Actor’s union Equity purports to have achieved a world first, after agreeing a rights deal with the producer of an updated audio podcast of 70s cult sci-fi show Blake’s 7.

Equity said its ground-breaking agreement with B7 Productions would guarantee performers a share of net revenues generated from podcast downloads as well as from audio streaming via the internet, and subsequent CD sales.

Equity assistant general secretary Andy Prodger said the deal‚Äîwhich will allow the podcasts, recorded in December and due to go online in April‚Äîrepresented an “important first step in establishing the rights of members in this developing market”.

When the Blake’s 7 tv program originally aired on the BBC from 1978 – 81, it scored higher viewer ratings than iconic sci-fi show Doctor Who.¬† Blake’s 7 was originally conceived as a “Dirty Dozen” story, set in space.

via Quick Takes Media

Odeo, a podcasting community that was one of the darlings of early podcasting coverage in the mainstream media, is looking for a buyer:

In the last few months, we here at Obvious have been increasingly focused on Twitter. As a result, our original product, Odeo, has not gotten the attention it deserves.

It does not cost us much to run‚Äîin fact, AdSense covers the hosting‚Äîbut on the web you need to constantly improve, or fade away. We’ve put too much into Odeo to want to see it fade away. And it still has tons of potential. But we’re not improving it fast enough.

It seems likely Odeo is worth more to someone else than it is to us at this point, so we’re looking for a new home for it. We’ve been having some conversations with potential buyers, and this is our attempt to put the word out more widely in the most expeditious way (and without involving investment bankers and the like). If we don’t get any attractive offers, we’ll continue to run it.

To clarify, what we’re talking about is selling odeo.com and studio.odeo.com, including all code, the domain, brand, database of three million MP3s, etc. Not a company, but a site and platform that could be ramped up to something much bigger.

Traffic snapshot, last 30 days:

* Unique visitors: 684,951
* Pageviews: 3,012,921 (does not include RSS, MP3s, or Flash widgets)
* Flash plays: 1,523,963
* Logins: 76,106

We’re open to a variety of scenarios‚Äîfrom cash offer to an equity position. Our main concern is the ability to focus on Twitter and to see Odeo live on in some legitimate form.

If you’re interested in Odeo and can make a serious offer‚Äîeither in cash or the ability to invest in it while we retain some equity‚Äîemail me (ev AT obvious) for more details.

Last year, Odeo’s CEO Evan Williams candidly revealed how his startup podcasting company screwed up in a speech at a tech conference. Now Williams is being surprisingly candid about his interest in selling Odeo.

Sirius Satellite Radio plans to buy U.S. rival XM Satellite Radio for $4.6 billion in stock, which could allow the combined company to raise prices, reduce costs and become profitable. The move will bring Oprah Winfrey, singer Bob Dylan, Major League Baseball, motivational guru Deepak Chopra and shock-jock Howard Stern under one roof.

Under the plan announced by the companies Monday, XM shareholders would receive 4.6 Sirius shares for each XM share held, or a 21.7 percent premium based on the two companies’ Friday closing prices.

The deal may face a tough time winning approval, though, since it will create a satellite radio monopoly. U.S. Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin said the agency would review the deal but the hurdle “would be high as the commission originally prohibited one company from holding the only two satellite radio licenses.”

Martin said the companies would have “to demonstrate that consumers would clearly be better off with both more choice and affordable prices.”

XM and Sirius argue they should be allowed to combine as they compete with every audio device that consumers use. Satellite radio has struggled to become profitable, faced with high subscriber-acquisition costs and growing competition from Internet radio and podcasting.

“We are confident we will get this through the regulatory arena by the end of this year,” said XM Chairman Gary Parsons. “Over a decade ago when the first satellite licenses first came out, there were no iPods, there was no HD radio, there were no streaming music on cell phones.”

It looks like the music industry has figured out a new way to anger music lovers.

Suretone Records, a label distributed by the Universal Music Group, plans to start distributing free video files featuring popular acts like Weezer and new bands like Drop Dead Gorgeous on file-sharing networks.

The music videos will not be wrapped in protective software to limit copying. Instead, they’ll be incomplete.

Users who download them will see half the video and then will be directed to the label’s Web site to watch an ad-supported complete version.

Attorneys general of more than 20 states have written to Anheuser-Busch, asking the brewer to provide tighter access controls to make sure underaged viewers aren’t accessing its new beer-themed video site, Bud.TV.

The site asks for your name, zip code and birthday to verify that you are 21 or over. The attorneys generals are asking Anheuser-Busch to use a more effective age-verification tool. They request that, at a minimum, you should have to enter your name and full address, or a driver’s license number, exactly as it appears on a government-issued ID before a person could access the site.

The situation raises questions about the responsibilities of online publishers, and also whether the government should regulate Internet video sites, and if so, how. Thousands of video sites offer content, without age restrictions, that is more adult than anything at Bud.TV.

The New York Post is reporting that satellite radio operators Sirius and XM are expected to announce a merger today.

The two sides were locked in negotiations over the weekend trying to hammer out a final agreement with an eye toward going public with the merger today in Washington, D.C., where XM is based, this source said.

According to the source, XM Chairman Gary Parsons will retain that title in the combined entity, with Sirius’ head Mel Karmazin likely taking the CEO role. It is unclear what role, if any, XM CEO Hugh Panero will play.

Combining Sirius and XM would result in a single satellite radio operator with more than 12 million total subscribers. A deal would also marry Sirius content, such as Howard Stern, Frank Sinatra and Nascar with XM’s Oprah Winfrey, Bob Dylan and Major League Baseball.

More important, analysts widely predict that a deal would also save the two companies nearly $7 billion annually.

The two companies have long struggled with the high cost of acquiring subscribers. In 2007, Sirius missed its goals for subscriber growth. Satellite radio has faced several new challenges in the last year:

• Podcasts are competing for the satellite radio audience;
• Lawmakers may limit the capabilities of satellite radio players; and
• New automobiles are coming with iPod-ready car audio systems.

As recently as December, XM said “no way” on the idea of a merger. As the companies face increased pressure from competitive technologies, merging may be their only way to achieve profitability.

If Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs wasn’t a lightning rod for controversy after blaming Apple’s DRM on the music industry, he will be now.

At an appearance at an education conference Friday, Jobs blasted teachers’ unions, saying that no amount of technology in the classroom would improve public schools until principals could fire bad teachers.

“What kind of person could you get to run a small business if you told them that when they came in they couldn’t get rid of people that they thought weren’t any good?” he asked. “Not really great ones, because if you’re really smart you go, ‘I can’t win.'”

“I believe that what is wrong with our schools in this nation is that they have become unionized in the worst possible way,” Jobs said. “This unionization and lifetime employment of K-12 teachers is off-the-charts crazy.”

“Apple just lost some business in this state, I’m sure,” Jobs said.

Forum Communications has added podcasting capabilities to its Consortium line of enterprise voice conferencing systems. Users have one-touch access and can download conferences as podcasts, letting users to conferences at their leisure. Both Consortium II and Consortium VIP now let users capture calls as podcasts for automatic download via their choice of software such as Apple’s iTunes.

According to Consortium, there solutions lets users access recorded calls without the hassle of having to download files, and lets you catch up on important meetings while in your car, while working out, or traveling.

The website for MusicStation, a new ‘all-you-can-eat‚Äô mobile music service that some are calling a mobile iTunes-killer, has a strangely familiar look and feel.

Is MusicStation imitating Apple’s style in an effort to imitate Apple’s success in thew world of digital music? Check out these similarities, and judge for yourself…..

Omnifone, a UK-based mobile music company, has announced a collaboration with Musiwave, a leading provider of mobile music entertainment services, to distribute an ‘all-you-can-eat’ mobile music service, MusicStation, that works on all major music handsets.

The service is the latest challenger into the mobile music market, which has gained new interest with the introduction of Apple’s iPhone. As these services compete, later this year, it may determine whether subscription services will be a viable alternative to Apple’s proven approach with iTunes digital music purchases.

For a fee of £1.99 per week (about $4), MusicStation provides subscribers with unlimited Over the Air (OTA) downloads to their mobiles from Musiwave’s end-to-end music platform.

“By working with Musiwave we will be able to offer millions of subscribers worldwide freedom to access the music they love, wherever they are and on whichever music phone they choose to buy,” said Omnifone CEO Rob Lewis. “Linking with Musiwave’s network of 35 operators will help us to quickly bring MusicStation onto consumers’ handsets so that people can start enjoying all the world’s music for a small weekly charge.”