Never mind the rampant, royalty-free downloading going on via myriad unauthorized web sites. Forget about how iPod culture has made buying actual CDs obsolete. Those issues are old news. The fresh new worry wrinkling music executives’ foreheads is the new satellite radio receivers being produced by XM and Sirius, which will allow users to record satellite broadcasts, manage song inventories, and create playlists–much like Apple’s popular iTunes software.
The key difference? Labels get significantly lower compensation for music played on satellite radio than they do for songs sold on iTunes or purchased on a CD. Thus, the black hole draining the music industry of its revenue widens a little further…and sales of Zantac and Excedrin rise a little higher.
