The U.S. Department of Justice approved the Live Nation and Ticketmaster merge on Monday, according to rollingstone.com. The joining of the two biggest pieces in the $4.4 billion (U.S.) worldwide concert business is sure to affect every live-music fan, artist, agent, manager, and promoter.

In a statement, Ticketmaster’s chief executive, Eagles manager Irving Azoff, called the decision “a great win for fans,” but some people in the business fear the combined power of the two companies will make it hard for outsiders to promote and sell tickets.

“It’s disappointing to me,” said Buck Williams, who represents R.E.M. and Widespread Panic. “It’s just another step in eliminating competition.”

“They’ve pulled the rug out from under the entrepreneurs, to some degree,” he added.

The new Live Nation Entertainment, which will begin its merge as early as tomorrow (Wednesday), will own a large chunk of the business: Ticketmaster’s Front Line management company represents the Eagles, Jimmy Buffett, Christina Aguilera and many others, while Live Nation’s clients include Madonna and Jay-Z. Ticketmaster has exclusive ticketing deals with most of the major U.S. arenas, while Live Nation owns and operates 140 top venues overall, including most of the ampitheatres. And Ticketmaster alone sells about 140 million tickets a year.

These combined assets make some people in the business optimistic. “My hope and belief is that there is going to be an expanded opportunity for touring artists to [experiment with] a variety of different products,” said Jim Guerinot, manager of the likes of No Doubt and Nine Inch Nails. “And I look forward to trying those things.”

Azoff and Live Nation’s CEO, Michael Rapino, said that the new Live Nation Entertainment would have the power and flexibility to make more money, cut costs, and ultimately reduce ticket prices and service fees. The Justice Department mostly agreed, but before approving the merger, U.S. attorneys forced Ticketmaster to license its software to top competitor AEG Live and forbade the combined company from retaliating against any concert venue that uses a non-Ticketmaster outlet.

The agreement “promotes robust competition for primary ticketing services and preserves incentives for competitors to innovate and discount, which will benefit consumers,” said Christine Varney, an assistant attorney in the Justice Department’s antitrust division, in a statement.

Some artist representatives are still skeptical. “I don’t think prices are going to come down,” said Tom Windish, an agent who represents Animal Collective, Hot Chip, and dozens of other top indie artists. “I don’t think it’s going to change that much. I don’t see Live Nation getting less money, I don’t see artists getting less money and I don’t see Ticketmaster charging a surcharge that’s lower than [what] they can possibly get. If anything, it’ll be higher.”

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LaCie, manufacturer of computer peripherals, announced a merger with the creators of the online storage service, Wuala, yesterday.

“We will also bring this technology to enterprises and professional customers, who will soon take advantage of our services with both cloud and data center-based storage,” said Dominik Grolimund, Co-creator of Wuala.

LaCie was established in 1989 and makes peripherals for PC, Apple and Linux users. Wuala is online storage that allows users to securely store, backup and access files from anywhere. Users start with 1 GB of storage, but can trade idle disk space or buy more space. LaCie is planning on implementing “cloud storage” technology into its storage devices.

“For 20 years, LaCie massively promoted hard drive technologies; today, as a leader on storage market, we will be a first mover in the next leading technologies: flash-based storage, and cloud storage. With this merger, LaCie will morph from a pure hardware manufacturer to a solution provider. These new technologies will be amazing for our customers and will enhance their experience,” said Philippe Spruch, CEO of LaCie.

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