with apologies to Chief Vitalstatistix:
ARIA’s half year figures for 2008 show that sales of recorded music are still falling – down 4% on the corresponding period last year.
But guess what, the decline in sales of physical copies is almost all set off by the rise in digital sales: 12 million digital tracks up from 8 million for the 6 month period last year.
According to ARIA:
“… figures which demonstrate the beginning of a remarkable transition to a whole new economy that is still only in its infancy.”
Perhaps in a sign of gloom for music industry executives, a lot of these downloads were single tracks rather than albums, but digital albums still increased by 55%.