Back in March, when the word came out that the new royalty rates for webcasting were much higher than in the past, we were confused. After all, webcasting helps promote music -- so why would the RIAA (and its SoundExchange spinoff) want to set rates so high that it would kill off this promotional channel? The answer isn't that hard to figure out. Traditional radio, of course, is dominated by a few similarly formated stations that all play RIAA-backed music. 87% of the music you hear on the radio is from an RIAA-member record label. However, when it comes to music on webcasts, the story is quite different. Jon Healy, at the LA Times, points out that only 44% of music on webcasts are from RIAA labels. This, at least, based on the findings of Live365, one of the larger webcasting services out there. So, with more than half the songs coming from non-RIAA labels, no wonder they're less interested in keeping webcasts alive. And, of course, the situation really is a win-win for the RIAA (in the short-term). It either kills off those webcasters who don't contribute to the homogenization of music, or it forces them to pay large sums even if they only play non-RIAA music. Of course, this is a strategy guaranteed to backfire in the long run, as it simply pisses off even more music fans who will simply look elsewhere for music.

Earlier this year, the EFF sued Viacom for being overly aggressive in trying to police its copyrighted content on YouTube. Specifically, Viacom had sent a DMCA takedown notice for a parody clip of The Colbert Report that was clearly protected by fair use. After first denying it had sent the takedown notice, Viacom eventually 'fessed up and then settled the case, promising to be much more mindful of not pulling clips that have a clear fair use defense, and also making it easier for those whose videos were wrongly pulled to get them back online. If you thought that others in the entertainment industry might take notice of this and be a bit more careful about things, you'd be wrong apparently.

The EFF has felt the need to step in again, this time suing Universal Music for getting a home video of a little kid dancing pulled from YouTube. The video is only 29-seconds long and is clearly fair use. More importantly, there is simply no way that anyone would claim that this somehow hurt the commercial value of the song (well, I guess Universal Music implicitly was claiming exactly that). No one is going to use this 29-second clip as a substitute for getting the actual song. In fact, if anything, the video might encourage people to go out and find the song to purchase. Also amusing, of course, is that the song in question is by Prince, who's been in the news quite a bit lately for having a much better understanding of how the music industry works than those who run the record labels. Either way, it appears that the EFF is building up a number of such DMCA-abuse cases -- and it seems likely that they'll eventually use these to demonstrate the problems of the DMCA.

The entertainment industry's tried all sorts of things to fight file-sharing online, ranging from flooding P2P networks with fake files (though that didn't really work out) to apparently seedung them with spyware. One of its favorite tricks, though, is to set up honeypots of fake content or torrents, then capturing IP addresses from visitors and using them as the flimsy basis for their infamous lawsuits. The MPAA -- or rather MediaDefender, a company working for it -- has done this again recently, but going a little further by not just trying to trick people into downloading copyrighted movies, but also by offering visitors a custom downloading "client" that's essentially spyware that scans their machines for copyrighted files (via Broadband Reports) they've downloaded. Of course, "dirty tricks" is a phrase that seems to find itself near the letters "RIAA" and "MPAA" fairly often. Just a few weeks after a lawsuit alleging the tactics used by MediaSentry, another company hired by the entertainment industry, to search people's computers are illegal, another such suit has been filed. A woman in Texas has sued the RIAA, saying it employed unlicensed investigators and knowingly broke Texas laws in doing so. Judges have smacked down the RIAA's tactics before, but that appears to have had little effect on it. At what point do they figure out they don't get to determine what's legal for them to do in the name of investigation? Probably about the same time they figure out that instead of wasting their resources by suing their customers, they should change their business model instead.

Slippery Brits promise no reselling

The US and UK Governments have drawn up a treaty that will give Britain easier access to American military technology, but no rights to resell it.

Archaeologists in Egypt have unveiled a 3,500-year-old mummy now positively identified as Hatshepsut, one of history's few female pharaohs. Using computed tomography (CT) scanning and ongoing DNA testing, Dr. Zahi Hawass and his team solved the mystery of what happened to one of ancient Egypt's most powerful and successful rulers.

Two proteins that are implicated in autism have been found to control the strength and balance of nerve-cell connections, researchers have found. The proteins, which serve to physically link nerve cells together, were discovered more than a decade ago, but until now their function has been unclear.

Scientists have built a highly efficient room-temperature nanometer-scale laser that produces stable, continuous streams of near-infrared laser light.

Scientists started out investigating the complex effects of nanoparticles on cell freezing, according to an article in the journal Nanotechnology. The results of their study -- while not what they expected -- could end up impacting cancer treatment.

Blizzard Entertainment reveals plans for Starcraft II, the long-awaited sequel to one of the most popular PC games.