RIAA hands out awards for most popular legal downloads

GristyMcFisty used our news submit to tell us about a story he saw detailing a recent gala event in which awards were presented to those that enjoyed the greatest success with legal online downloads. OutKast, who sold 400,000 copies of 'Hey Ya!', won a multi-platinum gong. Other platinum winners were D12, Maroon 5 and Hoobastank. The list of gold winners included Beyonce, Black-Eyed Peas and Usher. 

This would be fine and dandy except for one thing, the organization that was handing out the gongs was non other than the Internet communities public enemy number one, the RIAA. Kind of makes you queasy inside. I gues they have to do something besides sue people all the time.

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) - better known these days for pursuing digital music swappers - honoured sales of digital music last night with an awards ceremony.The digital market is only a tiny percentage of the massive revenues generated from the sales of CDs. But the burgeoning market in paid-for downloads, led by Apple"s iTunes, is fast gaining momentum and is seen as a lifeline to a music industry that feels it"s under threat from the file swappers.

Last July, the RIAA announced that it had embraced the legal download industry and therefore created the digital download program. In order to be recognised, certified sales of 100,000 singles earn a Gold award, 200,000 downloaded singles take Platinum. Multi-platinum awards are presented at the 400,000 level and increase in increments of 200,000.

Source: PC Pro