Jan 11
article from the Pioneer Press site shows that iTunes is hardly
making waves in the music industry. To quote a few passages from
it:
- A new report on digital music sales
casts doubt on the power of Apple Computer to reshape the music industry
and turn around a long-term slump in music sales.- The report,
from Forrester Research analyst Josh Bernoff, showed that sales at
Apple's iTunes Music Store dropped dramatically in the first six
months of 2006. Since January, the number of monthly transactions
declined 58 percent, while the number of songs purchased each time fell
17 percent, leading to a 65 percent overall drop in monthly iTunes
revenue, according to Bernoff.- Aside from the issue of
iTunes' sales trend, Bernoff's research spotlights a significant
shift in how people are buying music online: They want singles more than
albums. That trend is putting further pressure on overall music sales,
which continue to drop steadily year after
year.
So much for all of Steve Jobs'
posturing about huge iTunes sales.
What we're really seeing
here is that iTunes, by allowing people to buy individual tracks instead
of entire albums, is helping to speed the music industry's
decline. That is NOT really iTunes' fault, mind you.
It's the fault of the music industry and its desire to push artists
into releasing entire albums on a schedule rather than letting them
produce quality work on their own schedules.