With the rising cost of broadcast programming and the high-profile of “blackouts,” Retransmission Consent has earned a place at the forefront of the modern communications policy debate. To provide a framework under which to evaluate the issue, we present in this PAPER an economic theory of...

Over the past twenty years we have seen the emergence of an important phenomenon in the practice of modern regulation — cooperative bargaining between the regulator and the regulated over a “bundle” of seemingly unrelated issues. Because of the multiplicity of issues being adjudicated...

For the last twenty years, promoting broadband adoption has been a focal point of communications policy around the world. Despite significant advances, there is still much work to be done. To help bridge this adoption gap, in many countries private communications companies are now offering...

When a terrestrial radio station plays a song during its over-the-air broadcast, the artists and their record labels receive no compensation for the sound recording right. Yet radio's digital competitors — including streaming services and satellite radio — do pay performance royalties to...

In the regulatory setting of rates for statutory-licensed music services, the question of value-based versus cost-based rate setting for the component-rights of a musical performance arises. In this article, we have demonstrated this value-or-cost question is a distinction without a difference....

According to the music recording industry, YouTube, one of the largest purveyors of on-demand digital music, evades paying market rates for the use of copyrighted content by exploiting the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's “safe harbor” provisions. The source of the distortion in licensing...

When a pirated version of a copyrighted work is shared over the Internet, many online intermediaries may participate, exposing these firms to liability through legal concepts such as direct, contributory and vicarious infringement. Safe harbors largely shield intermediaries from “crippling...