News

Mom fights back: As we've previously reportedhttp://stereophile.com/news/020705riaa/">reported;, the recording industry hasn't shied away from pursuing individuals it suspects of illegal downloading from peer-to-peer networks through the RIAA's "John Doe" lawsuits, most of which have intimidated the recipients into making out-of-court settlements. This strategy has, on several occasions, made the organization look foolish—as it assuredly did when it served a deceased 83-year-old.

Naxos, the world's leading distributor of classical music, has just signed a worldwide digital distribution deal with the Independent Online Distribution Alliance (IODA), which will use its Digital Distribution Dashboard (D3) technology platform to distribute and manage music files from the Naxos family of distributed music labels. The deal entails distributing titles to many of Naxos' 22 Digital Service Providers, including Sony Connect, Rhapsody, iTunes, Napster, and Microsoft (which charges consumers the lowest download price of all: $4.99 for an entire Naxos CD).

Most audiophiles probably consider low-fi media such as podcasts irrelevant. But this may change when accessories manufacturer Boston">http://www.boston-audio.com">Boston Audio Design launches its new HiFi Industry Podcast Series later this fall.

XMas in August: XM Satellite Radio held its annual "XMas in August" new product show in Jazz at Lincoln Center's Frederick P. Rose Hall on August 9. Trumpeting the XM-related products that will be available for the 2005 holiday shopping season, the satellite radio provider announced strategic relationships with Altec Lansing and Belkin Corporation, as well as newer, smaller receivers from longtime partners Audiovox and Delphi. A Samsung-sourced MP3-enabled receiver with Napster capabilities was also announced.

In this, its 50th year of company operations, Phase">http://www.phasetech.com/">Phase Technology announced and demonstrated a new type of loudspeaker system. The series, named dARTS for Digital Audio Reference Theater System, is obviously aimed at the custom-install, home-theater market, but the components and concepts are applicable to music reproduction in any number of channels. As described by PT's director of sales and marketing, Tony Weber, the dARTS system is (1) modular and (2) actively powered and equalized by DSP, incorporating Audyssey's">http://www.audyssey.com/">Audyssey's MultiEQ XT for digital room correction.

New cable: River">http://www.rivercable.com">River Cable has announced a new speaker cable called Flexygy 8, which employs eight conductors in a flat, flexible topology with "tremendous amounts of copper." Boasting a "unique ratio of low resistance-to-capacitance," Flexygy 8's capacitance is rated at 10pF/ft. Additionally, Flexygy 8 is touted as "an installation dream, [it goes] under carpets, along baseboards, with a super flexibility that can’t be beat in a cable with an aggregate AWG of 7."

Ibrahim Ferrer, one of the best-known practitioners of the Cuban vocal music known as son, died in Havana on August 6 of multiple organ failure. He had returned, ill, from a European tour several days previously, and then been hospitalized.