For the music industry, copyright and royalty litigation is like an endless war fought on many fronts. During early November, as four of the industry's "Big Five" continued their pursuit of the file-sharing service Napster, a parallel trial in US Federal Court in New York against music archiving-and-accessing site <A HREF="http://www.mp3.com/">MP3.com</A&gt; by <A HREF="http://www.umusic.com/">Universal Music Group</A> entered its penalty phase, that segment of the proceeding in which aggrieved plaintiffs seek to extract money from guilty defendants. Other plaintiffs in the trial&mdash;Sony Music Entertainment, BMG, Warner Music, and EMI&mdash;have all settled with the San Diego-based Internet service for an average of $20 million each.

Two top executives at <A HREF="http://www.bmg.com/">Bertelsmann Music Group</A> will depart in the wake of the company's recent <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/news/10885/">settlement</A&gt; of its lawsuit against Napster. Citing irreconcilable differences with parent company Bertelsmann AG over company strategy, BMG chief executive Strauss Zelnick and chairman Michael Dornemann announced their resignations Sunday November 5.

When CDs were becoming popular, Neil Young made no secret of his disdain for the sound of digital. Interviews from the period quoted him as saying that the sound "left him cold," and he would rather listen to an LP, thank you very much. To this day, his new CD releases also appear on vinyl, but with the advent of DVD-Audio, sampling and quantization rates have improved&mdash;enough, apparently for Mr. Young's approval.

Attention, high-end audio manufacturers ready to crack the exporting nut: The <A HREF="http://www.ce.org">Consumer Electronics Association</A> (CEA) has just released its "General Guide for the Export of Consumer Electronics," providing a step-by-step process which the CEA says manufacturers can use to navigate the often uncharted and challenging regulatory waters of the export market. According to the CEA, the guide focuses on assisting manufacturers in exporting their products to the South American and Pacific Rim countries of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan. The organization reports that, in a survey of its membership, these countries were identified as primary growth markets of interest.

Is community radio at death's door? More than 1000 churches, schools and community organizations nationwide have applied for licenses to operate 10W-100W FM stations. Despite a strong grass-roots movement, and the support of <A HREF="http://www.fcc.gov/">Federal Communications Commission</A> chairman William Kennard, the low-power radio (LPFM) movement is about to be buried by the combined weight of the <A HREF="http://www.nab.org/">National Association of Broadcasters</A>, <A HREF="http://www.npr.org/">National Public Radio</A>, and their many friends in the US Congress.

Sidney Smith, revered audio engineer and a founding father of the modern audio industry, passed away on October 25, 2000 after a battle with cancer. He was 77. Sid, a family man, left a loving wife, Marilyn, three caring daughters, Jennie, Pattie, and Laura, and two grandchildren.

Could this be a record executive's dream come true and the end of the need for watermarking as we know it? <A HREF="http://www.CantaMetrix.com/">CantaMetrix</A&gt; has announced the further development of a new technology, MusicDNA, that the company claims is capable of identifying and tracking the billions of existing as well as new MP3 files on the Internet and providing an exact accounting for the copyright, "thus enabling legal file sharing and linking value-added data to songs."

At least one media conglomerate has seen the light. In a surprise move, German giant <A HREF="http://www.bertelsmann.de">Bertelsmann AG</A> broke ranks with the music industry and settled its copyright-infringement lawsuit with embattled <A HREF="http://www.napster.com/">Napster</A&gt;, in effect becoming the startup's tentative partner. The deal, reached on October 31, could mark the real beginning of the music industry's move into the Internet age. Bertelsmann is the parent organization of <A HREF="http://www.bmg.com/">Bertelsmann Music Group</A> (BMG), one of the world's major music labels, as well as online music retailer <A HREF="http://www.cdnow.com/">CDnow</A&gt;.

Chip Stern writes, "There is something enduring and reassuring in the classic audio verities." The <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//loudspeakerreviews/284/">Vandersteen 2Ce Signature loudspeaker</A> is certainly considered one of those timeless classics. But how does a speaker released in its first incarnation more than 20 years ago hold up by today's standards? Stern lends his modern ear to the task and includes notes from Richard Vandersteen himself.