Okay, they’re not earth shattering, mind blowing numbers, but album sales did rise 1% in 2010. The first increase since 2004 according to Nielsen SoundScan via TechCrunch.
Weird that my last post talked about how we’re not getting what we pay for in terms of digital music, paying the same price as the album, and getting a much lower quality product. Based on this latest Nielsen report, maybe word is catching on that for many consumers, the CD quality audio is well worth the investment. At least the end of massive decreases in album sales over the past 6 years would indicate so.
So, why the increase, albeit small, in album sales last year? A couple comments on my last post may indicate a growing trend with respect to consumer sentiment:
The trends in music consumption all point to lower quality audio especially when it comes to the cloud as it exists today. As the cloud matures and mobile bandwidth increases, maybe we’ll get to the point where CD quality or 100% lossless music can be streamed from public or even private / personal clouds to mobile devices. Then again, what quality expectations do consumers have when it comes to listening to music on their mobile devices? Is lossless music more of a need for home audio and less for mobile audio? Based on my own experience, I would suggest that is the case.
So what is the solution? For me, for the music I have to have in CD quality (Metallica, Godsmack, etc), I buy the CD and try to maintain 2 music libraries, one for home, and one for mobile enjoyment. It’s not the most convenient solution, but it works. Maybe, the music industry should bundle a digital version of the album and store it in the cloud (e.g. Apple iCloud, Amazon Cloud Drive) with every CD you purchase. That way, I get the CD quality audio at home, and access to “copies” of lower quality yet lower capacity audio files via the cloud. Just a thought.
What’s your solution?
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I buy the disc then load it on my computer. That way I can transfer it to my phone, mp3 player, my zumo or amazon cloud or burn a disc to play in my car. Back when I bought vinyl records, I would record onto a cassete tape and that was my mobile music and I would use the tape everywhere and the album stayed pristine. Vinyl Album has much better sound qaulity then cd, Still can’t get the reverb right with digital which is why many musicians still use old analog equipment.