Newberry Talks Royalties On C-SPAN
October 5, 2009: In an appearance over the weekend on C-SPAN series The Communicators, NAB Joint Board Chair and Commonwealth Broadcasting President/CEO Steve Newberry, talking about the Performance Right Act, said the record labels are trying to shore up their failing business model by coming to broadcasters for more revenue.
Asked if radio would ever charge for airplay, Newberry said the relationship between radio and artists has been successful for decades, and added, "We don't think airplay should go to the highest bidder."
He continued, "But if we do see [performance royalties] happen, and radio stations are forced to pay, I think that one of the unintended consequences could very well be that it becomes a pure business transaction, and radio stations are forced to do one of two things: expect compensation or a pure business investment, a return on my investment. If I am paying ... you'd better believe that I am going to be much less willing to take a risk on new artists or unknown artists, and I am going to play those that have the most consistent performance recognition. And you could see the new and evolving artists really take it on the chin."
Four Tops member Duke Fakir, a supporter of the Performance Rights Act, also appeared on the show, and he said other forms of radio are paying performance royalties and "they don't squawk, it's not bothering them. It's no big deal. Satellite radio pays performance rights, Internet radio pays performance rights, and cable."
The half-hour show can be streamed here.
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(10/11/2009 11:37:45 PM) The Performance Rights Act is a bad bill. It's nothing more than a money grab by the recording industry desperately trying to recover from their failure to see their industry changing right under their noses. They'd rather pay lobbyist millions of dollars than make the changes necessary to remain viable in today's digital world. This bad bill is also one of the most severe cases of "biting the hand that feeds you" on the part of the artists that I've ever seen. Why didn't they think about the future when they were out there buying up multi-million dollar homes, riding around in Rolls Royces and snorting up thousands of dollars in coke every night. If this bad bill passes, the damages will be across the board. The recording industry will see music radio begin to fade then dry up. So they would actually have contributed to their own demise by putting their number one leveraged marketing tool out of business; those artists expecting to getting all of those $5,000 checks in their mail every year won't see dilly squat after the first year or so because radios would be foolish to pay for 20 and 30 year old music when young independents will waive their rights and give their recordings away for free just to get their music heard; the next generation of music lovers will never be able to discover "the classics" because they won't be played on public radio any more; the old timers will have to struggle to remember the name of that song by that "One-Hit-Wonder" they played at their weddings forty years ago; the talk radio stations will have to get wilder and even more marginalized because Rush and his buddies will find themselves with lots of new competition; and "The Voice" of the local community would be eventually lost; and, finally, once again, corporate greed would have triumphed by hiding behind the skirts of bought and paid for legislators. If you don't like free public radio...advocate to change it. Throwing the baby out with the bath water so that the greedy fat cats can eat it is not the solution. Write your congressman/woman. Help save free public radio. |
| - Isaiah Too |
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