Streaming drives up US music sales by 11 per cent

Streaming now makes up 51 per cent of United States music sales - the first time it has had a majority.

The business generated US$7.7 billion (S$10.8 billion) in retail revenue last year, up 11.4 per cent from 2015, the Recording Industry Association of America reported on Thursday. That is the industry's highest sales figure since 2009 and best percentage gain since 1998.

Streaming contributed US$3.9 billion. But revenue is still about half of what the industry enjoyed in 1999.

Request to use Cosby's 'Spanish Fly' tale in trial

Comedian Bill Cosby told CNN host Larry King in 1991 the "old story" of boys dropping a purported aphrodisiac they called "Spanish Fly" into a girl's drink. He said: "The girl would drink it and, hello America!"

On Thursday, prosecutors asked a judge to introduce the television interview as evidence in Cosby's upcoming trial on charges that he drugged and sexually assaulted Temple University staff member Andrea Constand in his home outside Philadelphia in 2004. They are also seeking to introduce a chapter of a book that Cosby wrote from that same year, in which he told a childhood story about how he and some other boys sprinkled Spanish Fly on cookies to give to girls.