DX News Bits: Lil Wayne, T-Pain

Thursday, Yuma County, Arizona officials set a trial date for felony drug possession charges against Lil Wayne. Charges were brought against the multi-platinum rapper after he was arrested in January of 2008 [click to read]. Law enforcement officials said they found cocaine, Ecstasy and a handgun on the bus at the time of the arrest. Lil Wayne pleaded not guilty, and his manager, Cortez Bryant, maintains that the weapon found on the bus was his.

Attorneys for Lil Wayne did not return calls from any media outlets seeking comments on the matter. The New York Times cites Chief Criminal Yuma County Attorney, Roger Nelson as saying misdemeanor plea deals are not offered under such circumstances. Lil Wayne will go on trial in March of 2010.

In other news, despite recent Auto-tune backlash and a curiously timed swipe at Jay-Z [click to read], T-Pain is cashing in via the digital market. The technology development company Smule reports selling upwards of 300,000 downloads of the I Am T-Pain Apple iPhone application. TechCrunch.com reports that 4.1 million performances have been recorded within the application, with the average user spending around 66 minutes rendering their own versions of pitch corrected songs. The application initially retailed for $2.99 per download, with additional songs selling for $1.00 each. By way of comparison, T-Pain's latest album, Thr33 Ringz [click to read], was certified gold as of January 2009, with roughly 525,000 copies sold.