The technology of Shazam Entertainment has been bought out by BMI for an undisclosed sum. Shazam’s recognition technology, called BlueArrows, uses pattern recognition to identify music titles from any source containing audio.

Shazam had implemented the technology into a service that allows cellphone users to call a number when listening to a song to identify the title, track and album, in as little as 2 seconds.

BMI also announced the formation of a wholly owned subsidiary, Landmark Digital Service, which will own, deploy and exploit this new technology. Landmark will integrate the pattern recognition technology into BMI’s royalty distribution systems. BMI/Landmark’s immediate usage will be to improve BMI’s radio airplay measurement system that monitors what music is played on stations.

From the press release, “As part of the agreement, Shazam will continue to pursue business activities aimed at the mobile consumer use of the BlueArrow technology under a worldwide exclusive license to be provided by Landmark..”

For the past several years, municipalities across the country have talked about and even begun implementing free WiFi offering. Many critics of these plans have claimed that cities have no business offering free high-speed wireless access as it competes with local telephone companies, cable providers of broadband, cellular companies and even local small business owners that use free wireless access to attract customers.

Proponents of free municipal provided WiFi say that it will bring internet access to lower-income households, improve tourism and benefit businesses. There are benefits, but many of these do not pass even the most basic cost-benefit analysis.

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Enter a simple but novel approach from Huntsville, Alabama. Many do not think of Alabama as a technology front mover, but Huntsville is home to 1) one of the country’s two U.S. Space Camps 2) Intergraph Corporation, 3) sizeable offices for Boeing, Northrop Grumman, LG Electronics and Lockheed Martin 4) Redstone Arsenal which houses several military and NASA installations, plus external associate firms 5) many other large technical installations and smaller R&D houses.

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Other municipalities would do well to copy this arrangement from Huntsville. It provides wireless data access to visitors and residents for basic needs at little cost to tax payers, may even become a revenue stream from commissions on extended plans sold by the service provider and leaves open the possibility of helping low-income households access the internet.