Comment by lakethun | Hacker News Reader

Comment by lakethun | Hacker News Reader

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Did you read yesterday's post linked in the article [1]?

  WHO PAYS FOR:            Pandora   AM/FM
  Songwriting/Publishing     YES      YES
  Performance                YES      NO

And those performance royalties Pandora pays are 13 times songwriting/publishing! Not to mention your royalties are capped at 1.5% of revenue. You are paying less than 1/10 what Pandora pays for each listener hearing an artist's song. Please enlighten us if this is incorrect or how this is fair?

[1] http://theunderstatement.com/post/53867665082/pandora-pays-f...

I don't recall arguing that radio pays less royalties than Pandora. I'd like you to show me where I said that (you can't). You've almost completely ignored what I actually said.

Your position claiming that radio pays 10% what Pandora does for each listener hearing a song is bogus, just on the fact that you can't actually show me how many people are hearing a song on my radio stations at any given time. Thus you are presenting false data.

I specifically said that the claim that radio doesn't pay out to artists is deceitful. It is.

If your issue is that publishers are ripping off artists when it comes to the cut from radio plays, then why aren't you arguing in favor of fixing that? Radio stations don't get to choose how they license popular music; they don't get to pick whether they pay publishers via BMI / ASCAP or artists directly.

Also, in fact, in the past I have indeed argued that Pandora is getting screwed compared to radio. It's obvious they are.

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