Anyone still care to insinuate that major labels don't pay mob-connected independent promotion specialists to control what gets played on the radio? I'm not interested in debating anything else the NY State Atty General has ever done, because it has nothing to do with this issue. If you think that it would make sense for a record label to settle if no wrongdoing had occurred, given the evidence that this is a widespread illegal practice dating back decades--plenty of evidence--then perhaps you could explain why.

I don't care if Eliot Spitzer did 99 things that are or were misguided, self-promotional, wrongheaded, or even destructive, because those would then be debated on their own merits...in another thread, and probably on another board. This is one thing that has been accomplished that is a longtime wrong that is hopefully on its way to being corrected. The dynamics & infrastructure of the music industry have changed radically, of course, but that doesn't mean allowing something like this to continue is or should be considered valid policy. And I don't have much sympathy for shareholders of the controlling entities of these labels. If they didn't know this sort of thing was going on & that there might be some fallout from the eventual discovery & investigations (that nobody in Congress ever followed through on, despite lots of bluster from politicians who typically kept quiet after being lobbied), blaming the authorities--as was done previously in other threads on this topic--for overreaching is simply not valid. Maybe in some mutual funds case, but certainly not here.

Not that Sony BMG's stock is likely to tank, anyway. This will likely be handled quietly across the board and any potential effect will probably be little more than an afterthought within a few quarters. Then again, I could be wrong. In which case some of the music that some of the people on this board happen to like might even find its way onto commercial radio in the U.S.

Well, maybe that's a reach.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-f...,4233398.story