SWCast Network's topics - tribe.net

Actions Speak Louder than Words

sorcerykid — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 21:26:39 GMT

I recently came across the following statements from a 2002 press release on the RIAA Website. Granted, this opinion of small Webcasters may have changed somewhat since that time. However, for all of the proclaimed merits of the small Webcaster community, the recording industry never justifies the exorbitant royalty rates with any real foresight into the economic consequences for small Webcasters. Certainly the RIAA's intent may have been to pacify nay-sayers, but this type of questionable propaganda will not go unnoticed forever.

The Myths & Facts: Internet Radio Fairness Act (Sept 27, 2002):

"Myth: The major record labels and the RIAA don't support the nascent webcasting industry and want small webcasters to pay royalty rates that are so high that no small webcaster will be able to stay in business.

"Fact: The major record labels and recording artists want 'small' webcasters to succeed. At a time when enormous consolidation is occurring in the traditional radio industry, the diversity of music choices provided by webcasters is great for consumers and artists."

http://www.smallwebcaster.org/commentary/view.cgi/107

Randall E. Krause
Executive Director
Small Webcaster Community Initiative

posted in SWCast Network - 1 reply

SHOUTcast DNAS 1.9.8 Released

sorcerykid — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 04:51:02 GMT

Nullsoft yesterday released version 1.9.8 of the SHOUTcast server which fixes a known exploit from previous versions. Downloading this latest update is highly advised, particularly for hosting providers in accordance with their ongoing security policies.

http://www.shoutcast.com/download/files.phtml

--Randall

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Worldwide Webcaster License Still Ends at SoundExchange

sorcerykid — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 14:13:44 GMT

Many Webcasters today recognize the value of streaming their content globally. However, based on a recent press release concerning Phonographic Performance Limited (PPL), it appears the UK performing rights organization claims they can now provide this much needed "multi-territorial" clearance to Webcasters -- even with respect to the United States. And apparently the first such worldwide license has already been executed.

To get some clarification on this matter and its validity, I spoke with Kyle Funn, licensing representative for SoundExchange. He confirmed that while PPL may be signed to the IFPI International Webcaster Agreement, they are not in the position to administer licensing for the online transmission of sound-recordings into the United States. For this purpose, he informed me that one must also secure a separate agreement through SoundExchange. To reiterate, there is currently not a "one-stop" license available that includes the United States. Any claims to the contrary, are quite likely fallacious.

--Randall

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Attention Small Webcasters, We're Set to Launch this Week!

sorcerykid — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 21:30:17 GMT

Hello All:

I'm happy to say that Small Webcaster Community Initiative will be "officially" going public this week. We are still pursuing a few more industry connections as well as finalizing a press release. But our Website is online, so feel free to review our new mission statement including the initial goals we've outlined.

http://www.smallwebcaster.org/

Also, check our MySpace profile every so often for the latest action-alerts and commentary pertaining to Internet radio.

http://www.myspace.com/smallwebcaster

There's still a long road ahead of us. However, by banding together and standing together, we can overcome the adversity facing our community. So please continue to spread the word about the coalition. Every bit of momentum we gain prior to launch, will help demonstrate our cause and justify our concerns to the public at large and to our lawmakers.

I appreciate the support and generosity of everybody who has offered it along the way. I look forward to working with many of you in the months to follow.

Thanks again,

Randall E. Krause
Executive Director
Small Webcaster Community Initiative

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The PERFORM Act Makes a Repeat Performance

sorcerykid — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 23:03:04 GMT

The infamous PERFORM Act, originally shelved in committee last year, has been revived, this time as Senate bill S.256.

The limitations it will impose on both satellite and Web radio are no more benign than the Act's previous incarnation. In fact, the small Webcaster community would likely be cripped by the technological limitations alone. Not surprisingly, the RIAA is backing the PERFORM Act. Why else would Congress take such an atrocity of legislation so seriously? And so once again consumers' fair-use rights are in jeopardy.

www.arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070112-8609.html

Rest assured, I will post a fully commentary on this issue once I have the time.

--Randall

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New U.S. Webcasting Rates Could Spell End

sorcerykid — Sat, 20 Jan 2007 23:22:23 GMT

Official proceedings to determine the new license fees for U.S.-based Webcasters retroactive to January 2006 are drawing to a close. The trial-phase was completed this past November, and deliberations were held on December 21. It is now up to the Copyright Royalty Judges to evaluate the testimony submitted by all parties involved and enact a new statutory rate by March 4, 2007.

SoundExchange has urged that the license fees be raised to 30% of gross revenues or 0.08 to 0.19 cents per-track per-listener, whichever is higher. (This, of course, is in addition to the revenue-based fees already imposed by ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC for use of their repertory of musical works.)

Other participating industry groups -- including such major players as AOL, Yahoo!, NPR, and AccuRadio, and Digitally Imported -- argued that the rates were already excessive given the current marketplace conditions. Any increase would create an unrealistic barrier-to-entry.

At present, eligible online music stations that elect the Small Webcaster Settlement Act pay a license fee corresponding to 10% or 12% of revenues or 7% of operating expenses. In other words, SoundExchange is proposing a triple-fold increase in the statutory rate, and one that would apply to all Webcasters regardless of commercial or non-commercial status.

There is a good likelihood that the revenue-based model now afforded by the SWSA will become obsolete. Individual broadcasters (in particular, those generating less than $50,000 per year) will no longer be provided immunity from the standard performance-based license fees endured by large commercial broadcasters. This could spell disaster for many.

The recording industry contests that stream-ripping alone imposes an unbearable economic risk, and therefore higher royalties are a necessity to compensate sound-recording copyright owners for potential losses in CD and MP3 sales. This ongoing sense of paranoia is particularly evident given that the recording industry perceives Webcasting to have very little to no promotional benefit to performing artists.

Will March 4, 2007 spell the end for independent online radio?

http://www.smallwebcaster.org/commentary/view.cgi/105

Randall E. Krause
Executive Director
Small Webcaster Community Initiative

posted in SWCast Network - 0 replies

New Australian Copyright Law Permits Space, Time-Shifting

sorcerykid — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 08:31:58 GMT

By Randall Krause

A new Australian bill went into full-effect on January 1 of this year, which specifically allows Australian consumers who have purchased music on any recorded medium to re-record the same music onto another medium or device for convenience of private use -- that is, "space-shifting". Thus far, from what information I can find, "time-shifting" of Australian television and radio broadcasts is now permitted as well, but the legal ramifications with respect to Internet radio are still rather vague.

Personally, I am very disappointed by this new legislation. On the surface these provisions seem like great news since they expand the rights of music-users. But once again -- they also carry some remarkable limitations:

If the media on which the songs were originally recorded is protected in any way (for example, a copy-protected CD or a DRM-encoded multimedia file), then you still have the right to re-record it onto a different medium. But that right is suddenly usurped if you attempt in any way to defeat the protection measures in the recording. In other words, you have the freedom to legally backup your music collection, yet you can't backup your music collection because the sound-recording prevents you from doing so. Similar restrictions could, in theory, even preclude home-recording of HDTV, HD Radio, Sirius Radio, and XM Radio programs on receivers that honour specially-mandated broadcast flags. Hence, the very law that is designed to provide you freedoms is trumped by the other law that was intended to preemptively take away your freedoms.

The APRA discusses the issue in greater depth on their Website. They actually proposed levying a low-cost license fee (most likely upon the consumers themselves rather than the vendors of audio recording devices, as is done in the United States) to allow music-users to legally transfer their music-collection from one medium to another.

http://www.apra.com.au/news/industry/news/061206_CopyrightAmendmentBill.asp

This is yet another example of how the recording-industry continues to seize the fundamental fair-use rights of legitimate music consumers, all for their own commercial advantage.

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Addition of Station Page Statistics

sorcerykid — Sun, 31 Dec 2006 19:59:58 GMT

Beginning December 30, the Daily Listener Activity Reports will include some additional statistical data pertaining to your SWCast Network station:

Total Station Page Views = Derived from the number of hits to your personal station page within the span of 24 hours.

Total Stream Launches = Derived from the number of tune-ins to your hi- and lo-band streams via the SWCast Network site within the span of 24 hours.

We hope that you enjoy these new features,

--Randall

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Intraversal to acquire SWCast Network

sorcerykid — Sun, 31 Dec 2006 19:56:26 GMT

Beginning January 2007, SWCast Network, Inc. and the entirety of its properties will come under the umbrella ownership of Intraversal Communications Corp. (ICC). This changeover will not impact SWCast Network clients in any direct capacity; it is purely a legal formality. As president of SWCast Network, I will maintain majority ownership in Intraversal.

--Randall

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Membership Rate Schedule 2007

sorcerykid — Wed, 27 Dec 2006 04:05:13 GMT

Our new membership rates for 2007 are available. Please review them at your convenience.

http://www.swcast.net/broadcast/newrates.html

Best wishes for the new year,

--Randall

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Changes to Tune-In Functionality

sorcerykid — Wed, 20 Dec 2006 04:42:12 GMT

In our continuing efforts to ensure compliance with the rules and requirements of the Joint Performance Licensing Program, we have recently implemented several site-wide changes to the tune-in functionality. These modifications will be transparent to visitors who launch streams from within the SWCast Network family of sites and services (including via bookmarks in all major media players). If you experience any problems, however, please feel free to notify us in the Support and Feedback forum.

Thank you for your cooperation,

--Randall

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New URLs to Third-Party Tools

sorcerykid — Wed, 20 Dec 2006 04:40:15 GMT

Dear Members:

The URLs to all third party tools are in the process of transition, as summarized below. These changes are designed to promote better uniformity as we begin to introduce new third-party tools.

LIVESTATS BASIC
From: http://tools.swcast.net/LSBasic/...
To: http://tools.swcast.net/shared/livestats/...

SAVIOR
From: http://tools.swcast.net/Savior/...
To: http://tools.swcast.net/shared/savior/...

LIVESHOWS
From: http://tools.swcast.net/LiveShows/...
To: http://tools.swcast.net/shared/liveshows/...

The corresponding Knowledge Base article has been updated.

While the former URLs will continue to function for at least the next six months, we encourage use of these new URLs.

--Randall

posted in SWCast Network - 0 replies

Important reminder about outside links

sorcerykid — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 07:52:49 GMT

DJs, please remember that you are not permitted to publish SWCast Network stream URLs in forums, blogs, or newsgroups. Instead listeners must initially tune-into your station via the provided landing page on our site.

The only exceptions to this rule are the AudioRealm and SHOUTcast directories and alternatively hyperlinks that employ our 'gst' scheme. (For other directories outside of SWCast Network, such as StreamFinder, your submission must only include links to your SWCast Network landing page.)

If you prefer to have your stream launch automatically upon arrival to your landing page, simply append '?play' to the end of the URL. Do not direct-link to any playlist files (PLS, ASX, and RAM) on our site.

This is CORRECT
http:// stations.swcast.net/morefm?play

This is NOT correct
http:// streams.swcast.net/launch.cgi/morefm/lo-band.pls

Thanks for your cooperation
--Randall

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Sitewide outage 11/13

sorcerykid — Mon, 13 Nov 2006 17:04:17 GMT

Please check status.swcast.net for more information and updates. Thanks.

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Some recognition for SWCast.net

sorcerykid — Sun, 13 Aug 2006 21:55:37 GMT

I see our site's been featured on the front page of the new AboutUs.org. Wh00t :D

http://www.aboutus.org/

--Randall

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New Mini-Button for Your Radio Homepage

sorcerykid — Fri, 28 Jul 2006 03:29:37 GMT

Hey there!

We've now got a standard 80 x 15 button that you're all free to put on your pages. You can link to the SWCast.net front page or your own station page!

www.swcast.net/images/minibutton.gif

You can find other cool ways to spread the word about SWCast Network in our Knowledge Base:

forums.swcast.net/viewtopic.php

--Randall

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Coalition for Small Webcasters

sorcerykid — Fri, 21 Jul 2006 16:22:08 GMT

Just a heads up....

Given the political climate as of late, it has come to my attention that we desperately need to effect some degree of legal reforms to preserve the small Webcaster community. SWCast Network has already been discussing the need for a coalition with several interested parties over the past few months. Based on the positive response received, we've decided to go through with forming a trade association to represent independent Internet radio broadcasters. It's still very much in the initial phases. In fact, we've only just begun developing the strategic partnerships and alliances we need. But we're almost nearing completion of a Website so that we can at least disseminate news and information about this endeavor.

I firmly believe that a special interest group devoted to promoting and protecting small Webcasters on Capitol Hill is critical to our survival. It is more important now than ever before that we all band together for a unified cause to finally oppose the recording-industry's continued oppression of the independent Internet radio community.

If you would be interested in helping out, just drop me a note. I'll post more information as it becomes available.

Randall Krause
SWCast Network, Inc.

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ClubRadio Network joins the SWCast Network family

sorcerykid — Thu, 20 Jul 2006 17:11:39 GMT

July 9, 2006

Dear Members:

I am proud to announce that SWCast Network, Inc. has acquired Club Radio Network, the popular online dance-music community for disc-jockeys and clubgoers featuring an extensive selection of exclusive mixshows, nightclub reviews, artist interviews, and dance music charts.

As a further extension of the SWCast Network(R) brand service offerings, the new ClubRadio Network(SM) site will retain many of the same core features that made it a success since its emergence in 1999, including mixshow hosting and party schedules, while incorporating the already well-established licensing schemes and new technologies of SWCast Network.

The acquisition of ClubRadio Network will allow SWCast Network to better penetrate the profitable club music market while further leveraging our position as a premiere Internet radio service provider. Look forward to ClubRadio Network to launch in October 2006.

Randall Krause
President/CEO
SWCast Network, Inc.

posted in SWCast Network - 0 replies

New version of SHOUTcast server released!

sorcerykid — Tue, 20 Jun 2006 15:05:41 GMT

SHOUTcast DNAS 1.9.6 has rolled out the doors from Nullsoft. It fixes some known issues. Get it while it's hot :)

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?threadid=249145

posted in SWCast Network - 2 replies

Broadcasting On Swcast

Cat — Mon, 26 Jun 2006 20:41:16 GMT

How much does it cost to broadcast via swcast and can we actually have advertising? Currently I am paying $19.95 to broadcast via Loudcity and was wondering if it is lower via swcast? Thanks.

posted in SWCast Network - 1 reply

Cat Galaxy Has Arrived

Cat — Tue, 27 Jun 2006 19:15:16 GMT

Cat Galaxy is now broadcasting via swcast. You can check out our station at www.catgalaxymedia.com. For those of you not familiar with Cat Galaxy, we are an internet radio station just for cats to listen to and enjoy. Meow!

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Calling Beta Testers - Internet Radio Toolbar

sorcerykid — Mon, 29 May 2006 21:51:15 GMT

We're looking for beta testers for our exciting new Internet radio toolbar. All you need is Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox. If you're interested in helping out, just contact me.

--Randall

posted in SWCast Network - 3 replies

Happy anniversary to us!

sorcerykid — Tue, 20 Jun 2006 20:05:51 GMT

We are going to be 3 years old on July 1! Thanks to all of our broadcasters and our listeners for showing your support and for helping to keep Internet radio alive and legal.

--Randall

posted in SWCast Network - 0 replies

Keiichi.net Radio! Yay!

Keiichi — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 21:14:36 GMT

Keiichi.net EX² is an all request, live feed station that plays your Anime, J-Pop, and J-Rock favorites from our extensive playlist of over 3000 songs including songs from Clamp Campus Detectives, Shoujo Kakumeai Utena (Girl's Revolution Utena), Gundam Wing, and Mamotte Shugogetten, we provides hours of listening pleasure without fear of hearing the same song once every three hours. Also, we have a unique request system, so that if you have a particular song you want to hear, you can request it! This station is up 24x7 and brodcasts at multiple bitrates.

Website: http://www.animeradio.net

~k1

posted in SWCast Network - 1 reply

Code X Radio: Mainstream Rock/Pop

Andrew — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 04:05:38 GMT

Just thought I'd let you know about Code X Radio, which is a proud member of the SWCast Network.

Code X Radio is born after an idea that Andrew Syn (Owner/Founder) had back in the good old days of hassle-free shoutcasting... in his small neighborhood, he ran a weekly station called "Code X-Treme Radio", which was a part of the promotion made for an e-wrestling federation called "Code X-Treme Wrestling".

After that venture since 1999, Andrew Syn didn't really work the airwaves, except for interviews with local radio stations (about his musical project). It was until 2004 when Andrew Syn started broadcasting again, this time as part of the now defunct Hybrid Radio, running a daily show called "The Sound And The Fury". That stinct lasted for a few months, before Hybrid Radio went into hiatus, then finally doomed.

In 2005, Andrew Syn got his break as a professional radio DJ, when he started working a rock show called "Rock En Exa", which aired weekly, then daily, on EXA 101.9 FM (Poza Rica, Veracruz, Mexico). After six months on the air, EXA decided they wanted to take the station's direction to a more poppish crowd, and Andrew Syn was fired along with all of the other DJs.

Now in 2006, Code X Radio is born as an alternative, to showcase musical talents, but most importantly, to showcase the talent of our DJ's. Code X Radio is commercial-free, and for the meanwhile is being paid by Andrew Syn himself.

To listen, just visit http://codexradio.com.

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www.teazerstunage.com

DJTEAZER — Tue, 13 Jun 2006 19:39:52 GMT

Webcaster Call Letters: T.Z.E.R.
Station Name: TEAZERS TUNAGE
Owner/Operator: DJTEAZER
Email: teazerdj@gmail.com
Website: www.teazerstunage.com
Format: Rock & Alternative
Shows: Yes
Live Dj's: Not Yet (Recruiting, Check Forums, or send 1min MP3 to me.)
Station is 24/7 broadcasting thru:
http://stations.swcast.net/teazerstunage

Myspace: www.myspace.com/teazerstunage
Xfire: teazerstunage

IRC Channel: irc://irc.gamesurge.net/teazerstunage
Gamesurge.net - #teazerstunage

Mottos:
"Escape Reality Thru Music."®
"Tune out of your world, Tune into TEAZERS TUNAGE."®
"TEAZERS TUNAGE is, Music for your inner Monkey." ®

TEAZERS TUNAGE is The Best of the 80's, 90's & Today, 24/7 Rock & Alternative.
LINK TO ME:
http://www.teazerstunage.com/forum/uploads/DJTEAZER/teazers1yo.gif
Add this Stream Link to the Image:
http://stations.swcast.net/teazerstunage

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SWCast Network and MyTuner genre directory

sorcerykid — Tue, 13 Jun 2006 19:07:31 GMT

The official genre directory is being deployed over the next two weeks. Broadcasters can get the lowdown on how to best take advantage of the new listings in our Support and Feedback forum.

--RK

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Scheduled service updates June 14

sorcerykid — Tue, 13 Jun 2006 18:56:59 GMT

We're performing updates to our backend systems tonight. Downtime for the SWCast Network and MyTuner sites should be approximately one hour. An announcement will be posted to the service status homepage.

--RK

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We have struck a deal with PPL

sorcerykid — Wed, 31 May 2006 20:46:28 GMT

After an initial round of discussions regarding licensing, we have struck a deal that is quite favorable for our company. I will post more specifics in our Support and Feedback forum!

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