I'm not a huge fan of monopolies. As a consumer, and as a creator, I want to have as many choices and options as I can for interacting with content and audience.

That just makes sense, right? More choices is better, free market, etc. etc. etc. I mean, can you imagine a world where you go to turn on your radio, and all you can get is a top 40 station? "Now Wil, you're just being silly." You say, "I'll just listen to an indie station on the internet. I'll never have to hear the Red Hot Chili Peppers or Ashlee Simpson ever again."

Not so fast, Captain Smugs-a-lot. The douchebags at the RIAA (who, I have decided, have realized that they've failed to evolve with their industry and are now determined to destroy it) are working overtime to completely destroy our ability to enjoy online radio, like Radio Paradise, Soma.fm, radioio, and Pandora:

The RIAA claim that they are working to "protect their artists." Like every other claim the RIAA makes, this is complete and utter bullshit. They realize that they can't force their outdated Big Hit business model on Longtail consumers any more, so rather than adapt to survive in the current marketplace, they're going to destroy it, and roll radio back to the pre-internet years when they could safely sit in their glass towers and twirl their mustaches while lighting cigars with 100 dollar bills. Uh, while we all listened to Toto and Survivor and liked it.

Bill Goldsmith, one of the guys behind the absolutely wonderful Internet radio station Radio Paradise, has written an impassioned and informative article about the beauty of online radio, and the consequences this ruling will have on broadcasters like him:

I can feel Bill's passion and his pain. When I started my blog back in the stone age, I used Shoutcast to do a simple streaming radio station through Live365. I called it Radio Free Burrito, and it gave me a chance to live out a dream I'd had since I was in middle school: play music I loved, talk about the history of the band, record, or song, and pretend I was a KROQ or KMET (rip) DJ. It was great fun, at one time got all the way up to 100 listeners, and gave me something to do that kept me off the streets. Then the CARP was passed, and my simple little hobby became an expensive nightmare of reporting and bureaucracy. Those 100 people who could have been turned into customers for some of the indie or little-known acts I played never got the chance, because it was more important to the RIAA to cling to an outdated and dying business model, rather than embrace a new technology.

Now, they're at it again, against all logic and reason, but luckily for all sane people, a diverse coalition of broadcasters from Clear Channel to NPR ultra-indie webcasters have joined forces to fight this outrageous ruling.

There are a few glimmers of hope here: This only impacts US-based internet radio, so until big business and nanny-state congressmorons get their China-like Internet filtering right here in the good old USofA, we can still tune into services like Last.fm, which aren't located here in the land of Freedom Fries and magnetic ribbons. Also, the fact that an evil conglomerate like Clear Channel is on board to fight it should tell us all a lot about just how bad this ruling would be for everyone (though it raises my suspicions more than a little bit; I'm far too cynical to believe that Clear Channel suddenly got a case of "concern for anyone but Clear Channel.")

I don't have a ton of additional personal commentary to add here; pretty much everything I want to say is summed up in the links above and below. But this is an important issue that needs wider exposure, and goes directly to the heart of consumer choice and technological empowerment of the same. I will add this: I agree with John Scalzi's (and Cory Doctorow's, and lots of other smart people's) suggestion that the greatest threat to authors is not piracy, but obscurity. I'd suggest that the same can be said of musicians. While the RIAA's contributors at the big labels may want to ensure that clones of Fallout Boy and Panic! at the Disco get massive radio play while unique acts like The Legends and Wilco struggle to get any airtime, I believe in giving audiences more -- not less -- choices and listening options. What does the RIAA have to gain by limiting our choices? I guess we should just follow the money, but fight them every step of the way.

Pissed off? Want to do something? Here are some resources to get you started:

RAIN: Copyright Law and the CRB: What Went Wrong?
Slashdot: Internet Radio in Danger of Extinction in the United States.
FAQ from Save our Internet Radio dot Com
Medialoper: NPR Starts a War
Webcasters Unite dot Net
And, of course, write, call, and fax your congressmoron . . . but be polite. Don't tell them you think they're a moron.

Wil Wheaton is really fucking tired of *AA orgs fucking up a good thing.