Pandora shutting down in 2010?
According to an interview with its founder in the Washington Post, Pandora is getting close to shutting its doors:
“We’re approaching a pull-the-plug kind of decision,” said Tim Westergren, who founded Pandora. “This is like a last stand for webcasting.”
Basically, the Copyright Royalty Board decided to double the royalty payments for Web radio by 2010 (see page 6). Pandora currently spends $17 million of it’s $25 million on royalties as it is, so, obviously, the “math don’t work.”
This seems incredibly short sighted of the recording artists lobby. Of course, the big player here is SoundExchange (a RIAA puppet), so that shouldn’t be too surprising.
RIAA is a bunch of power happy douchebags that should just leave well enough alone. They are mad because they aren’t making money off the independent musicians who are too smart for mainstream recording contracts, so this is how they handle it. Shut it all down! they say… If we can’t own them and make them our puppets, then no one will hear their music! They’re angry because file-sharing (gasp!) is still going on and there’s nothing they can do about it. I can see libraries being the next target for RIAA’s jackbooted tactics. It’s no wonder I don’t buy anything but independent music anymore.