After two years of negotiations, a consortium of internet radio stations has finally reached an agreement on the amount of royalties they are to pay to music copyright holders.rnSites earning less than US$1.25m annually will pay up to 14% of revenue in royalties. Larger sites, such as Pandora and LastFM, will pay either 25% of revenue or 0.08 cents per song- rising to 0.14 cents by 2015. On top of that, all licensed websites will pay a minimum annual fee of $25,000 to operate.rnInternet radio stations have said that the new rate is much fairer than the one imposed by the US Copyright Royalty Board in 2007 which forced all websites to pay a flat-fee of 0.19 cents per song. The sites also agreed to give more detailed information about the songs they play and how many people listen to them to SoundExchange, the US organisation which collects and distributes digital royalties on behalf of artists and labels.
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