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To put our collecting hobby into the context of overall music consumption, here are highlights from a report on music sales so far in 2017 from BuzzAngle Music as reported in Radio Ink.
The bottom line is that overall music consumption is up 10% because of internet streams. Audio streams reached nearly 180 billion in the first six months of the year, up 58% from the comparable period last year. Paid subscriptions accounted for nearly 79% of all audio streams.
Meanwhile, overall album sales were down 14% compared to 2016 (74 million in 2017 YTD* vs. 86 million in 2016 YTD). This is mostly because digital album sales were down 24%. Physical (CD) sales were down 2%, and vinyl grew by 20%. (Digital albums represent 46% of all album sales, CDs 53%, and vinyl 5%). Digital song sales were also down about 24%, with 313 million sales so far in 2017.
Here's a link to the full report: http://www.buzzanglemusic.com/.
*YTD = year to date
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So in terms of albums, CDs are still notably ahead of downloads -- interesting.
Yavar
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I'm reading the full report for work, and just came upon an interesting list - top 25 albums by total consumption (which combines streaming and purchases). There are 6 soundtrack albums in the top 25, and 7 in the top 25 for album sales (including digital, cd/vinyl, and cassette - god help us!). Song albums rule of course, but there's some underscore here as well.
7 Moana (3 in album sales)
12 Trolls (6 in album sales)
13 Hamilton (13 in album sales)
15 Fifty Shades Darker soundtrack {not score album} (not in top 25 total album sales)
19 Beauty and the Beast 2017 (9 in album sales)
22 La La Land (11 in album sales)
Other soundtrack albums in the top 25 in total album sales that are not the top 25 in total consumption are the Guardians of the Galaxy Mix. Vol. 2 (ranked 8th) and Awesome Mix Vol. 1 (ranked 20) - I'm guessing because only a few songs are available for streaming, at least on Spotify.
Here's the consumption breakdown for Moana as an example of the dynamics of what's happening now.
AUDIO STREAMS: 410,715,430
SONG SALES: 1,498,589 (digital)
ALBUM SALES: 463,808 (physical + digital)
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So in terms of albums, CDs are still notably ahead of downloads -- interesting.
Yavar
It's about replacement vs. conversion. Digital purchases are declining because of the move of digital listening from personal collections to streaming, as well as the move towards mobile devices for most listening. (Especially since you can download thousands of tracks on your mobile device from your paid subscription.) So streaming is increasingly replacing digital ownership.
It's replacing physical ownership too, but much more slowly (thus the smaller percentage decline). Many people who prefer buying physical media do not want to convert to digital, and CDs do not have a viable replacement technology. (Vinyl clearly remains a tiny niche, and cassettes are a stunt driven by Guardians of the Galaxy.)
Of course, this is an oversimplification, as many people will move from one to another - physical media to personal digital collection to streaming. In my family, that's me, but both my wife and daughter have fully converted to streaming, both paid and free, and including YouTube.
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Always important to keep supply and demand in mind. Stores stopped selling CDs when too many people stopped buying CDs, not the other way around.
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Yes, people generally stopped buying CD's so stores stopped carrying them, but I should note even when stores had CD's, I probably made half a dozen purchases of CD's simply because they either didn't have what I wanted (or in some cases there was no release at all) or the price was too high. Nearly thirty dollars with taxes for a CD I could go to SAE and get cheaper or even more cheaply if a used copy.
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(Just bumping the thread.)
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Always important to keep supply and demand in mind. Stores stopped selling CDs when too many people stopped buying CDs, not the other way around.
People didn't stop buying CDs. They simply started buying them from Amazon where they cost half the price of those found in Tower Records, Borders, Best Buy, etc.
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It took a long time for Internet sales to have a major impact on retail. CD sales started going down long before that, and they are a tiny fraction of what they were at their peak in 2000. The key single factor was the arrival of iTunes and the market maturity of digital music sales and streaming. And, of course, illegal file sharing.
http://blog.thecurrent.org/2014/02/40-years-of-album-sales-data-in-one-handy-chart/
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Very-good news on digital a slump.. why it was ever introduced to us in the 1st place is questionable, quality, presentation, rubbish
A 2% drop on cds isn't a disaster, its half season so maybe it can boom, i will all ways fund a cd format, sometimes lp.
There is no digital slump. There is more digital listening than ever before. It is just that streaming has overtaken and is beginning to replace sales. There is no good news for CD sales here, which continues to decline every year, just at a lower rate.
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Posted: |
Jul 16, 2017 - 8:33 AM
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By: |
leagolfer
(Member)
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To put our collecting hobby into the context of overall music consumption, here are highlights from a report on music sales so far in 2017 from BuzzAngle Music as reported in Radio Ink.
The bottom line is that overall music consumption is up 10% because of internet streams. Audio streams reached nearly 180 billion in the first six months of the year, up 58% from the comparable period last year. Paid subscriptions accounted for nearly 79% of all audio streams.
Meanwhile, overall album sales were down 14% compared to 2016 (74 million in 2017 YTD* vs. 86 million in 2016 YTD). This is mostly because digital album sales were down 24%. Physical (CD) sales were down 2%, and vinyl grew by 20%. (Digital albums represent 46% of all album sales, CDs 53%, and vinyl 5%). Digital song sales were also down about 24%, with 313 million sales so far in 2017.
Here's a link to the full report: http://www.buzzanglemusic.com/.
*YTD = year to date
I only looked at your 1st post, down 14% on albums, no graphs, it says above, digital album down 24%. + digital songs down 24%. Cd physical down 2%. I read correctly, & I'm partly right digital is down on them stats over a physical cd.
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But you're skipping streaming, leagolfer. Digital is not down, as I've been saying, including in the first post. Streams, including paid streams, are way up. That's where most consumption is (and revenue), not in sales of any kind, digital or physical.
It's a brave new world, where for more and more people the behavior is changing from buying to paying for streams. Which is what the other posts in this thread describe and document.
One post does not a thread make! 
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Actually haven't been in a Best Buy in almost seven years. 
