Los Angeles - News Corp.'s MySpace online social network on Thursday announced details of an anticipated new music service, a spin-off that will be a joint venture with major labels Universal Music, Sony BMG and Warner Music owning minority stakes. [more..]

Cupertino, Calif. - Apple's iTunes Store has surpassed Wal-Mart to become the No. 1 music retailer in the U.S., according to new figures from market research firm NPD Group. [more..]

New York - Hip-hop artist and impresario Jay-Z is about to close a $150 million deal with concert promoter Live Nation, that will see him leave longtime label Def Jam -- from which he stepped down as president last year -- and form a joint venture that will include recordings, tours, artist management and merchandise, The New York Times reported on Thursday. [more..]

Mountain View, Calif. - Google will lay off about 300 employees from its recently acquired online ad firm DoubleClick, or about a quarter of the company's U.S. staff, The New York Times reported, citing a person with direct knowledge of the plan. [more..]

New York - NBC has announced plans to launch original webisodes in July for some of its most popular TV shows, including "Heroes," "The Office," "30 Rock" and "Chuck." [more..]

Minneapolis, Minn. - Comcast, the nation's largest cable TV provider, which also counts 13.2 million broadband customers, on Thursday launched a new high-speed Internet service that offers up to 50 Mbps downloads and 5 Mbps uploads -- fast enough to download an HD movie in about ten minutes. [more..]

Emeryville, Calif. - Yardbarker, an online sports community and branded vertical ad network, announced on Thursday that it has raised $6 million in its second round of funding, led by Draper Fisher Jurvetson. [more..]

New York - Fix8, a division of Mobinex that provides 3D avatar animation technology, announced on Thursday that it has raised an additional $2 million in its first round of financing, from South Korean wireless network operator SK Telecom. [more..]

The public has a clear strategic stake in a modern, affordable communication infrastructure, and the goal of public policy ought to be to promote the public interest, not simply to make the world safe for private investment and private profit, blogs Paul Sweeting. [more..]

Sunnyvale, Calif. - Ian Rogers, the head of Yahoo's Music unit, has stepped down to go work at a music-related start-up he co-founded, according to a post on his blog. [more..]

Burbank, Calif. - Disney's Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures Group announced on Thursday that it has promoted Jason Brenek to the newly created position of SVP, worldwide digital cinema and cinema programming. [more..]

Las Vegas - Gracenote, a provider of music data services, said on Thursday that LG Electronics will be the first mobile partner to bundle its Mobile MusicID and two other services in its music-enabled handsets. [more..]

New York - The Orchard, a digital distributor of independent music and video, announced that it has signed a worldwide distribution and marketing deal with U.K. independent label Gut Records. [more..]

New York - IBM and Linden Lab, creator of the "Second Life" online virtual world, announced on Thursday that they will collaborate on the development of "enterprise solutions for security-rich, custom virtual world creation and collaboration" on the Second Life Grid platform. [more..]

San Francisco - Double Fusion, a provider of in-game advertising services, said on Thursday that it has signed a deal with NCsoft, to serve ads within the developer's popular massively multiplayer online game, "City of Heroes." [more..]