More radio hijinx- web radio piracy and indie contracts

Two rather disturbing stories about radio. First one is from the Future of Music Coalition, which found out that Clear Channel is demanding that indie-rock acts sign away their rights to get played on their stations- hey guys, why not just take their first-born? Then there’s this story from the Salon blog about how SoundExchange is demanding that web radio stations will only get a break in royalty payments (which would let them survive) if they combat piracy (i.e. users copying music from their service). As the article notes, there’s no silver bullet that’s gonna kill off all piracy of this type and it’s not clear how they’ll enforce this anyway. No matter- SoundExchange has them over a barrel so who are they to complain?