Washington - The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) on Thursday said it has reached an agreement with SoundExchange, an entity set up by record labels to collect and distribute digital royalties, on the rates and terms that public radio stations will pay to stream music online. Under the terms, which cover the period of January 2005 through December 2010, SoundExchange will receive an upfront payment of $1.85 million, in addition to "consolidated usage and playlist reporting from CPB on behalf of the entire public radio system," FMQB.com reports.

Washington - National Public Radio (NPR) announced on Wednesday that it will cut 7% of its workforce and cut expenses, citing "an uncertain economy and a sharp decline in current and projected revenues from corporate underwriting."

Washington - National Public Radio (NPR), the producer of programming for public radio stations, has named Vivian Schiller, the senior vice president and general manager of The New York Times' (NYSE: NYT) website, NYTimes.com, as its new president and CEO.

Washington - National Public Radio (NPR) on Tuesday announced the beta launch of new online community features, which let users create profile pages, and comment on NPR stories. "NPR is late to this game, to be blunt," said NPR editorial director for digital media Dick Meyer. "NPR has been cautious because we want to do it right; we want the comments and the conversations to be useful, friendly and civil; we want NPR employees to participate and talk about their work. We needed the right tools and the right philosophy to come together."

Washington - National Public Radio (NPR) announced that it has acquired Public Interactive, the public media Web services company owned by Public Radio International (PRI), for an undisclosed sum.

Arlington, Va. - PBS said that it has launched its new presidential election site, called Vote 2008. The site features a variety of news stories, video, online tools and user comments from public television and public radio sites across the nation. It also includes several social media widgets, a video player, a blog and an interactive election map produced in conjunction with National Public Radio (NPR).

Washington - National Public Radio (NPR) announced on Friday that CEO Ken Stern will leave the network by "mutual agreement," abruptly ending his 10-year stint as a top executive at NPR.

Washington - The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia has released a briefing schedule for the appeal of webcasting royalty rates filed by various webcasters, which will begin in February but is not likely to be resolved until sometime in 2009, according to the Broadcast Law blog.

Washington - NPR on Monday announced the launch of a new NPR Music multimedia site, which features on-air and online content -- such as interviews, reviews, blogs and live performances -- aggregated from NPR and 12 NPR member stations. Initial participants include KEXP and KPLU (Seattle); WFUV an WNYC (New York); KUT (Austin); and American Public Media/Minnesota Public Radio. NPR.org also launched a media player that lets users create playlists of NPR audio and video content available on the site, and makes recommendations based on a user's selections.

New York - Some involved in the prickly royalty negotiations between music webcasters and the major record labels believe that issues could be resolved as early as the end of September, the Associated Press reported.

Washington - A group of large and small webcasters, including NPR and those represented by the Digital Media Association (DiMA), on Wednesday asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to suspend the date on which new, higher webcasting royalty rates are due to take effect, until the court hears the webcasters' appeal of those rates.