen. Brownback's office is now CLEARED on the vote for the "Small Webcasters Amendment Act of 2002" — and may have been so for the past few hours.

That means that the bill may come before the Senate this evening (Wed.). C-SPAN offers live video coverage on their website here.


From our late-afternoon edition (updated):


With only HOURS left in the current legislative session, the "Small Webcasters Amendment Act of 2002" is apparently, according to RAIN's record industry sources, being blocked from a "unanimous consent" vote on the Senate floor by ONE AIDE in the office of Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS) -- on behalf of a concern raised by, of all people, Verizon!

According to those RAIN sources, Verizon is apparently concerned that language in the bill about a study of "third-party participation revenues" affects them. Virtually all parties involved agree that Verizon is MISINTERPRETING the purpose of that study, which is actually to investigate whether ad sales commissions (e.g., by Hiwire, Lightningcast, Interep, MSN, or Real) should be included in the base revenues from which performance royalties are calculated.

But that study has nothing to do with Verizon at all! Brownback's aide supposedly wants clarifying language ADDED to the bill -- but if so, it would have to go back to House, and it's too late for that, as they go into recess after tonight too.

There is an easy potential SOLUTION: A Senator could read language on the Senate floor that would clarify the intent of the bill, thus establishing a "LEGISLATIVE HISTORY." But Brownback's aide is supposedly rebuffing requests from both sides (webcasters and copyright holders) in favor of this solution!

If you're in favor of the bill's passage,
here's what you can do:
Particularly but not necessarily if you have a Kansas connnection, contact Brownback's staff THIS EVENING. Their office phone number is 202-224-6521, and the fax number is 202-228-1265. They're working late tonight. They may take phone calls but should almost certainly see e-mails and faxes.

	Next Tuesday (10/22), RAIN publisher Kurt Hanson will be speaking at the NAB European Radio Conference in Prague on the topic "How Internet Radio Will Replace AM & FM (Eventually)." If you're planning to attend the conference and would like to make plans to meet there, please send an e-mail to kurt@kurthanson.com. Thanks!
RAIN Congressional update: We're still waiting to hear whether the Senate is going to pass its version of the "Small Webcasters Amendment Act of 2002." We'll send out a "News Flash" if we hear anything definitive.

BY KURT HANSON
In an effort to demonstrate the breadth and depth of the offerings currently available in Internet radio, we're adding new features to our RadioJump! "consumer guide to Internet radio" (see Monday's article here).

Today, we've got a new on-line form available that will allow you to add your webcast to the site's database.

There are actually TWO different listings you can submit:


On Monday, we added a new feature to RadioJump! that we believe might make it easier and more fun to explore the medium than ever before — a feature called "QuickTuner" that allows the listener to explore dozens of options in one easy-to-use browser window.

With the new design, the consumer can see a couple of dozen different Internet radio webcasters on a single page.

Each listing includes brief one-sentence description of the webcast plus a 100x40-pixel logo (that opens a separate browser window with the sites' home page).

We're trying to fill out another couple of "QuickTuner" sets of stations this week — and if you'd like to be included, for that, all we need from you is two simple things: (1) a 100x40-pixel logo and (2) about six or seven words that describe your webcast (see examples at right).

Send those two items via e-mail to radiojump@kurthanson.com and there's a reasonably-good chance (based on our editorial judgment regarding our need for variety, etc.) that your webcast will show up on RadioJump's "QuickTuner" later this week!



A more elaborate feature of the site allows users to search the RadioJump! database by format, location, or (coming soon) artists played on the station. So far, however, the database is pretty sparsely-populated, as our crack team of interns has been dividing their time up among several different development projects.

However, in the upper-right corner of the RadioJump! home page, you'll find a link called "Get listed" — which leads to a form you can fill out to add your webcast to the RadioJump! database.

The process takes only 5 or 10 minutes for a single-channel webcaster (although more TIME if you're a multichannel webcaster who wants separate entries for multiple channels). Optimally, you should have a 100-pixel-wide version of your logo ready before beginning the process (although it's not strictly necessary).

We hope you'll take time today to add your station to our database. Thanks!

[an error occurred while processing this directive]

From the Wall Street Journal: "In a major step forward, MusicNet and pressplay, the online services owned by the major international record labels, are close to reaching licensing agreements that would allow both of them to offer songs from all five big music companies.

"The deals will fill one of the major gaps that both operations have faced in competing with free, unlimited peer-to-peer song-swapping outfits. Despite their ties to the top names in the music business, the two services have been unable to offer full catalogues of artists from all five companies...

"MusicNet has completed a licensing agreement to use music from Universal, the biggest music company, and is close to a deal with Sony, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Pressplay said Monday it had signed a deal with BMG, Bertelsmann’s music unit. People with knowledge of the matter say the service also is close to reaching terms with Warner Music Group."

Read this Wall Street Journal story online for free at MSNBC.com here.

BY PAUL MALONEY
"Backroom deals," "bait-and-switch," and industry group members "resigning in disgust" — such is the picture painted of the H.R. 5469/Small Webcaster Amendments Act (SWAA) negotiations in an article published last weekend in a U.K. tech newsletter.

The piece, which was written by a San Francisco journalist and appeared in the UK tech newsletter The Register, reports that "the smallest, non-profit webcasters accuse a "cabal" of thirteen small commercial operations of misleading Congress and the public by negotiating a deal which saves the wealthier stations from performance royalties while many smaller operations, college stations and amateurs — the core of the grass roots broadcasters — will go to the wall."

The complaint is that the revised language of the bill offers no specific relief for noncommercial and "hobbyist" webcasters. The article says that after supporting the original incarnation of the bill, these factions felt betrayed by the negotiations.

The seed of the Register article seems to be an open letter from Ann Gabriel (pictured at left) of Gabriel Media Inc., resigning her position in the International Webcasting Association (IWA), saying she was "appalled, outraged and disgusted" by the insertion of the additional language to the bill. She pledged to contact "every Senator I can, both by telephone and by fax, to let them know about the grave injustice that has been carried out."

Gabriel had been a cohost of a planned 20-day IWA-sponsored webcast to rally support for the bill, to air until October 20th (the day the retroactive royalty payments are currently officially due).

...

... "The passage of HR.5469 would, at a stroke, reduce the [Net radio] spectrum from thousands to a few dozen commercial players," concludes The Register article. That's ridiculous. The bill offers an optional royalty rate that could keep a certain class of webcasters alive who might be otherwise be overwhelmed by the retroactive royalties due under the Librarian of Congress's decision. Admittedly, the noncomm and hobbyist webcasters did not get the specific relief measures for which they had hoped. And that is truly unfortunate, as they worked hard to support the lobbying and publicity efforts that led to this deal. But given their relatively small audience sizes, most will have an obligation of only the minimum royalty of $500 per year (i.e., less than $10/week) that they streamed. Clearly, in our opinion, the forced compromise cut in the House Judiciary office was not the result of "conspiracy" on the part of small webcasters. The new language in the bill came about when Rep. Sensenbrenner (pictured above) specifically asked labels and certain small commercial webcasters to make a deal. When the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee offers "friendly advice," it's usually pretty wise to take it. -- PM & KH ...