On March 2, the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) ruled that internet radio stations would have to pay royalty fees ranging from 200% to 1200% more than the stations pay now. Leave it to three lame-ass judges named James Scott Sledge, Stanley Wisniewski, and William J. Roberts to decide on the royalty rates. Homeboy James Scott Sledge even has the fancy name of Chief Copyright Royalty Judge. Anyway, that trio of jackasses have decided on the new rates that the CRB will put on internet radio stations. It makes perfect sense, because most of the internet radio stations are noncommercial so they don't make any gold. Wait. How are these purveyors of music supposed to pay outrageous royalty rates if they don't make any dough through their noncommercial station? Exactly, they won't be able to, and they'll eventually go bankrupt if the act goes into effect on May 15. Doesn't make a lot of sense to me either, children. SaveNetRadio has been attempting to fight the evils of the CRB, but now it has a hell of a fighting chance.
Enter Jay Inslee and Donald Manzullo, a Democratic representative from Washington and a Republican representative from Illinois, respectively. These two men are responsible for introducing the Internet Radio Equality Act To Congress. To spice up how bills are typically proposed, I now will place Jay Inslee and Donald Manzullo in an extremely political, buddy-cop movie dialog where they break into Congress and present the Internet Radio Equality Act.
Jay: "Alright, everybody shut the fuck up about all this Iraq shit; we've got more important matters to attend to."
Donald: "That's right, motherfuckers."
Jay: "First off, I'd like to say a couple of things. James, Stanley, and William -- you can suck it. This CRB royalty crap is bullshit, and I've got just the secret weapon to destroy it. Show em' Donald"
Donald: "Bam!"
Jay: "See that right there? That is the Internet Radio Equality Act, and it's about to bring down this shit. Don, explain it to them."
Donald: "Alright, listen closely. I don't want to repeat myself, and I sure as hell don't want to have to unload this clip on you motherfuckers. What we are proposing is simple. We need to modernize section 118 of the Copyright Act. Don't you understand that over 800 stations across the country are noncommercial? Section 118 has always read that public radio serves a different purpose from those commercial motherfuckers, and because of this, they can't pay the same types of rates."
Jay: "Basically, what Don is saying is that this shit is whack and we need to get a handle on this before May 15. Because on May 15, the CRB ruling goes into effect and we can't be having that, can we Don?"
Don: "Hell no!"
Jay: "Right. So our bill is going to propose that we update the royalty rates to those of the satellite radio stations. This way we can make this shit fair and not ridiculous like James, Stanley, and William want it to be.
Don: "That's right bitches."
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