Payola Today, Placeola Tomorrow

Payola--that unseemly union between record companies and radio companies--is back in the news. New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer has uncovered the latest pay-for-play scheme, as reported in this National Public Radio story. The class then weighed in on whether they think payola deserves to be illegal (most said yes). We also had an interesting discussion of how payola may change when the music industry moves to a business model centered around paid downloads. Some said the payola of the future will be pay for prominent placement on iTunes and other paid download sites. Placeola, I guess.