Napster died.. CDs sales went down.. Coincidence?

A new study done by the SoundScan sales-tracking firm says the overall record sales dipped almost 6% in this second quarter of 2001. Also: napster died this quarter... just a coincidence?

Coincidentally or not, Napster's star was on the rise in that second quarter of 2000, at a time when record sales were on the rise.

The recording industry, of course, sued Napster saying that the rogue music-exchange was stealing bread from its mouth by allowing consumers to get for free what record labels were selling at fairly premium prices. The industry now appears to have gotten the upper hand in court. The free version of Napster is out of service and it might remain that way until it reemerges as a subscription service.

So good questions can be asked... Was there a relationship between a healthy Napster and healthier record sales? And is there a correlation between flagging record sales and a dead or dying Napster? I think indeed Napster increased the whole music business. More music got to more people. But the relationship with CD sales... who knows.

Thanks to looser for pointing us to this article...

Source: Newsbytes