UK company Zgroup claims to have perfected technology which allows digital audio files to be shrunk to one quarter of their original size. Forgive us if we're a little doubtful.

Company CEO Jamie True said in a press release today, "'ShrinkMyTunes addresses important and specific needs for anyone with a music collection and will be particularly popular with owners of iPod minis and shuffles, as well as new iPhone customers. There are currently over 11 million people in the UK alone that own an MP3 player and this sector is continuing to experience high growth."

The product will reportedly be available online and through HMV stores this fall.

Many Webcasters will wake up facing an uncertain future on Monday, thanks to conflicting messages coming from SoundExchange, the US royalty collection society for sound recordings.

The netcasting industry has been in a state of strife since the 1s oft May when the Copyright Broadcasting Board (CRB) announced new royalty rates for netcasters which amounted to a substantial increase in royalty rates for existing netcasters starting Monday 16 July. The new rates have been the subject of much negotiation between the society tasked with collecting the royalties, SoundExchange, smaller netcasters, who argue that they may go out of business if made to pay the new rates.

Speaking in front of the US Congress on Thursday the executive director of SoundExchange, Jon Simson, said that his organisation would not enforce the new royalty rates and would continue to negotiate with Webcasters concerning the rates.

Yet the failure of SoundExchange to reach a compromise solution with the small netcasters to date and conflicting statements in the media since Friday means that small netcasters are still uncertain about the rates they will be expected to pay on Monday and what measures SoundExchange will use to enforce the new rates.

On Friday, SoundExchange publicly repeated its offer for a $500 minimum per channel fee, with total channel cap of $50,000 per year for broadcasters providing that they give SoundExchange detailed reporting of their playlists and agreed to introduce mechanisms to stop digital recording of radio broadcasts.

While the statement from SoundExchange referred directly to payment requirements for large netcasters, it left open the subject of what rates smaller Webcasters would be subject to. Opponents of the new rates have pointed out that smaller netcasters will be hardest hit by the new rates, while the impact on larger companies such as AOL and Yahoo will be fiarly minimal.

'We do expect commercial webcasters like Yahoo! and AOL to pay the new royalty rates set by the CRB due July 15,' Simson stated on Friday. ''It is essential that recording artists and content owners receive full and fair compensation from the webcasters making use of their creative works.'

It is likely tthat SoundExchange's statements late last week were designed to put further pressure on smaller Webcasters to come to an agreement, however that's unlikely to provide fans of netcasting with much assurance that their favourite services are still going to be available after Monday.

The bane of the international music industry - Russia's pirate music site, AllofMP3.com has finally been closed by the Russian Government - but a new site has sprung up to take its place.

AllofMP3.com has been trading for a number of years by flagrantly selling cheap unlicensed albums from major international record labels, although the site claimed that it was legal under Russian law, it was clear that the site had no license agreements with record labels. Over the past year the site had become the focus of Russia's failure to deal with its endemic intellectual property piracy problems - the US had used the site's existence to threaten Russia's membership to the World Trade Organization.

But when it comes to the AllofMP3 saga, it would appear that it's gone but not forgotten. Shortly after closing down AllofMP3.com, the ''brains' behind AllofMP3 launched a sister site - http://www.mp3sparks.com, which featured the same interface, downloads and graphics as the original site.

However, it seems that perhaps the Russian authorities decided to act a little faster this time because shortly after its launch, MP3Sparks also appeared to go offline. Of course I wouldn't hold my breath on it staying that way.

Sonific, the Web service that creates SongSpots, embedded music streaming widgets that can be inserted into most Web pages, blogs or community sites, has just launched a new angle on the application - a music network that will allow bands, songwriters and labels to upload their own music.

Since its beta launch, Sonific has shown itself to be a pretty cool web app, but the service suffered from a serious lack of content. Although Sonific signed up hip labels such as Cooking Vinyl, Ninja Tunes, V2 and Nettwerk, its catalog didn't quite have the breadth necessary to give the service mass market appeal. The new network features might well prove to be a savior for Sonific, adding both content and an army of users who will promote the service as they promote their music.

Sonific CEO Gerd Leonhard compared the new networked service to the massively popular community generated video sites such as YouTube and Revver, saying that the Sonific Network would be able to democratize music distribution:

Music production and music distribution have already become democratized because of new, disruptive technologies, and now Sonific.net will democratize music promotion, as well. Just like any visual content creator can already virally distribute his videos via YouTube, Revver or VideoEgg, a record label or artist can now use Sonific's SongSpots platform to make their music widely available as a full-length audio stream that can be embedded into any website -- the power of content syndication is finally available at a click of the mouse.

Given the recent storm of controversy surrounding the unauthorized uploading of content on YouTube, the launch of the Sonific Network means that Sonific now needs to navigate the legal minefield associated with user-generated content. Speaking to DownloadSquad, Leonhard said that, since the registration process for users was fairly detailed, filtering for unauthorized content would be done on a manual basis. That said, the company is in the process of investigating technology that would allow for automated content filtering.

SongSpots can already be embedded into most major Web community sites, but Leonhard said that Sonific was working on new developments that would provide for further integration and new features including a facility to allow for the use of the widgets for podcasting.

Amazon.com has announced that it's going to head deep into the jungle of digital music sales - and will only be selling DRM-free MP3 tracks. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos announced the plans to launch the DRM-free store later in the year in a joint announcement with EMI, who are the first major label to release DRM-free tracks.

At the present time having a DRM-free strategy will mean that Amazon will only be able to release tracks from EMI and Independent labels, restricting the available offering for their store. However, the announcement of a DRM-free strategy from the giant of online retailing will place further pressure on the rest of the major labels to look into releasing DRM-free tracks and will give Amazon the time to enter into what will be no doubt very arduous negotiations with those labels.

Amazon is pursuing a clever strategy by announcing the DRM-free store: in an industry dominated by Apple's iTunes Amazon will need to distinguish itself against its competitors. Amazon, without the benefit of a digital music player to back up its music store offering will be keenly aware that the DRM-free strategy will open up its store to every music players in the market, as Bezos was at pains to point out at the announcement:

"Our MP3-only strategy means all the music that customers buy on Amazon is always DRM-free and plays on any device," Bezos noted "we're excited to have EMI joining us in this effort and look forward to offering our customers MP3s from amazing artists like Coldplay, Norah Jones and Joss Stone."

Even for an e-tailer of its size Amazon will have its work cut out to challenge the power of iTunes, but a DRM-free policy is certainly a very very good way to start.

In this issue of Googleholic we'ss cover:

• Google Talk WiFi phone
• Google and AP
• Military Secrets
• GoogDesk
• Google Digital Music

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