Alizée's music sales drop may not be as it seems

[ALS]

Here is an interesting chart on music sales from 1972-2012. How as a new media is introduces the older media loses it's luster and sales. As music transitioned from vinyl records to the cassette tape to CD's to digital down loads sales revenues also change. As the public has moved from the CD to the .99 cent single down load sales have dramatically increased. On the other hand they are virtually killing off the revenue generated by CD sales of the past. Also this new jump from CD's to digital downloads is also making pirated content easier to share.

Be sure to click the toggle between Units/Sales to see how much of a hit in revenues the industry has taken since 2,000. According to the chart sales are through the roof yet two thirds of the revenues are gone

CNN/technology/How iTunes crushed music sales

Looking at these two charts and it would have been almost impossible for Alizée to come anywhere close to the sales she had in 2000 and 2003 with her 2007 and 2010 releases. Her sales were not good but when you look at these two charts you realize they were not as bad as they appear.

Looking at these charts the only way today for an artist to make a good living, is by touring and the merchandising of their brand.

[Karin]

Originally Posted by ALS

Looking at these two charts and it would have been almost impossible for Alizée to come anywhere close to the sales she had in 2000 and 2003 with her 2007 and 2010 releases. Her sales were not good but when you look at these two charts you realize they were not as bad as they appear.

well... from what side of view you look... when we look back to Psychédélices, MJ and FS were digitally downloaded (legal) 2.000.000+ times together. So it wasnt so bad.

but in that time nobody looked on it, only physical medium, and the sales for it were low

[Euphoria]

Digital sales are where it's at. It's amazing to me how people on review sites only seem to report physical sales. That goes for everything. Music, video games, movies, TV shows, software, etc. Why buy something that is just going to take up extra space? I only really buy collector's editions now.

[Junkmale]

A lot of it is down to personal taste i would imagine.
I've never downloaded anything and doubt if i ever will.
For me it's just not the same. I will still buy vinyl over CD if i possibly can and the whole MP3 thing just doesn't appeal to me at all.
Maybe it's an age thing!

[qazws]

Sometimes with games a physical DVD got from Gamestop, say, is noticeably cheaper (eg the fairly iffy Simcity 5). Record do sell quite nicely packages albums for not much money, but almost always I just d/l to the phone from iTunes (even if the DRM does suck), like I did with 5.

[Ray4AJ]

Originally Posted by ALS

According to the chart sales are through the roof yet two thirds of the revenues are gone

Another thing I find curious is that physical sales dropped off before iTunes even started. Piracy? I'm thinking that if Apple hadn't made it so cheap and convenient for at least some music buyers that the industry would have disappeared already. I'd like to see the chart also show how many stolen downloads there are each year. I guess there is no real way to count that though.

[Rev]

Originally Posted by Ray4AJ

Another thing I find curious is that physical sales dropped off before iTunes even started....

You can thank Napster (first incarnation) for that.

[stevejackson]

yes indeed, piracy has killed the music industry and so has youtube..the sales drops are due to these reasons, the music is illegally downloaded and several countries.

[Rictor]

I think she's actually still very popular in France. This reporter interviewed me a few weeks ago (for uh...something that I don't want to talk about here) and she was from France. I asked her if Alizée is still popular or well known in France, and she said "yes! yes! She has a new album coming out..."

She promised me Alizée items when she got back, but so far nothing. Oh well. Hahaha.