Music Firms Lose Bid to Block U.S.

Time Warner Inc., Sony Corp. of America, EMI Music Inc., Bertelsmann Inc. and PolyGram Holding Inc. must turn over documents about their foreign activities to investigators looking into possible price fixing for music video licenses, a federal judge ruled. The ruling, issued this week by U.S. District Judge Harold Greene in Washington, could jump-start a Justice Department antitrust investigation that has been on hold for more than two years. The firms have refused since 1994 to produce the documents. Greene said the Justice Department was entitled to look at the documents to determine if the companies’ foreign activities affected U.S. markets. Company lawyers said they hadn’t seen the ruling and had no comment. . . . In a separate development, the U.S. said it has settled a dispute with Japan over copyright protection for recordings of American popular music of the ‘40s, ‘50s and ‘60s. U.S. Trade Representative-Designate Charlene Barshefsky said amendments to Japan’s copyright law passed last month bring the nation into compliance with the intellectual property rules of the World Trade Organization. The Recording Industry Assn. of America, which represents the music industry, praised the decision.