Don't close Pandora's box.

Pandora is a pretty killer site. It's an online streaming music station that "learns" what you like based on the ratings you gives songs.

Big effing deal, right? There's a huge variety of pre-programmed music stations in the world, anyway.

The nice thing about Pandora is that it eventually becomes far more customized to your tastes than a pre-programmed station ever could be. You don't have to sit through a queue of bands with uninspired lyrics and hackneyed riffs just to hear one decent song. (Not that I've ever had that experience with broadcast radio in Jacksonville)

However, recent laws have threatened Pandora and similar Internet radio. The Copyright Royalty Board recently decided to triple the licensing fees for Internet radio sites like Pandora. The new royalty rates are irrationally high, more than four times what satellite radio pays, and broadcast radio doesn't pay these at all.

Left unchanged, these new royalties will kill every Internet radio site, including Pandora. In response, Internet radio sites formed the SaveNetRadio Coalition, a group that includes listeners, artists, labels and webcasters.

If you give a damn, I suggest Signing the petition to have the new decision revised. Just enter your address info, and it'll automatically e-mail a copy of the letter (you can use their canned letter, or write your own) to all your reps.