New York - The Digital Media Association (DiMA) -- which represents large webcasters like AOL, Yahoo, RealNetworks, Live365 and Pandora -- announced on Thursday that it has reached agreements with SoundExchange on several thorny issues related to the disputed royalty rates for streaming music online.

DiMA said that SoundExchange, the entity set up by record labels to collect and distribute digital royalties, agreed to cap a $500-per-channel minimum royalty at $50,000 per service -- which large webcasters with thousands of individual channels had lobbied for.

The parties also agreed that, six months from now, webcasters will provide SoundExchange with a full census of all songs played on their services, which will be helpful for accurate distribution of royalties to major label and independent artists.

DiMA and SoundExchange will also form a committee to evaluate the issue of "streamripping," or recording of Internet radio streams, and potential technological solutions.

"This agreement marks an important first step in the internet radio royalty negotiation process," said DiMA executive director Jonathan Potter.

"We're encouraged by this development and the knowledge that good-faith negotiations have begun. We look forward to the next step of negotiating the royalty rates that will allow for the growth of the Internet radio industry, a platform for music discovery for consumers."

Yesterday, SoundExchange offered smaller webcasters a discount on the royalty rates set in March by the Copyright Royalty Board.

SoundExchange is still negotiating actual royalty rates with larger webcasters, many of whom have said the rates set by the CRB -- but not yet enforced by SoundExchange -- are so high that they will be forced off the air.

Related Links:
http://www.digmedia.org

http://www.soundexchange.com