The State of Digital Music in 2006

wh0pper writes "Designtechnica has an excellent article on the state of digital music in 2006. Digital music accounted for only six percent of total music sales in 2005. Yet even that is a massive increase over the year before, a whopping 194 percent, which is fiscally valuable as the sales of CDs continue to decrease (although even with digital sales, the record labels experienced another downturn in 2005). While the young, usually the first to adopt and adapt to new technology, have been downloading and swapping music for quite some time, there's been a ripple effect into the older, warier area of the population, one that will only increase. Thank--or blame--Apple and its iPod, or any of the many other makes selling like hotcakes in the stores.

Comments

And no OGG support

[ericdano]

And they did all this without OGG support. AAC all the way!

Since most all the "other" services are subscription, I would think that Apple's iTunes store is the source for this increase.

Error

[The Cisco Kid]

The music on CD's IS digital, moron. So comparing "digital music" to "CD's" is just silly. What I suspect you really meant was 'Internet-downloadable digital music' and presumably only that purchased from a RIAA-approved source in a proprietary format including an offensive and obnoxious DRM system (as opposed to that shared between individuals via whatever mechanism), as compared to 'purchasable digital music delivered on physical read-only optical media, including both "order [online or by phone] and wait for it to be shipped", and "walk into the store and pay for it at the register" (sometimes including the offensive DRM, sometimes in a standards compliant format)'