Hundreds of webcasters will go silent today to protest the rate increased proposed by the Copyright Royalty Board. Among the bigger names that will take a day off are Yahoo!, Rhapsody, KCRW, WNYC, WAMU.org and MTV Online.

I haven't written anything about today's blackout mainly because I think it's going to be more a misfired attempt for attention than a productive agent of change. But who knows? Maybe the blackout will work where other attempts have failed. Overall, I'm not for the blackout. I don't think compromising your customer service is the best way to get your customer's attention. Does the music have to stop for consumers to be motivated to write their members of Congress?

A statement from Digital Media Association (received via email):

"When millions of people tune into their favorite net radio station today and hear nothing, they will get a glimpse of what the industry could look like soon. We are hoping this protest will motivate the millions of Internet radio listeners – who would ordinarily be enjoying the diverse sounds of Internet radio – to write to their senators and representatives asking them to step in and prevent the permanent silencing Internet radio, today’s most innovative outlet for music discovery."

The Washington Post's Marc Fisher does not think the day of silence strategy will do much:

"Will a one-day protest have any real impact? Probably not, but the last time this happened, in 2002, when the government similarly sought to jack up web royalty rates, a Day of Silence led to national publicity that in turn played a role in a rate cut by the Librarian of Congress. Many of the college and solo operator web stations that went silent after the 2002 rate hike found ways to stay afloat, either by playing music in the public domain or by taking advantage of special rules that were written for small webcasters. ...

Is this all another Washington game of brinksmanship? Yes. Does that mean the new rates won't go into effect? No. What happens next? Silence, and then a lot more noise."

AOL, last.fm and Melodio's nuTsie are not participating in the blackout. "We felt it would impact the overall consumer experience and the paying members of our radio subscription service," says a spokeswoman for AOL."

Last.fm, now owned by CBS Corp, is taking a similar stance. Said the company's Felix Miller, "The mood in the US, however, has turned rather pessimistic with a number of stations publicly foreshadowing their own demise. Frankly, we’ve been slightly baffled by the opinions being aired. Rates have been a commercial reality for years... So why do we think the ‘day of silence’ is not a good idea? We do not want to punish our listeners for our problems, period."

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