*A correction has been made to this story.

Santa Monica, Calif. - ArtistDirect, an online network focused on music and film, announced on Monday that it has signed lyrics licensing agreements with Universal Music Publishing and EMI Music Publishing, and plans to launch a new song lyrics section on its site in the fall.

Denver - Radio broadcaster Clear Channel (NYSE: CCU) is looking to add a personalized Web radio player to its station websites, and is in talks with Pandora, but no deal has yet been finalized, Billboard reports.

New York - Sony Corporation of America (NYSE: SNE) announced on Tuesday that it will acquire Gracenote, a provider of digital media identification and recommendation services, for $260 million plus other contingent consideration. Founded in 1998, Emeryville, Calif.-based Gracenote developed the CD identification technology that has become the standard used by software like Apple's iTunes, Yahoo's Music Jukebox and Winamp, and on portable music players from Sony, Samsung and others.

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. The LG handsets will allow users to identify songs playing at a party, in the car or even at a club, using their phones. The other features will let users identify any song imported into their phones, and seek recommendations based on the current song playing.

Emeryville, Calif. - Gracenote said on Friday that it has expanded its partnership with Philips, with the two companies combining their respective content fingerprinting technologies. Through the deal, Gracenote has combined its audio fingerprinting technology with Philips' video fingerprinting technology, creating a system that content owners and service providers can use to control the use of copyrighted content.

New York - Viacom's MTV Networks announced on Monday that it has partnered with Gracenote to incorporate music lyrics into its on-air, online and mobile platforms. On sites like MTV.com, VH1.com and CMT.com, users will be able to search for full song lyrics, while mobile users will be able to text an artist's name, song title or a portion of the lyrics and be sent to a mobile Internet page displaying the full lyrics.

Emeryville, Calif. - Gracenote, a provider of music identification and other digital media services, announced on Thursday the launch of its Mobile Music 2.0 platform, which will power mobile music search and discovery services on handsets from makers including Sony Ericsson. The service will let users identify CDs via their PC, and transfer songs to their mobile phones, as well as search for music and get recommendations on their phones, and purchase tracks from mobile music stores. The first phones to support the service -- the Sony Ericsson W910 Walkman and K850 Cyber-shot, are slated to ship in the fall.

Franklin, Tenn. - Digital music retailer PassAlong Networks announced that it has partnered with song ID service Gracenote and MP3Car.com on a service that will let consumers download songs directly to their car stereos. MP3Car.com's service, which also offers Yahoo's Launchast radio, will launch a digital music store powered by PassAlong's StoreBlocks platform.

Santa Monica, Calif. - Yahoo's music unit announced on Tuesday that it has partnered with Gracenote, a provider of CD and digital track identification services, to offer its users access to Gracenote's new database of song lyrics.

Redmond, Wash. - NexTune announced on Monday that it has allocated $50,000 in free music to offer consumers who help to build its music recognition database. Redmond, Wash.-based start-up NexTune aims to provide an alternative to song ID systems offered by Gracenote, FreeDB and All Music, which adds additional song information like tempo, style, vocals, moods and instruments used. The company is offering consumers a 10 cent credit for purchases in its online CD store for every song profile they submit to NexTune.

Cannes, France - Gracenote, a provider of CD identification and other database services, announced on Monday that it has expanded its Lyrics program into Europe, having initiated licensing discussions with European music publishers and artists. California-based Gracenote signed over 80 publishers to add titles to its Lyrics database in the U.S., including the five major publishers. The company said that its database contains more than 600,000 uniquely European albums, and has been searched more than 100 million times by European consumers. Gracenote plans to launch its Lyrics program in Europe in 2008.

Las Vegas - MusicIP, the developer of a global search engine for music, announced at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week the launch of a new, free pricing structure for MusicDNS, its on-demand service that can identify music tracks and deliver accompanying metadata.

Las Vegas - Gracenote, a provider of CD identification and music database technologies, announced that it has developed a new standard for classical music display on digital media devices. The company worked with classical music experts, labels and several prestigious orchestras on the CMI format, which expands typical album, track and artist information to include composer, conductor, ensemble, soloist, work, movement and catalog number elements. Gracenote said it has already converted more than 10,000 of the most popular classical music albums into the CMI format, and will work with labels going forward to input new albums into its database using the standard.