• Album sales dropped 1% last week and were down 3% versus the same week last year. For the year, album sales are down 15%. Digital track sales were dropped 2% last week and were 47% higher than the same week in 2006. For the year, digital track sales are up 48%.

• The Orchard is planning a merger with Digital Music Group. Said The Orchard's Greg Scholl, who will continue to lead the company, "This company has been uniquely designed entirely around the exploitation of digital music rights. We’ll have more songs for sale so we’ll be a bigger partner for the retailers we supply and we’ll have more leverage in the market." (New York Times, via Digital Music News)

• Universal Music Latino has launched Rebel Music Group, a joint venture with Jack Gonzalez of rap group Psycho Realm. (Press release)

• The Los Angeles Times has a good recap of the copyright infringement lawsuit involving Avril Lavigne's song "Girlfriend." (Los Angeles Times)

• The Copyright Tribunal of Australia has issued an increase of music licensing fees for recorded music. The dance music community has taken notice. "...the fees paid by venues that play recorded music will rise from its former flat rate of seven cents per patron per song, to a rate that can go as high as $3.07 per person depending on the scale of the event. Breaking it down, clubs will now pay a licence fee of $1.05 a person based on the club’s capacity, which means that a club that holds 1000 people for instance will pay $1100, even if the venue is only half filled for the evening." (Same Same)

• iDupe is an application that finds duplicate and dead tracks in your iTunes library. (The Mac Observer)