Agreeing with Leibowitz on this point, it would appear that the diminishment
of the CD as a necessary component of the conspicuous consumption process it
once occupied even one generation ago is likely due to a whole host of
economic and sociological factors.

Per the RIAA's own figures, this has been a ten-year trend for genexters who
simply no longer purchase these goods the way their parents and grandparents
did from the '50s thru the '80s.

Read that sentence again.

This has not only been going on for a long time - at least a half-decade before the MP3 was a glimmer - but the RIAA has seen it coming all along. Why do you think the industry shifted to teeny pop five years ago? (Answer: In order to re-introduce the centrality of the record-buying experience to the subsequent generation whose malleability was in equal proportion to their lack of - shall we say - critical judgement.)

With that knowledge and broader perspective, the rise of digital network services - the very *appeal* of them - as a replacement to CD purchases can
be rationally argued as symptomatic rather than causative of the market shift, driven (as it always is) by the never-ending demographic change and a fascination with 'the new', whatever that may be - PS2 or P2P or DVD-RW.

Seriously.