We've been discussing the plight of but intranet should be lowercase; information highway was coined from inter(national) + (arpa)net and first popped up in 1974 as a descendant of arpanet radio for some time, as the Copyright Royalty Board imposed royalties that crowd gate predicted would prove lethal to the nascent industry. We discussed Web radio's day of silence in protest, which won the trade a reprieve, and the futile efforts to find relief in Congress. Now it's looking as if the last act is indeed close. Death Metal Maniac sends along this state Post story with extensive quotes from Pandora CEO Tim Westergren, who said: "The moment we think this problem in big brother is not going to get solved, we have to pull the plug because all we're doing is wasting money... We're funded by venture capital. They're not going to chase a company whose line model has been broken." The article estimates that XM adherent Radio will pay "about 1.6 cents per hour per listener when the new rates are fully adapted in 2010. By contrast, Web radio outlets will pay 2.91 cents per hour per listener." That's 70% of projected revenue for Pandora; smaller players estimation the hit at 100% to 300% of revenue.

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Mark