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"  Last week, we covered the raw deal given to Internet radio stations when it comes to copyright payments. After an agreement yesterday between the Digital Media Association (DiMA), the National Publishers&amp;#039; Association and three groups representing recording artists and songwriters, some music-sharing Internet sites will be free from the worry of paying royalties per song, though Internet radio stations will still be on the hook.  If the federal government&amp;#039;s Copyright Royalty Board approves the tentative agreement, two kinds of sites would pay a base rate of 10.5 percent of their revenue for the rights to use millions of songs owned by the major record labels.  The first sites that would fall under this new agreement are limited download sites\u2014places like Rhapsody and Napster To Go, where users pay a per-month fee to download songs but don&amp;#039;t actually own them, and lose them if they stop paying the fee. Second are interactive streaming sites\u2014places like imeem.com that allow users to choose songs they want to stream and play, but not to download them.  Publicly, all sides involved are celebrating the deal. DiMA declined to elaborate in an interview with PM, but executive director Jonathan Potter said in a statement that he was particularly pleased that the deal, if approved, would end litigation against some of DiMA&amp;#039;s member organizations. But there remains the elephant in the room that this deal didn&amp;#039;t touch\u2014Internet radio. That includes Pandora, the service that creates custom radio stations for its users based on their tastes. When digital media sites and recording industry groups couldn&amp;#039;t reach a monetary agreement, the Copyright Royalty Board decided to raise the price of using songs to double the 2005 rate, which stations say threatens to eat up their revenue. Internet radio stations must pay record labels on a per-use basis\u2014including songs that listeners skip. Today&amp;#039;s announcement puts Internet music-streaming sites like Rhapsody under the same system that satellite radio stations already use\u2014a percentage of revenue versus a cost per song played. The sites will have to pay a higher percentage of revenue than satellite radio pays\u2014it currently pays 6 percent of overall revenue, which will increase to 8 percent by 2012. But it&amp;#039;s still better than having to pay a set fee per song, a system that can put Web sites in the red if revenues are down.  Internet radio may not be far behind in negotiations with record labels, but for now it will have to wait for its own separate settlement. Because it is subject to a different section of the Copyright Act from music-streaming sites, a section that deals with the public performance of a work rather than the distribution of it, Internet radio fell outside the scope of yesterday&amp;#039;s agreement. &amp;quot;We&amp;#039;re not involved in that one,&amp;quot; Pandora representative Michele Husak told PM. &amp;quot;Our negotiations are still ongoing and we&amp;#039;re hopeful.&amp;quot;  We&amp;#039;ll continue to follow the imperiled Internet radio industry as its story unfolds. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/gadgets/a3942/4284518/>