What is the majority of sales in an industry and CNN declares it DEAD then you know what?

So for those of us that use Math, the current sales of prerecorded music by category is lead by none other than physical music and of that the CD is the majority of sales*

From the weekly Sales report of Soundscan a division of Nielson Entertainment, LLC it's pretty plain to see that despite the rumors of digital taking over the world it hasn't taking over half of the market, yet? And the CD is still very much alive.

I said "yet" because of something called  Manufacturing on Demand "MOD," and my company AltavozEntmt, under the leadership of Bobby Ekizian, pictured below,  is leading this new charge for pin pointing where a physical sale is desired; Now coupled with the ability to ingested the title into the AMPED and NARM EDI database.

The artists can now worry about generating fans that are BuyingThis(tm) and the indusrty parthers involved can use the clicks to pinpoint the bricks in Altavoz aptly named new service ClickstoBricksDistribution.com "C2BD" This capability has not been harnest to ensure that the whole supply chain from Fan to Retailers knows there is a some fan heat before they even have to make one physical copy.

This information for the fan backup the supply chain will also let the artists know that there is a potential to make 500 limited edition releases, sign them and sell them to their AltaFans for a healthy profit and everyone is happy.  The future is and I gotta wear em ....

The report of digital and physical demise of music is silly Forbes.

Recently Forbes weighed into the conversation about the state of our business publishing a story from Zack O'Malley Greenburg "Nielsen's Mid-Year Report Reveals Demise Of The Digital Download" in it he makes a couple of bold assertions about the state of the business which as the CEO of an Entertainment company I say ain't really the whole pictures.   The part about Digital download and how they are going to disappear, didn't we just hear that about CD's.  and that streaming is taking over the WORLD, please.

 I can point readers over to an article written by Jon Maples aptly called "The Value of Nothing: Don’t Accept Junk Food Streaming Music Numbers" and he presents some questions for the people that are thinking that streaming is chicken waffles tied to never ending money machine.  Cuz it Ain't. and I agree about that part and here is what I wrote about this subject back in January were I believe more of the tale of Digital is being played out think of it as it ain't your parents ipod anymore kids. 

However,  Jon and Zack and everyone else besides dozen distributors and the Gores Group don't seem to understand MATH.  

Physical is king ((((STILL))))) which any subscriber to Soundscan knows has been the story for the year and this last weeks report is no different with physical sales still being 2384 units of the 4,252 total sold or 56% of the pie.



Now how can something, namely physical sales of prerecorded music, be the majority of sales in it's category! Yet people keep writing it off?

Sure Vinyl is coming back. Considering I backed and released Music That Changes the World  Box set in 2011 and knew and wrote about vinyl back in 2009 when vinyl was .08 percent the pervious year sales those of us that are a VinylDistributor.com can attest yeah it's a great business; However, this number ((((1,015 number rung up from sales at Mass Merchants ))))) -- ain't vinyl --it's CD's and it shows that the big boys are still in the game and to play and win in this game you got to have the right equipment.

Unless they teach something new in Bschool today-- you still have to be where the markets are and for the life of me how 56.1 of it's ain't part of the market is akin to Bush's Voodoo Economics. Heres' a thought how would the US music business fair if writers like Jon and Zack looked at the whole picture ya know, not leaving out the majority of a market. Cuz to me this is either a lack of understanding of the business model or they have an agenda?

As well,  unless I've not gotten "the memo" the fans want music in many different ways and the cost of giving them what they want has never been cheaper;  So, until the bloggers and writers come to terms with the new world where things don't go away (( They maybe niche however on the internetwork nothing goes away since the cassette tape is coming back))  we're not going to see a real connection between the artists, fans and their music until the whole picture is put forth and then the fans can decide how they're BuyingThis.  Not the writers of words or their publishers.

Funny, This reminds me of a Sumerian text by Kabti-ilani-Marduk know as Erra Epos and in it is the saga of the premature advancement of the powers by Marduk (Ram or Aries) over that of Enlil (Bull or Taurus) and the need for proper measuring to ascertain whether the time had indeed come.   Which as it turns out then and now-- it had not.

The Minutes have come home to roosts.

Just saw this on HypeBot.com and have to say that this is something I've been saying was going to happen the moment that I saw the mobile business trying to come into the music business.  It was back in 2009 when I was at the San Degio MusicBiz.org NARM convention <digress I believe that year they where DigitalMusic.org or something like this,  It was and is this still very important convention, next one is in Nashville -- so buckle it up, /digress>  and I looked up from the 1st morning breakfast/main meeting to view a banner that said [Digital Mobile Physical] and shook my head knowing full well that to be mobile it has to be digital and that phone companies sell minutes not music.

We all know the kids were onto this right on the jump and they started side slotting and we've seen a retrenchment into established distribution channels it's either digital or physical and those few distributors didn't go away infact they are in strong position and phone companies are back to the job of selling minutes.

Everyone streaming service or digital startup that does not put this minutes vs entertainment is free mindset to bed because there is no free on mobile.  And IMHO this is why physical will always be an option that you buy and load it onto your phone. Hey we all know saying FU to the phone companies is just as fun and meaningful as it is to the Majors and never underestimate the power of those out that that want to do just that.... It's what I live to do everyday and the phone companies mind you live to bill all of us.