Monday, July 14, 2003
: Illegal music downloads boosting album sales, reports the Scotsman (and others) last week.
Free registration is required to read the article, but I will summarize. A group called Music Research and Programming -- referred to as "industry research experts" -- conducted a survey with results like this "A total of 91 per cent of file-sharers download individual tracks, but more than two-thirds go on to buy the album, with even the heaviest downloaders saying they like to own real CDs."
In other news, 82% of heroin addicts report that it's not a problem at all with two-thirds replying that heroin does not interfere with daily tasks in any way.
Satire aside, the only data you can trust is to look at actual number of tracks downloaded and CDs purchased. I'm not sure if anyone can get this data reliably.
Interestingly, a Google search for "Music Research and Programming" returns ZERO results for the so-called experts except in conjunction with this one single survey. Do the search and notice how many independently written articles refer to them as "industry research experts". Something is amiss here.
