The debate regarding the various online royalties that should be paid by digital music services to the record labels, music publishers and their royalty collecting societies is ongoing in the US, with the Copyright Royalty Board considering various royalty issues in this domain as we speak.
As part of those considerations the issue was raised as to whether interactive music streams - ie music services where you can listen to music on demand, but do not get a download of it to keep - should be covered by the same kind of compulsory mechanical licences as radio broadcasts. It would be good for the digital music providers if they were, because the owners of those mechanical copyrights - ie the music publishers - would have to licence them to the digital outfits at a set rate.
The Digital Media Association requested that the Copyright Royalty Board ask for clarification on that matter from the Register Of Copyrights, a move which could have speeded things up in that regard. Only "could have", because Marybeth Peters of the Register said US copyright law said nothing about interactive services, so it wasn't for the Register to comment one way or another on whether compulsory licensing extended to them. Unless political types re-write the law to be more specific, then it will be up to the judges in the copyright court to decide whether radio style licensing can be extended to these online music platforms.
Their deliberations on the matter continue.