The Yanks can have Lloyd-Webber until "Steamboat Willy" goes out of copyright. Everyone wins that way.

Actually, make that until "Snow White" goes out of copyright. Don't bother to thank us, American cousins, it's the "special relationship" at work.

If it can detect unused frequencies, then wouldn't it be able to detect the use of other equipment, such as hospital gear and microphones?

Paris, because we can only hope her microphone gets effected.

An industry which is using a slab of "non-owned" wavelength *for free* is trying to stop another group from doing the same?

There's a reason companies bid for spectrum, people - you want exclusive use of a band, pay for the right.

Every event has to licence the radio mics it uses - on an event by event basis..... A lot of people think this will only affect the theatre and concert industry - however this will affect all radio mics - from the corporate events launching whatever great bit of new technology - right down to the local karaoke - it's going to be painful

In the UK OFCOM were going to sell off a load of radio frequencies as part of the Digital Dividend. At the moment there is a band called Programme Making and Special Events (PMSE) used by TV, radio and live music. Since there is no way that the UK event industry can afford the billions of pounds that is the going cost of a radio spectrum these days, it would have mean that no event in the UK would be able to use radio mics, in-ear monitors or walkie talkies for events after 2012. Not even the BBC. A lot of time an effort has gone into making sure that these frequencies are treated separately, but there is still a long battle ahead. You can read more about it here: http://www.beirg.org.uk/ and here: http://www.jfmg.co.uk/