One of my favourite phrases in English is “the more things change, the more they stay the same”. When I was growing up, I used to get a lot of my music from tapes recorded from friends (and even from the radio). I didn’t have money to buy records, and every purchase was treasured.
It seems like the availability of CD burning equipment has made this the choice for people exchanging music. Instead of going online, people have gone back to exchanging CDs.
What I found interesting in the report is that it claims that CD burning is affecting CD music sales, as the figures for this media are down 7% from last year. But at the same time, it is claimed that overall sales are up because of “legal” music sales. Wouldn’t it be accurate to say that the largest threat to CD music sales are legal music downloads? Does the fact that a new media is more popular be met with such negativity from the industry? Perhaps the RIAA will tell us that this year tape and vinyl sales are down. Duh!
Anyway, it is almost certain that these figures will spell more DRM included in music. I still have a policy that I will not buy a DRM-protected album.
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