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A year ago, Marantz gained full command over its own operations when Philips reduced its participation in the company from 50.5% to 49% by selling 1.5% of the shares to Marantz Japan Inc. (MJI).

Perhaps even more than the typical living room, the automobile might be considered multichannel audio's natural environment.

An intriguing loudspeaker technology which generates believable surround effects from only two small enclosures will be arriving at stores later this year, according to a February 24 announcement from Nirotek">http://216.87.12.168/enf/nirotek/niroson.html">Nirotek America Corporation.

The most entertaining part of the 44th Annual Grammy Awards wasn't the "Lady Marmalade" production number that opened the show or Alicia Keys' awkward tango later. It was Recording Academy President Michael Greene's rant about the criminal enterprise of electronic music swapping, a phenomenon that, he warned, threatens the music industry's very existence.

At its January CES presentation, Sony announced that this is the year that SACD will roll out big time to the masses. News from EMI/Capitol and Silverline Records would suggest that DVD-Audio may not be far behind, at least as far as available software is concerned.

Music publishing organizations such as ASCAP and BMI have long worked out licensing deals with radio broadcasters, who pay royalties in exchange for playing music over the air. A US">http://www.loc.gov/copyright/">US Copyright Office panel is now suggesting that online broadcasters also pay royalties, this time directly to the record labels, in a recommendation that has so far left all parties unhappy, particularly broadcasters.

Napsterhttp://www.napster.com">Napster; may have finally won a round in court. The Federal District judge in the music industry's ongoing case against the file-sharing service has allowed for the possibility that the plaintiffs may have abused their own copyright privileges in the launch of their online music services, MusicNet and pressplay.