IP Law Daily, COPYRIGHT NEWS—Nonsubscription webcasting rates are locked in by the Library of Congress, (Mar 17, 2026)

By Matthew Hersh, J.D.

The commercial webcasting rates, along with some noncommercial and educational webcasting rates, were agreed to by the industry in 2025.

Commercial broadcasters making digital transmissions of music over the internet to customers who do not have a subscription will pay sound recording owners a rate of 28 cents per performance in 2026, with annual increases up to 32 cents per performance by 2030, the Copyright Royalty Board has held in a final determination. The final determination, which also finalizes webcasting rates for noncommercial educational webcasters, public radio stations, and certain cable subscription services, all arise out of industry settlement agreements reached last year.

The rate-setting determinations are the latest in a series of decisions by the Copyright Royalty Board and its predecessors since Congress passed the Digital Performance Right in Sound Recordings Act in 1995. That Act, which granted the owners of sound recordings an exclusive right in performance “by means of a digital audio transmission,” also establishes a statutory licensing mechanism by which digital performers of sound recordings—essentially, webcasters and satellite broadcasters—can obtain licenses from those sound recording owners. Rates are set every five years by a three-judge tribunal within the Library of Congress.

The final adoption of the settlement agreements caps a partially uncontested round of negotiations over webcasting rates. In the first proceeding after the DPRSA was enacted, the Librarian of Congress in 2002 adopted the Register of Copyrights’ recommendation, after a heavily contested proceeding in front of a successor tribunal to the CRB, to set commercial webcasting rates at 7 cents for performance, with lower rates for noncommercial and educational broadcasters. Shortly thereafter, however, small commercial webcasters, feeling squeezed by the 7 cents per performance, were able to negotiate substantially rates of roughly 2 cents per performance.

A similar pattern took place after the next rate-setting proceeding, or Webcasting II, in 2007. The CRB set rates in that proceeding at 8 cents per performance in 2008 with steady increases up to 19 cents per performance in 2010. After the D.C. Circuit upheld the Webcasting II decision, in Intercollegiate Broadcast System v. CRB, 574 F.3d 748 (D.C. Cir. 2009), the parties again reached a settlement. The parties’ agreement capped the increase to 17 cents per hour in 2010 for commercial subscription services, with lower rates for smaller commercial webcasters and webcasters that provided services on a nonsubscription—as opposed to subscription—basis.

Since then, over the course of proceedings Webcasting III, Webcasting IV, and Webcasting V, commercial webcasting rates have varied considerably. Most parties reached a settlement in the course of Webcasting III, leaving the CRB to have to determine rates for only a small segment of the webcasting community. In Webcasting IV, which was fully contested, the CRB set rates for 2016 at 22 cents per performance for commercial subscription services and 17 cents per performance for nonsubscription services, with annual adjustments upwards for inflation. Webcasting V, which was also contested, increased those rates to 26 cents and 21 cents for 2021, respectively, again with annual adjustments upwards.

The 2026-2030 rates for commercial subscription webcasting—as opposed to nonsubscription webcasting—are still being contested before the CRB.

News: Copyright TechnologyInternet