Storybox: News

This is the time of year when most people write about the highlights of the year. If you have paid close attention you probably know everything. But I want to mention the highlights of Storybox's 2007.

January:
The year started with Hey! Lonely charting at no. 1 (for 4 weeks) on AeschTunes. We also announced Lthrboots as the winner of the remix contest for Sun. Never Wonder was included in Woobie Bear Music's G CD Global 1 release.

March/April:
By March 20th Never Wonder had been no. 1 for 3 weeks on Bear Radio and then it reached no. 1 on AeschTunes on April 9th.

July:
Triple Play is released with 5 Storybox tracks along music from SpekrFreks and Decoding Jesus. Unfortunately, in July we lost one of our biggest supporters when AeschTunes radio shut down. But they are still with us, just not the station. We gained another big supporter: The Bear at KMRL.

August:
Storybox joins Section 44 label, home of Tristraum, Eloquent, Royal Visionaries, Provision and more.

September:
No Dancing Allowed (CD) is finally released. Russians love it! (Seriously, google it and you'll see!). Hatred, from the Triple Play disc reached number 9 on the Sirius Out Q Top 20. NDA (track) was included on the top 20 songs on HomoPod's anniversary show as voted by their listeners. Reviews of the album start to come in from Jerry Rabushka and Dan of AeschTunes.

October/November:
More reviews from Mentenebre, Chain DLK, Connexion Bizarre and Gregg Shapiro. NDA debuts at number 39 on the OutVoice.net top 40 cds and moves up to 28 for November.

December:
The year ends with news of HomoPod's end. AeschTunes announced their Top 5 Cds of 2007 and Storybox ranks at number 3! (Thanks Guys). Never Wonder is one of the 100 songs on the Duke's Music Playoffs which will air on New Years Eve and New Years Day and Fantasy is on the current Mountman's Musical Montage from Rainbow World Radio.

I should mention that writer Rane Arroyo also wrote a review on NDA but it will be published in January.

So what is planned for 2008? So far, a new single for the 20th anniversary of No You Turn's first release Puppet's Frustration. No release date yet but recording has begun.

On a personal level, I moved to a new house in September and now have limited internet access. I am sorry for the lack of contact but that is country living! Hopefully 2008 will change that.

Thank you everyone for your love and support. I hope you all have a wonderful 2008!

The day is finally here. Classic synthpop melodies and sounds with a
modern twist. If you like Depeche Mode, Erasure, OMD, Pet Shop Boys
and Human League, you will love Storybox's No Dancing Allowed.



Track listing:

No Dancing Allowed
Never Wonder (Words Unspoken)
Ashes In The Air
Fantasy
Sun
Things We Said Today
Ardor
[Hidden Track]
Dream Ghosts
Therapy
You Move Me
Gone With The Wind

Get your copy at any of the following retailers:

Amazon.com

CDBaby

WoobieStore

CD Listening Party

September 1, 2007

4:00 PM EST to 6:00 PM EST

Listen to No Dancing Allowed in full. Join Storybox and friends and preview the full album online. Agent D will be available through instant messaging and you can ask any questions about the CD or anything you like.

To get access to the CD link, simply message storyboxagentd using AIM during the time slot posted above.

"Hatred" debutes at number 18 on Sirius Out Q Hot 20.

No Dancing Allowed, the highly anticipated CD by Storybox is now available for pre-order at Amazon.

Order it now and have it by release date of 9/4/07!

Visit Storybox's forum on Section 44.

Storybox NDA Trailer 2

Add to My Profile | More Videos
Storybox on isound.com

Storybox is featured on Malice Radio's 3rd part of their 6th broadcast. Check it out here. Storybox plays at 8:40 into the show.

"Hatred", a new track off the Triple Play CD is on heavy rotation at bearradio.net

Help Fight Against New Ruling Faced by Internet Radio Stations

Please: Go to the links below to SIGN THE PETITIONS and for the
latest news regarding the Copyright Royalty Board decision.

www.SaveTheStreams.org

www.SaveNetRadio.org

Internet radio may be driven out of business within weeks due to the
latest March ruling. Here are the basic facts from
SaveTheStreams.org.

1. Okay, what's going on?

On Friday March 2nd, the U.S. government (specifically, the Copyright
Royalty Board, or "CRB") announced its determination of the royalty
rates Internet radio webcasters must pay the owners of sound
recording copyrights to license the music they play for the years
2006-2010. The owners of these sound recording copyrights are, in the
vast majority of cases, recording companies ("labels").

While successful webcasters which have built loyal audiences can
usually cover most of their costs from their revenue (and sometimes
even make a little profit), these new rates will almost certainly
destroy the Internet radio industry, as they amount to well over 100%
of even the most-successful webcasters' online radio revenues. In
other words, these fees are grotesquely disproportionate to any other
expense a webcaster would normally face, and certain to bankrupt him
or her.

2. Are the rates really that high?

First of all, the rates webcasters pay are "per performance," meaning
any time ONE listener hears ONE song (or any portion of a song),
that's a "performance." If ONE listener hears ten songs, that's TEN
performances. If 1000 listeners hear ten songs, that's 10,000
performances. Still with me?

The rates announced for 2006 (long story, but the licensing term is
for 2006-2010, and it took this long to figure out the royalty rate,
thus webcasters will pay "retroactively" for 2006) are $0.0008 per
performance. Now, that's only 8/100ths of a cent, but let's do the
math to see what happens.

Let's imagine a webcaster with an AVERAGE audience of 10,000
listeners (obviously, listeners come and go, and no one listens 24
hours a day, but we're talking about an average number... so
sometimes there'll be lots more than 10,000 folks listening,
sometimes lots less... but for math's sake, let's deal with the
AVERAGE audience). Our webcaster plays 16 songs every hour, 24 hours
a day, 365 days a year, to an audience that averages out to be 10,000
people.

$0.0008 X 10,000 listeners X 16 songs/hr. = $128. It'll cost our
imaginary webcaster $128 to play one hour of music for 10,000 people.
At the end of the day, that's $3,072 ($128 X 24 hrs./day) -- for just
a single day! After a week goes by, it's $21,504 ($3,072 X 7
days/wk.). And for all of 2006, this webcaster with a steady average
audience of 10,000 listeners would owe $1,121,280!! (the $3,072 X 365
days/yr.) That takes care of 2006. For 2007, the rate increases 37.5%!
So, with no audience growth, the cost of streaming music for the year
would increase to $1,541,760.

And the royalty rate goes up another 28% in 2008, and another 28% in
2009, topping out at a $.0019 per performance rate in 2010 (resulting
in a royalty obligation of $2,663,040 for that same audience averaging
10,000 listeners) for that year. I wish my boss gave me raises at
those rates!

3. What about the commercials I hear? Aren't webcasters making money
from those?

Advertising rates are expressed as a "cost per thousand" ("CPM," as M
stands for thousand). Rates vary, but national radio ads (pretty
comparable to Internet radio) go at about a $2 to $3 CPM. In other
words, an advertiser would pay $2 or $3 for every 1000 people that
heard their commercial one time. For our hypothetical webcaster,
let's go with a $2.50 CPM. The webcaster would earn $25 ($2.50/1000 X
10,000 listeners) to run a commercial.

If this webcaster ran an average of 5 commercials an hour from 6 am
to midnight every day, not only would he or she win the "set of steak
knives" for selling more ads than any other webcaster ever, but would
earn $821,250 in ad revenues ($25 X 5 commercials X 18 hrs./day X 365
days/yr.). Not a bad job, but unfortunately, it'll cover just about
three-quarters of our webcaster's royalty obligation for 2006
($1,121,280). And you can be sure ad rates won't increase 37.5% in
2007, 28% in 2008, another 28% in 2009, etc. like royalty rates do.

4. Can't you make a "percentage of revenue" deal -- you know, the
more money you make, the more you pay?

Not this time... small webcasters were able to operate with just such
a deal for the previous 5-year term, but the CRB made sure all
webcasters would be subject to the "per performance" method of
royalty calculation.

5. Well... independent music is cool. Why not just play independent
music?

This is very important to understand, as lots of people see this as a
solution. The statutory webcast license covers ANY copyright music,
from the biggest labels, down to the smallest, and even
independently-released music. Again, the license covers ANY copyright
music. The copyright owner need NOT be part of SoundExchange or the
RIAA. The ONLY exceptions to this are (A) direct deals with each and
every sound recording copyright owner, (B) copyright owners that are
willing to make a blanket "waive" of fees, or (C) non-copyright,
public domain music.

6. This is crazy, and I don't wanna lose my favorite station. What
can I do?

Glad you asked! Please click the 'Sign the Petition' and 'Send a
message to your Representative' links available in the upper-right of
the SaveTheStreams.org page or on the website of your favorite
webcaster. And please, tell your family, friends, and anyone you know
that would rather not see Internet radio disappear.

Help us keep the music alive!

Thanks,

Storybox

Storybox has the best fans!!!
Thanks to you all for making Never Wonder the Top song on AeschTunes Top 40 and Bear Radio!

Cheers!
Storybox

Bear Radio has voted NWWU as the Top Requested song again. Inexplicably (?) back to number 1 after one week at number 2. Meanwhile, it has reached number 5 on AeschTunes.

You were just waiting for this, weren't you? You waited all week long to read this.

Never Wonder is number 8 this week on AeschTunes. The Top 10, baby!

Bear Radio listeners continue to hold Storybox at number 2. "In a song" by bobbyblue holds the top spot while our friend Lthrboots with "Where are you now?" and Grecote with "Closer" (Featuring Freddy Freeman) are moving up as well. All these tracks: Closer, Where Are You Now?, Never Wonder and In A Song are all available on the G CD Global 1 from Woobie Bear Music.

And this concludes the chart updates for Never Wonder. Thank you all so much for your continued support!

This week NWWU was again the top requested song on Bear Radio. It has been number one for 3 weeks now!!! The song moved from number 16 to 11 on this week's Aeschtunes Top 40. THANK YOU and Keep Voting!

All the remixes for Never Wonder are now posted on MySpace:
1- Dervish_NL Big Fat Dancemix (Brand New!!!)
2- Dervish_NL Pop Mix Part 1
3- Agent D Flight Mix
4- Dervish_NL 1981 Timewarp Mix

Never Wonder (Words Unspoken) is the top requested song on Bear Radio this week.

It is number 22 (Rapid Riser) on the AeschTunes Top 40.

Thank You All for Your Support!

Today Never Wonder (Words Unspoken) enters the Bear Radio Top 10 while it holds the 29th position on the AeschTunes Top 40. Hey! Lonely is still on their top 10 also. Thank you all so very much for your votes.

Never Wonder (Words Unspoken) debuts at number 34 on the AeschTunes Top 40.

Hey! Lonely continues to hold the No. 1 spot on the AeschTunes Top 40. That is four weeks now. Thank You everyone who keeps voting. Your support is invaluable.

Woobie Bear Music and HardBite Records are proud to announce the winner of the Storybox Remix Contest for Sun.
Lthrboots did a fantastic job with his remix of Sun. The remix will be released in the Spring.

We would like to thank everyone who submitted remixes for the contest. Congratulations to Lthrboots!

If today is a sign of how the new year will be, then 2007 promises to be awesome.

As of today, Hey Lonely is the number 1 song on the AeschTunes Top 40 charts. And there is more. Yesterday AeschTunes had their Top 40 songs of 2006 broadcast and No Dancing Allowed was number 2.

I want to thank everyone who supports and believes in Storybox. You know who you are!

AeschTunes can be heard 24/7 through Live 365.

Agent D