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US lawmakers have honored their promise to address a languishing small-webcaster royalty bill that was put">http://www.stereophile.com/news/11468/">put on hold prior to the fall elections.

Earlier this month, an unambiguous and simple message went up on the Dunlavy Audio Labs web">http://www.dunlavyaudio.com/">web site: "As of November 7, 2002, Dunlavy Audio Labs, LLC has ceased operations." A phone call to the company confirms that it is indeed out of business, although Dunlavy president Keny Whitright did not return calls seeking comment.

Folk wisdom has it that fools lock the barn door after the horses have escaped. They also chase all over the countryside trying to catch them. The music business is doing some of both in legal action brought against file-sharing service Madsterhttp://www.madster.com">Madster;.

John Atkinson and Arnis Balgalvis audition the Avalon">http://www.stereophile.com//loudspeakerreviews/703/">Avalon Eclipse loudspeaker, whose quasi-anechoic TDS response prompted JA to exclaim, "Boy, that's flat!" But is flat where it's at? AB thought so: "The sound I heard was truly outstanding."

The latest figures for the music industry remain grim: Online sales of recorded music have dropped 20% through the first half of 2002 compared with the same period last year, losing ground faster than the overall US music market, which lost 7% during the same period, according to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). And the trend is accelerating. The latest numbers show online sales down 25% in the third quarter over last year.

One of the great things about the DVD-Audio format is the sheer flexibility built into the standard: two-channel or multichannel (mixed for four, five, or six speakers), multiple resolutions, multiple encode/decode choices (MLP, Dolby Digital, DTS, PCM), and an assortment of special features, including video.

Tom Dowd, a recording engineer and producer who created some of the greatest pop, jazz, and rock recordings of the 1950s, '60s, and '70s, and who ushered in the era of multi-track tape recording and stereo playback, died Sunday, October 27 of emphysema at an assisted living center in Aventura, Florida, near Miami. He was 77.