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Another Reprieve for Small Webcasters?

Small webcasters have won another reprieve from royalty payments.

On Friday, October 25, SoundExchange, an organization established by the music industry to collect and distribute royalty payments, announced that it would hold off collecting royalties from webcasters until the US Senate reconvenes to consider legislation that would codify a rate approved by the music industry, a webcasters' organization, and the US House of Representatives.

A reduced rate agreed to by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the Voice of Webcasters (VOW) was unanimously approved by a…

SDMI Evaluating Hundreds of Submitted Hacks

With $60,000 in award money as incentive, the hacker community is helping the Secure Digital Music Initiative find out just how secure six proposed watermarking technologies really are. On October 12, as SDMI representatives were testing the audibility of three of the watermarks, the organization announced the closure of a month-long challenge it had offered hackers: break the code. According to the terms of the challenge, each defeated technology will mean $10,000 to a successful hacker.

Despite calls for a boycott of the challenge by some prominent hackers, 447 submissions were received…

Added to the Archives This Week

This week we have two John Atkinson speaker reviews from the February 2004 issue. First, JA gets his hands on the B&W 705 loudspeaker, commenting, "When I heard about the company's new 700 series of speakers, based on the technology featured in their cost-no-object Nautilus series but priced to sell in the real world, I asked to review the $1500/pair 705."

Next, JA takes a stab at the budget-priced Klipsch RB-15 loudspeaker. Can one glimpse audio nirvana with a 5.25" woofer and a horn-loaded 1" titanium-dome tweeter? JA says, "At $300/pair, there has to be some compromise." He explains…

Added to the Archives This Week:

Ethics and high-end audio have always been a tangled web---especially when it comes to deciding whether to purchase equipment from a helpful local dealer or trying to find the best price possible. In the web reprint of February 1999's "The Final Word," Stereophile's publisher emeritus, Larry Archibald, examines a recent high-end purchase of his own to shed a little light on the dilemma faced by the audiophile grinding for a great deal. Also included are some choice reader responses.

Next, we bring you the first installment of John Atkinson's comprehensive three-part "Measuring…

If At First You Don't Succeed . . .

When we received notice several days ago from Panasonic that the company was finally releasing its DVD-Audio players next month, we filed the press release for a couple of days to see if it would last the week (see previous story). Apparently, the products are still a go. Panasonic says it will offer a full line of DVD-Audio/Video models under both the Panasonic and Technics brand names, with the first units arriving in stores in July. As previously announced back in August 1999, the Panasonic DVD-A7 will have a suggested retail price of $999.95, and the Technics DVD-A10 will have an SRP…

iTunes Becomes Seventh Largest Music Retailer

At stereophile.com, John Atkinson, Jon Iverson, and I troll the Internet constantly looking for audio-related news, so on November 21,when I spotted an article by John Borland about iTunes outselling traditional retail record outlets like Tower and Borders, I passed it on to the other two without even thinking about it.

"Sounds worth a story," JA suggested. And it was, but it turned out not to be the story most of the media was telling.

Borland reported that the NPD Group had released a survey that compared album downloads at iTunes to complete album purchases at ordinary record…

Reference Recordings Bought By Dorian

It's been a rough year for the music industry—and possibly an even rougher one for audiophile labels. The Dorian Group, however, seems to be thriving. Parent company to Dorian Recordings, the Dorian Group announced last week its acquisition of Reference Recordings. During its 25 years in business, RR has consistently garnered praise from audiophiles for the sound quality of its recordings, and has scored eight Grammy nominations and two Grammy awards.

Dorian reports that RR's identity and key staff will remain intact, including the label's famed recording engineer, Keith Johnson. The…

Liquid Audio and Billboard Online Announce Web Audio Deal

Billboard Magazine announced an agreement this week with Liquid Audio, a developer of secure music-delivery systems on the Internet, to make Billboard's extensive database of album reviews and audio previews available through Billboard Online. The audio portion will be provided in Liquid Audio format by the Music Previews Network, the company that provides Music Previews for Billboard Online.

Billboard is opening its album-review archives (dating back to 1948 and encompassing tens of thousands of albums in all genres) to users on the Internet at no charge. Previously, access had been…

Three Tenors Reach Global Audience, Play to Disappointing Crowd in Paris

The Three Tenors may have reached a global audience of 2 billion people during their performance prior to the final game of the World Cup, but they had only 80,000 fans on hand in Paris's Champs de Mars park, acording to estimates by Paris police. That number was only 10% of the anticipated 800,000, most of whom stayed away because of unseasonably cold and windy weather.

With James Levine conducting the Orchestre de Paris, the almost-three-hour-long show near the Eiffel Tower featured José Carreras, Luciano Pavarotti, and Plácido Domingo singing popular songs and operatic favorites in…

Industry Financial View Uncertain

Financially, the winter months have been all over the map. Some electronics companies have reported upswings in revenue, but others are experiencing a decrease.

In mid-March, Boston Acoustics projected a previously unexpected net operating loss for its fiscal 2005 first quarter, ending May 31, 2004. (BA's fiscal year begins March 1.) Reasons included a 50% cutback in orders from an unnamed major purchaser—rumored to be Tweeter Group—whose prior business accounted for 32% of BA's net sales for the 9-month period ending December 31, a total of $41.1 million.

BA also supplies Ultimate…