plus: MP3-TVT lawsuit mistrial. MP3's Copyright Wizard. Tenacious D. Terrorvision [ tickets ]. Foetus [ tickets ]. America the Beautiful and its documents.

Those Dallas DJs who said that Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears [ tickets ] were killed in a car accident were fired on Monday (6/18), the Dallas News reported.

According to Reuters, the DJs once told listeners to run down cyclists.

Disc jockeys are the worst human beings in the world.
--Albert Brooks

The judge in the copyright-infringement lawsuit that TVT Records filed against MP3.com declared a mistrial on Tuesday, according to published reports. This was the case where the jury intended to award TVT $3 million, but due to a mathematical error, announced a $300,000 verdict.

The new trial date is Nov. 5, according to MSNBC.com.

MP3.com has introduced the Copyright Wizard, a service that the company says "simplifies the process [of copyright registration] by walking users through registration of a copyright and perhaps eliminating the need for professional assistance."

To young musicians, we pose the question: When have you ever heard of a copyright actually, like, protecting anything? Click here to learn how effectively a copyright protected Huey Lewis.

A registered copyright is no more powerful than simply putting out a recording of the song. Save your money.

Tenacious D, the acoustic rap-comedy duo consisting of Jack Black ("High Fidelity," "Saving Silverman") and Kyle Gass, will release its first CD on Sept. 25, KNAC.com reported. The Dust Brothers (Beck's "Odelay") produced the album, which features performances from Foo Fighters' Dave Grohl and Phish's Page McConnell.

Maybe we saw these guys on a bad night or something, but the set we saw was long and unfunny and featured this dumbass joke in which they used shampoo as ejaculate--or maybe it's for "South Park" fans, and we hate "South Park."

British band Terrorvision is breaking up, Music365.com reported.

From a Minneapolis' City Pages article on Foetus, a.k.a. Jim Thirwell, a man who "helped create a genre of music that he never quite identified with: industrial."

... his echo throughout rock history has been unmistakable. Around the same time as "Dead Christian" (a well-circulated compilation track), Thirwell released the seminal Hole, five years before Trent Reznor's "Head Like a Hole." The red, white,and black totalitarian cover art predated KMFDM; and the big-band punk-jazz anticipated, um, Big Bad Voodoo Daddy. If this wacky version of Einstürzende Neubauten sounds contemporary now (Beck for Goths?), that might be because pop music is just catching up with Thirwell.

Even so, Foetus has entered the mass-alt consciousness only as a respected remixer of bands he inspired: Marilyn Manson, the Melvins, the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Billboard.com reported that "more than 60 country and contemporary Christian artists"--including Vince Gill, Kenny Rogers, Amy Grant, Lonestar and Martina McBride--joined together to record "America the Beautiful."

Production of the song was reportedly headed by TV producer Norman Lear, who wants airplay of the song to precede a Lear-produced, 4th of July TV special in which actors will read from the Declaration of Independence. Lear owns an original copy of the Declaration of Independence, and reportedly wants to keep the document "circulating around the country in public view."

OK, fine, but really, who cares about the Declaration of Independence? Is it under assault daily? Is it in constant danger of being undermined? No one wants to amend it, as far as we know. It did its job. Leave it alone. Send the Constitution out on the road. Or better yet, instead of sending every citizen a letter saying when they can expect a tax cut--200 million sheets of paper or so--send them a copy of the Constitution.