If you turn on your favorite Internet radio channel today you might find it eerily silent.

Today, Internet stations around America are participating in a universal Internet "Day of Silence," a symbolic gesture to arouse political awareness. The hope is to call people into action to oppose actions taken by Congress that would effectively bankrupt almost all of Internet radio by July 15th.

Indeed, if action isn't taken, today's silence could be permanent.

All of our alternative sources for entertainment - gothic channels, industrial channels, jazz channels, indie channels, reggae channels, new age channels, talk radio channels, rap channels, pop channels - all of it, every last channel will fade away into a digital void. The scary thing is this issue isn't just about a few radio stations. This is about silencing freedom of speech itself.

Here's what's happening: The Copyright Royalty Board, or CRB, is requiring all Internet radio stations to pay extremely high royalty fees for every song they play. The belief is the profits will help record companies compensate for the large drop in CD sales due to digital piracy and downloading.

Here's the flawed logic behind the whole deal: The record companies can't make any profit off an Internet radio station that isn't running.

Still, it is estimated that 90 percent of all Internet radio stations may have to immediately shut down as a result of bankruptcy. The excess 10 percent will probably all just fade away with time.

Ergo, to gain profits by shutting down sources of profit is not sound business. Nor is it ethically sound, to be frank. Internet radio symbolizes, probably for the first time, a pure, digital democracy.

Before, people were restricted to a mere handful of AM and FM radio stations, all of which were very strongly influenced by record labels. Radio playlists were part of an agenda to convince the population to like certain kinds of music for the sake of promotion and profit.

Now, however, music doesn't come from the top and go downward, it comes from the bottom and goes to the top. Any person anywhere in the world with a microphone, a computer, an opinion and a CD collection has the opportunity to invite millions of listeners to their own little, musical world.

This digital revolution really is a beautiful thing because it empowers people to bypass the corporations and record companies - not to mention politicians.

Thousands of people even have their own political talk shows.

To shut this down would mean millions of listeners and broadcasters would be silenced. It would be nothing less than to silence an important medium for the freedom of speech. What good is freedom of speech if you don't have the proper channels to express yourself?

To practice freedom of speech in a vacuum isn't good enough. Without Internet radio, people aren't allowed to be their own agenda-setters and are being denied the opportunity to let their thoughts be known to the world.

If Congress is truly interested in helping out business, they should remember the No. 1 mantra all media connoisseurs live their lives by - give the people what they want.

If a business can find a human need and provide it, they'll find people are willing to pay for it. That leads to profit.

If they wanted to translate that to our digital generation, they'd see people are fed up with AM and FM radio, and most people don't listen to it anyway. Our digital generation represents the consumers of the future, and it is a generation whose tastes have been fine-tuned by having 24-hour access to any genre of music or talk radio they desire.

Diverse needs require diverse services - this is the consumer landscape of the 21st century. Conventional, terrestrial radio simply will not supply the demand.

Keeping Internet radio alive is good both for society and business. Businesses can make a profit off of giving the people what they want at an affordable price, and people are allowed to be masters of their own destinies.

Counter legislation is being introduced to keep Internet radio alive. It's called the Internet Radio Equality Act, and it ensures Internet radio will enjoy the same legal protections terrestrial radio enjoys.

Turn on your favorite Internet radio station today. If it is silent, listen to it for five minutes.

Use this to motivate yourself to call up your Congressman and inform them about the Internet Radio Equality Act. If you don't call soon, that five minutes of silence may turn into an eternity.

Isaac DeVille is an MSU English junior and a State News columnist. Reach him at devillei@msu.edu.