The music industry is attempting to go way beyond the norm and increase their royalties from Satellite Radio providers XM (XMSR) and Sirius (SIRI), according to Red Herring. They want to increase the percentage to 23 percent of revenues over a 6-year period. The current agreement is for between 4 and 7 percent.
The music companies say that they originally signed the agreement with the satellite companies to help them get started. Aren't they nice guys? That's a bunch of nonsense. The music industry is only trying to find anywhere that they can increase their declining revenues.
The problem satellite radio has is that they are required by federal law, along with digital cable and Internet companies, to pay out to record companies and artists. Regular radio stations aren't under this 
mandate. They only have to pay roylaties to songwriters and publishers.
In a joint statement the companies said:
“The music industry has made a proposal which unfortunately makes no sense, Sirius and XM, upon the guidance and recommendation of third-party experts, have proposed a sound-recording fee that is fair and reasonable to all parties. We look forward to presenting our materials to the Copyright Royalty Board in due course.”
It looks like there will be no settlement in the talks, so the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB) will be brought in to set the rate for the companies.
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