Frank Caico's Blog

Have you ever used Pandora Radio?  Its a very fun way to listen to music.  You simply type in an artist's name, or a song name and it plays music that is similar (based on a complicated set of heuristics).   It does a real good job.   Best thing of all, its free and there are no audible commercials (there are ads on the web page itself and you can buy songs through the site if you like). Pandora basically tailors a unique musical experience for every listener.  This is something that traditional radio just can't do.  I especially like Pandora for finding new music that I wouldn't have heard otherwise. 

It's this sort of innovation that makes Internet radio (some people call it webcasting) so compelling. Unfortunately for internet radio however, the Copyright Royalty Board last year ordered the per-song performance royalty on web radio stations to pay double what it was paying.  The trend goes like this:  If nothing changes by the year 2010 every time a song is played on an internet-based radio station, that station will incur 19/100  of a cent per song per listener.   That may not sound like alot but as an example, Pandora has 1,000,000 listeners and is adding 40,000 more every day. In 2006 the rate was only 8/100 of a cent.  Traditional radio doesn't even pay this fee and satellite radio pays a lower rate.

The net result is that there isn't a single internet radio station that can afford these rates -- even the successful ones! Tim Westergren, the founder of Pandora and the Music Genome Project has stated in no pretty black and white terms that Pandora may soon be finished:

We’re approaching a pull-the-plug kind of decision. This is like a last stand for webcasting. We’re losing money as it is. The moment we think this problem in Washington 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 business model has been broken. So if it doesn’t feel like its headed towards a solution, we’re done.

Congressional Rep. Howard L. Berman (a Democrat from California)is attempting to make some sort of arrangement between web radio stations and SoundExchange (the organization that represents artists and record companies) that would mitigate these new (and excessive) fees.  Unfortunately though, its doubtful that this will happen, and Pandora isn't going to be able to wait around very long to see how this plays out.  

Its really a shame.  Copyright and Patent laws were actually put in place to encourage innovation and protect the little guy.  Unfortunately, over the years these laws have been warped and twisted to represent the interests of big corporations and have actually started to stifle the innovation that these laws were originally put in place to foster.

Okay, perhaps it's a cheezy retake on the quote, but I'm noticing a marked trend where people in the world are very quick to give up their freedoms in order to feel the slightest sense of false security.

First there was the kid who got expelled for making a Counterstrike map based on his school, now The government has enabled legislation that makes DIY chemistry impossible without violating laws.  In states where don't even have to register a handgun, you now have to register the purchase of ann Erlenmeyer flask!  Yes, thats right - you have to let the government know that you bought a glass beaker.

Quoth Bill Nye:  “People who want to make meth will find ways to do it that don’t require an Erlenmeyer flask. But raising a generation of people who are technically incompetent is a recipe for disaster.”

I hope this irritates you as much as it irritates me.

Well, it was quite an exciting mid-term election.  The Democrats took the house with a commanding 227-195 majority. The Senate race is still up in the air.  There are current 2 seats still undecided and its tied at 49-49 (Though I think Lieberman falls under the democratic 49 and I'm not really sure how he'll vote after losing the primary).

This clearly shows that the American people wanted some change in direction here. It was, after all, quite a swing. 

So what happens now?  I fully expect that not alot is going to get done either in Congress or in the White House. The Senate rarely gets anything done without one side having a huge lead on the other, and even if they could Bush still has the Veto. While there will be alot of people complaining about how the Democrats are ringing in a do-nothing congress, I'm just hoping that the right-wing policy bleeding we've seen over the last 6 years should get stanched.

edit: 
Amazingly enough, it looks like the message sent has been received.  Donald Rumsfeld has stepped down as Secretary of Defense.

Ah, I love good political humor...

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It is irrelevant whether the executive in our country intends to harm or diminish or democratic rights, but it seems all too clear that they are intentionally deceiving us to achieve their own agenda. First they dragged us into a war with Iraq by claiming Saddam had WMDs and might sell them to terrorists. Now, as support for the war is waning, the administration is claiming that the insurgency in Iraq is "In its last throes". Even now, after its been proven that Saddam Hussein had absolutely no relationship whatsoever to the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the President still continues to speak about Saddam and 9/11 in the same breath.

There can't even be a rational discussion! Liberals have to tiptoe around our criticisms using humor to point out the ridiculousness of the conservative 'talking-point-du-jour' or they themselves are painted as crazies, conspiracy theorists and liberals who 'hate America'. All this while the powers-that-be claim that our already right-slanted media has a 'liberal bias'.

Don't believe that the administration is manipulating you to achieve its goals? Its been done before (the last paragraph is quite chilling in its relevance):

Oh, and by the way; I don't hate America!