The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) announced through its 2007 Digital Music Report that global digital music sales were almost double for 2006, reaching to about $2 billion, which equates to about 10 percent of total music sales.
They said that by 2010 they believe that digital sales will be a quarter of all worldwide sales.
IFPI Chief Executive John Kennedy told reporters that "To double over the last 12 months is fantastic. I don't think anyone will expect it to double in 2007 but we believe it will grow in percentages that any industry would be proud of."
The organization, which reflects the concerns of the overall industry, also said that they haven't made up for the steadily falling sales of CDs. Kennedy said that sales had dropped by 23 percent from 2000 to 2006, adding that in the 3 largest music markets in the world - U.S., Japan and Britain, there are signs that are encouraging the industry. Still, overall sales are down around the 3 percent mark for the second year in a row.
To me their continual obsession on connecting sales of CDs to sales of downloads has a disconnect. For example, how many times do we pay for a CD and like only a couple of songs on it? Yet we still pay the full price. If people buy an average of six CDs a year, that could come to somewhere between $80 to $90 dollars. But if you bought downloads that your really liked and they numbered say 70, it would still be a big drop in percentages and dollars spent.
While the industry can say that sales of digital aren't keeping up with the decline of CD sales, part of it can be because of the ability to buy individual songs that we want, rather than a CD full of songs they have no interest in.
The report also said that there are now about 4 million tracks available for download, which brings up another issue of sales: availability of what the consumer wants. The truth is that the music industry has been focusing on the wrong things (piracy) for so long that they've been slow to bring what music lovers really want in individual track choices and the selection. When they attack this even more heartily, they will find that sales will continually grow and will win back some of the fans that they've alienated.
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