Thursday’s Music Brief: Artist Lobby For Merger, Ticket Scalping, RIAA Lawsuits & More

HYPEBOT FEATURES:

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  Major Artists Lobby For Live Nation Ticketmaster Merger But Don't Disclose Azoff Connection
• Vodaphone Makes Mobile Music DRM Free With 3 Majors On Board
• The Converging of Cultures: MTV & YouTube (Part 3)
• Apple's New Talking iPod Shuffle
• imeem's CEO On Monetizing Social Networks
• Music Xray acquires SONGboost assets
• Daily D.I.Y. –Customize Your Facebook Pages
• Check in Friday AM for details on a special online video broadcast hosted by The Music Void that we'll be doing mid-day (Eastern) with a bunch 'o music biz heavyweights.  (more here)
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  Concert Tickets Get Set Aside, Marked Up by Artists, Managers (Wall Street Journal) This is the article everyone is buzzing about today and yet its a sad practice that has been going on in one form or another for years.
• French lawmakers debate strong anti-piracy bill. (AFP)
• Radiohead, Billy Bragg join fray against YouTube (CNet) & Top musicians unite to form copyright lobby group (Times UK)
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  Harvard's Charles Nesson, RIAA general counsel Steven Marks and three academics come together on  UCLA Professor of Law Doug Lichtman's regular podcast tp take on the Joel Tenenbaum P2P case where Nesson is arguing that the RIAA's entire litigation strategy is illegal. (podcast)
• Sirius XM reports very slow growth. (press relase)
• Report:Tackling Film Pirates Would Generate £614 Million for the UK Economy (press release)
• There Is No New Business Model For Music? (TechDirt)
• Musicnotes, a provider of downloadable sheet music recently sold its five-millionth download since its 1999 launch. The five-millionth download was a Guitar Guru Session of Don McClean’s “Vincent (Starry, Starry Night),” and was sold to a customer in Germany. (press release)