Grey Power!
Published May 16, 2003
It seems there might be a gap in the market for a music download site for
the so called 'grey market' - because recent research shows that the over-45s are increasingly using the illegal peer-to-peer networks. Most legit music download sites have primarily targeted the youth and pop markets, but new research undertaken by Universal owned MP3.com suggests up to a quarter of music downloading is done by over 45s.
MP3.com's Leanne Sharman told reporters: "These are staggering statistics
and contradict the traditional thinking that teenagers are the largest consumers of music on the internet. This is good news for record labels and consumer brands because it shows consumers are retaining youthful interests as they grow older - effectively extending core marketing demographics."
Meanwhile some good news for the record labels over downloading - research
company Forrester reckons online downloads will be worth £900m by 2007. The
bad news - long delays in getting decent legit download services online means this year's download income is unlikely to be more than £17 million (and by current reckoning, a big proportion of that will probably come via Apple's new I-tunes service).
Forrester analyst Rebecca Jennings told reporters: "Recent announcements by
EMI and Apple show that after a slow start, major music and technology
companies are now taking the future of digital music seriously. While the US
market for legitimate music downloads is already off the starting blocks, the European market lagged. But over the next few years digital music delivery will ramp up."
Marty's band, Growing Old Disgracefully, can be found at: Disgraceful Music. His Cthulhu tales can be found at Temple of Dagon. 
- Grey Power!
- Published: May 16, 2003
- Type:
- Section: Music
- Filed Under: Music: News
- Writer: Marty Dodge
- Marty Dodge's BC Writer page
- Marty Dodge's personal site
- Spread the Word
- Like this article?
- Email this
Save to del.icio.us
Comments on this articleComments
Add your comment, speak your mind
(Or ping: http://blogcritics.org/mt/tb/5361)
One reason so many of us old farts are downloading music is because we feel somewhat cheated by the recording industry when they forced us go switch to CDs by discontinuing LPs. The biggest share of the songs I have downloaded are songs that I own or once owned on vinyl. When CDs first came out, they were twice the price of vinyl. We were told this was because they sound superior and last forever. We all know those were both lies. It feels good to pay the industry back for their greed with a little greed of my own.