Brindle Media

This week, the RIAA sent 5 people to the National Association of Broadcaters’ headquarters in Washington DC with a blow-up pig to protest NAB’s stance against the Performance Rights Act. NAB responded by sending them a sausage pizza.

Dennis Wharton, the NAB’s Executive VP says:”It’s no surprise that RIAA is now employing silly frat-boy stunts, given its well-documented practice of suing college kids to rescue a bankrupt business model. It also seems appropriate for RIAA to use an inflatable pig as its mascot, since its foreign-owned members would be the biggest beneficiaries of performance tax pork. RIAA is losing this issue on Capitol Hill and in the court of public opinion, and today’s demonstration represents a new low in a campaign of utter desperation.”

About the sausage pizza, Wharton noted, “We’re suggesting they provide this food to the scores of exploited musicians who have had to sue their record label to recoup allegedly unpaid album royalties.”

As music industry veteran Steve Meyer notes in his DISC & DigitalAudioTechnology (Music & Digital Audio/Video News):
“All the artists who have earned a whole lot of money from selling a whole lot of records from a whole lot of radio play should think twice before they try and get what they wish for. Because if the Performance Tax is ever passed, a whole lot of newer artists won’t have the same ability to make a whole lot of money from record sales because they will most likely not receive the same whole lot of airplay. But that’s my opinion.”

“Back to the RIAA and their lame brained stunt. Labels fund the RIAA, and they should demand the costs of the stunt be deducted from the salaries of all those in the association who thought it was a good idea to draw attention to a matter so far removed from the public’s consciousness. It accomplished nothing and it allowed the NAB to retaliate with words the public is more likely to side with.”

(Read Steve’s weekly newsletters at www.freewebs.com/stevemeyer )

I like the sausage pizza move and Wharton’s responses but, unfortunately, visuals tend to trump the written and spoken word with we humans so I think that radio broadcasters need to respond with their own creative and iconic visual to represent the greedy labels and those ungrateful artists who dismiss FREE promotion and advocacy of their work as having no value.

Any suggestions?

Note to MusicFIRST: In a survey of its readers the broadcast trade, INSIDE RADIO asked if the Performance Rights Act were passed would they consider switching their music-formated radio stations to talk, sports or news programming. More than half (52%) said yes. A third of those responding said that their decision would be based on the size of the royalty payments.