As we observe the rapid changes the Internet is causing in the world of music, it is also interesting (and perhaps a bit frightening) to reflect on what Jacques Attali wrote about the role of music in anticipating social change in his influential book Noise (1977):

Music is prophecy. Its styles and economic organization are ahead of the rest of society because it explores, much faster than material reality can, the entire range of possibilities in a given code. It makes audible the new world that will gradually become visible, that will impose itself and regulate the order of things; it is not only the image of things, but the transcending of the everyday, the herald of the future (Attali, p. 11). In an email, VON SEGGERN also adds:

Although I don't have the numbers to prove it, my guess is that the
teenybopper top 40 acts (Britney, 'N Sync, Eminem, etc.) are suffering the most, if anybody is, for a few reasons:

1 their fans are young and have less disposable income for CDs.
2 young people are also most likely to have the technical savvy to download music.
3 Britney Spears fans are less likely to care about the low audio fidelity of her recordings than, say, Miles Davis fans, and thus would care less about buying the CD to get a high-quality copy of the music.

If I'm right, my reading of this situation is that the big pop artists like Britney — the main income earners of the industry as it is currently structured — stand to lose a lot, while independent music stand to gain a lot from the increasing opportunities for cheap promotion and exposure that the Internet provides. In my mind, this is what explains a lot of the resistance the majors have put up to new business models, new distribution methods, etc...

I am amazed that the mainstream media, such as Krueger in the NY Times and Reuters as discussed here, seem to buy without question the music industry's position that downloading has had an unambiguous negative effect on record sales when there is so much evidence to the contrary, or at least to muddy the waters.

UPDATE
Check out Jim Schwab's thoughts on the realities of downloading:

That's the real consumer power of "try and buy." If it sucks, then it gets penalized by try and buy. If it is good, it benefits. I see music try and buy as very similiar to those publishers who send you a book with a "30 day money back guarantee." Obviously, you have enough time to read the book, then send it back. However, if you read the book and like it, do you send it back? I don't. I send them a check back.

I know my decline in music purchases has been for two reasons:

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