The Recording Industry Association of America is expanding its gold and platinum certification program to include song streams on the Internet.

The first round of 56 combined digital single awards counting both downloads and streams go to artists like Eminem, Adele, Justin Bieber and Carly Rae Jepsen.

The RIAA is the latest to recognize the popularity of streaming music over the Internet. Billboard also recently changed its chart system to include streams. The gold and platinum certifications will be based on data from on-demand streaming services like Spotify and Rhapsody and video streaming services like YouTube and Yahoo! Previously, only song sales had been recognized.

The RIAA says in a Thursday news release that 27 artists will receive multi-platinum certification, 18 platinum and 11 gold.

“American Idol” is going nuclear for Season 13.

None of the four judges on the singing competition will be asked to return next season, an individual with knowledge of Fox’s plans told The Wrap. Longtime producer Nigel Lythgoe is expected to get the boot. And despite reports to the contrary, Fox isn’t even considering bringing former judge Jennifer Lopez back as a lifesaver for next season.

Like we said: nuclear.

“All four are gone,” the insider told TheWrap. “They feel they’ve lost their core audience and they want it back.”

Driven by this belief and the need to attract younger viewers, Fox is set to make major on-air changes to “Idol,” the most notable of which will be an entirely new judging panel. New judges pop icon Mariah Carey, rapper Nicki Minaj and country star Keith Urban won’t be back. Even original judge Randy Jackson won’t survive the blood bath this time around.

A Fox spokesperson declined to comment for this story.

All four judges have options to return for another season, but Fox won’t be picking them up, according to the knowledgeable individual, who said: “No more big checks for divas.”

The network has resolved to stop paying the huge salaries it has been shoveling out for its big name talent, i.e. Carey’s reported $18 million package, Minaj’s $12 million salary and former judge Jennifer Lopez’s $15 million.

The show’s format will also change. Its look will be redesigned and the dated tribute nights will be a thing of the past. But the show’s trademark audition episodes will continue.

Fox’s meltdown has everything to do with the talent competition’s declining viewership. Its ratings are already down 22 percent this season and it hit a series low for ratings last Thursday, when it attracted only 11 million viewers and a 2.4 rating/7 share in the ad-coveted 18-49 demographic. The ratings slide is especially problematic during May Sweeps, where ratings numbers are used to dictate advertising rates.

Viewing has been in decline for several seasons now. At its height during Season 6, “Idol” attracted about 30 million viewers an episode.

So, why not just cancel the show?

“Idol” is still a huge revenue generator for Fox, bringing in $836.4 million in ad revenue last year, according to Kantar Media. Plus, it has nothing to replace it. Simon Cowell’s “The X Factor” is far from being “Idol’s” heir apparent after failing to meet ratings expectations over its first two seasons. It, too, is undergoing another round of changes for Season 3, with pop star Britney Spears and record executive L.A. Reid not returning. Read more

After a successful stint in rehab, Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong has triumphantly returned to the stage in March and reconnecting with fans on the road without incident – until now. Taking to his Instagram account, Armstrong posted a picture of K-pop star Psy, and what he had to say about the “Gangnam Style” hit-maker was far from congratulatory. “This dude is the herpes of music,” Armstong wrote. “Once you think it’s gone, it comes back.” The Green Day singer also added a series of hashtags: #herpes, #flarup and #pleasegoaway. Posted on Tuesday (May 7), by the following day the missive has generated more than 20,000 “likes” from Instagram users, with nearly 2000 comments from fans mostly agreeing with Armstrong’s commentary.

One of Justin Bieber’s hit songs is the target of a $10 million copyright infringement lawsuit that also accuses Bieber’s mentor, R&B singer Usher, of funneling the song to the teen pop star.

R&B singer Devin Copeland, known professionally as De Rico, and songwriter Mareio Overton filed a lawsuit last week in U.S. District Court in Virginia alleging that they came up with the song “Somebody to Love.” Bieber, who is managed by one of Usher’s business ventures, released “Somebody to Love” in 2010 with Usher also singing on the recording. The song peaked at No. 15 on the U.S. Billboard chart.

Copeland and Overton allege that “Somebody to Love” has the same title, time signature, underlying beat pattern as well as similar chords and share similar lyrics, including the chorus “I … need somebody to love.” “There is essentially a zero probability for the number of points of congruence between the two versions of ‘Somebody to Love,'” Copeland and Overton said in the lawsuit.

Bieber, songwriter Heather Bright and the Stereotypes are credited as the writers of Bieber’s “Somebody to Love.” Read more

It’s a diplomatic failure at the highest level: Bill Clinton couldn’t get Led Zeppelin to reunite.

The CBS “60 Minutes Overtime” webcast reported Monday that the former president was enlisted to ask the British rock gods to get back together last year for the Superstorm Sandy benefit concert in New York City. He asked, they said no.

David Saltzman of the Robin Hood Foundation says he and film executive Harvey Weinstein flew to Washington to ask Clinton to make the plea. Led Zeppelin’s surviving members Robert Plant, John Paul Jones and Jimmy Page were in Washington just before the Sandy concert for the Kennedy Center Honors.

Led Zeppelin last played publicly at a one-night reunion in London in 2007.