Royalties
I was just wondering if Part 15 stations have to pay royalty fees to broadcast music? I use live365 to broadcast my station online and for now i just have a fm transmitter that only broadcast a few hundred feet. I am planning on getting an am transmitter so i can broadcast futher but I was curious about the laws on royalties.
Thanks!
IANAL, however, to date, no one has been successful in getting BMI, ASCAP, SESAC, or anyone to give us a rate sheet. Basically, we're not big enough to pay. One person got "we don't have provisions for part 15, so just go ahead until we do."
That's not to say that tomorrow, some exec at BMI won't decide to collect from us all ...
Concerning the Music Royalties, depending on who you hear this from, however, I have reports that the annual fee for Part 15 was around $200. Now depending who you talk to at BMI, ASCAP or any other agency, they may not recognize part 15. Now keep in mind that the annual $200 fee was from just 1 agency and if you play copywright music from other agencies, such as ASCAP, there may be other fees imposed as well. My opinion is to just wait it out and let them contact you once IF and WHEN they get organized as to set fee prices concerning Part 15. Part 15 is relatively new to the RIAA and will take awhile for them to keep up with the Jones for collecting royalites.
It was my understanding from the research that I did last year that if you are broadcasting on a low power part 15 transmitter (AM or FM) you are not reaching enough listeners to make a difference, but once you put it up on the web, you ARE responsible for paying royalties because of the unlimited pool of listeners available at any particular time. You may want to check with your streaming service to see if they have a guideline from the RIAA regarding such matters.
Royalties are called music licenses these days. Only BMI, to date, charges a Part 15 licensing fee annually of $200.00. ASCAP and SESAC don't have specific licensing fee schedules for Part 15 stations yet.
However, music licensing is required by federal law (Digital Milleniem Copyright Act-DMCA) on streaming audio internet radio stations. Some broadcasters use Live 365 to take care of the reporting to BMI, ASCAP, SESAC and Sound Exchange. See http://www.copyright.gov/carp/webcasting_rates_final.html
In the past couple of years, companies like Loud City and SWCast began offering services to handle music licensing for internet radio stations. Federal law for internet licensing is different than terrestrial stations in that they charge per/server source or launch site. Many stations launch from the same site thereby cooperatively licensing all their music at once. And the best part, the cooperative keeps track of the music played on your station and submits the reports and pays the fees for you. Overall, the cost per station is substantially less than terrestrial station fees. Monthly fees start at about $20.00 a month and go up from there.
Check here for more info:
Internet broadcasting law has special music rotation and requested music regs that are nearly inviolate. So before you jump in, make sure your automation software or music scheduling software can emulate the separation rules required by the music licensing law.
I have an internet radio station simulcasting with Part 15 AM/FM. I use Spacial Audio SAM3, Music1 and Loud City for internet scheduling and license compliance. Due to the micro impact that the Part 15 stations make, BMI has not required a music license as yet. Hopefully this information will be helpful to someone.
There is a form on the BMI website created just for Part 15 radio broadcasting. After further research I have found out that the requirements for broadcasting under part 15 is a flat rate of $200 PLUS if you plan on advertising revenue it MUST NOT exceed $10,000 annually.