Thousands of Internet radio stations may find their transmissions financially jammed after the Librarian of Congress yesterday adjusted the royalty fees that the webcasters must pay musicians and record companies for broadcasting their songs online.
Librarian James Billington cut the fees proposed by an arbitration board in half, but many of these fledgling firms say they will go out of business even under the reduced royalty regime.
Billington is charged by Congress with administering copyright laws for the printed word and sound recordings. He ruled yesterday that Web sites that broadcast music over the Internet must pay record companies and musicians 0.07 cents per song per listener. The arbitration panel set a per-song fee of 0.14 cents per listener late last year.
The panel had also proposed a 50 percent discount on that rate for FM stations simulcasting their broadcasts over the Internet, but Billington did away with that distinction.
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