The question so rightfully asked by Struan Robertson is "Is the music industry pricing themselves out of the podcast market?". My answer would be "Were they ever in the podcast market?"
Over here in North America, the RIAA and CRIA (US and Canada respectively) represent the rights of recording artists and record labels. The RIAA is far more rabid than the CRIA, but both have spent millions if not billions on tracking down and persecuting those who use signed music in unlicensed ways.
Podcasters are well aware that if they use signed music in their podcasts that these organizations are going to come knocking on their door sooner or later. History has shown that they don't care if you're a low-income single-mother or a music-pirating ring leader, they come after one and all.
I think it's pretty safe to say that signed artists and record labels have no interest at all in being in the podcast market. Ii think they do so at their peril, but they're not listening.
On the flipside, that's allowed progressive record labels like Magnatune and directories like the Podsafe Music Network to really flourish in the podcasting space. Those guys know that podcasting sells records and they want to be in that space.
We're just witnessing the changing of the guard.
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