Wired had an interesting article about the difficulties in dealing with program licensing when the music industry is involved. Anyone who was alive and watching TV in the US in the late 1970's and early 1980's will remember WKRP in Cincinnati, a campy sitcom about a small-time radio station in the city of the same name. It seems that one of the features that made the show popular, the use of contemporary music as background, has now made the release on DVD nearly impossible.

At issue are the licensing fees that the musicians and songwriters (through ASCAP) require that the TV industry pay when selling the DVDs. Now, it is possible that everybody will sit down in a room and make nice, but considering the competing interests (one IP licensor wanting to use another's product to make money), I think we're going to have a long wait before we see WPIG's biggest competition back on the air.