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A surreal event took place at the 1991 Audio Engineering Society Convention when loudspeaker cables were put on the witness stand. Robert Harley details the amazing event as it unfolded, along with many unexpected twists and turns, in "Audio">http://www.stereophile.com//asweseeit/107/">Audio McCarthyism."

Last week, The Recording">http://www.riaa.com">Recording Industry Association of America released its year-end anti-piracy statistics, which it says reveal an increase in the number of counterfeit and pirate CDs and CD-recordables confiscated in 1998. "We've had tremendous success this year with our anti-piracy initiatives," said Frank Creighton, senior vice president and director of anti-piracy. "Between the many CD plants around the country adopting better business practices to the scores of universities signing up for our copyright education program---we're making strides on all fronts."

Stereophile magazine is pleased to announce that senior contributing editor Jonathan Scull has joined its full-time staff as senior editor. As of April 19, 1999, he will be based at parent company Emap Petersen's office on lower Fifth Avenue in Manhattan's Flatiron district.

Last week saw a flurry of announcements in the online audio and video streaming business, capped off by Yahoo!'s">http://www.yahoo.com">Yahoo!'s acquisition of Broadcast.comhttp://www.broadcast.com">Broadcast.com;. Yahoo! says it has signed a definitive agreement with Broadcast.com whereby Yahoo! will issue 0.7722 of a share of Yahoo! common stock for each share of Broadcast.com common stock. In addition, all outstanding options of Broadcast.com will be converted into Yahoo! options. The acquisition is expected to be completed in the third quarter of 1999 and is valued at around $5.7 billion, including $4.8 billion in Broadcast.com common stock and $900 million in stock options.

Forget about tuning dots, mystical poker chips, and clocks with programmed electrons. They're all hopelessly out of date.

Holding his thumb and forefinger together to reveal barely a sliver of light, Chris">mailto:calish@ix.netcom.com">Chris English said, "This close. We're this close." He wasn't talking about how far apart we were sitting, but about how close Thresholdhttp://www.threshold.com/">Threshold; is to being back in business after an attempted">http://www.stereophile.com/news/10096/">attempted restructuring last year did not work out.

Accidents and disasters have no sense of good timing, and when they strike have a way of fouling even the most promising love affairs. Case in point: loudspeaker manufacturer Von">http://www.vonschweikert.com/">Von Schweikert Research and the small town of Watertown (pop. 30,000) in northern New York, about three hours' drive from Toronto.