Sales Statistics

Recently, I've seen variations on this same tune played in all the major media outlets:

Subject: article: Online Sales of Recorded Music Down in 2002-Survey

"http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=768&e=1&cid=769&u=/nm/20021104/music_nm/media_onlinemusic_dc"
No, I do NOT want to link to that crap (viz).

A shorter version of this same article, naming only comScore [sic?] appeared on the front page of the new "Red Streak", an ink-still-wet spin-off from the Chicago Sun-Times yesterday, ripped straight from the AP wire, near as I can tell.

What pissed me off most?

Why do they claim sales fell 25% after surveying ONLY the major labels?!

The *SAME* major labels that IGNORED the Internet for most of a decade, hoping it would just "go away."

Why do publishers/reporters repeat this crap as if it were true?

Did they bother to check indie sales AT ALL?

Wanna bet on it?

Hey Derek (CDBaby) -- Did they even bother to contact you, the largest Indie on-line retailer?

The AP article even claims (and I quote!) "There are legitimate ways to buy downloads online, supported by the music industry. But with no figures released from those sites, it is hard to guage their popularity."

Hey, I'll give you figures:
http://cdbaby.org/stories/02/06/04/5349389.html

You know what's not being published? *YOUR* Sales. You know why? It wouldn't fit in with the Major Label agenda to wipe you off the face of the Internet, and Indie artists are hardly making any noise about it.

INDIE ARTISTS: Your livelihood, and the very freedom to promote/sell YOUR music in a Free (Fair) Market, that the Internet brings you, is being taken out, piece by piece by the Major Label spin doctors, folks. Move your ass, or go down the tubes.

I may sound like an idiot now, Chicken Little talking about the sky falling in -- But look around you:

• Seen mp3.com lately? Nothing on the front page but Major Label kiss-ass. That's the same company that received millions of click-throughs from Indie artists, changed the "rules" every few months, and now that they are "famous" has all but ABANDONED you, the little people.
• Keep hearing about CD Sales being "down"? Are *YOUR* Sales down? Other Indie Artists you know? Are you even being COUNTED?
• Every time you turn around, some new Congressional (or worse, a loose cannon like the Copyright Office) is making up some new law that FAVORS the incumbent Major Label, and takes away one more bit of your chances.

In a country where we spend zillions to hold elections to choose between two (*) indistinguishable crooks, the Press and Pollsters of CD Sales can't even be bothered to count the Indie artists?!

(*) If you're lucky -- half of today's Chicago races didn't even bother to put a Republican, much less an Independent, pol on the punch-card. Not that I would have voted for the Republican anyway, but they could have at least TRIED to make it look good. Jeez, put Mickey Mouse on there or something, okay?

Mark my words -- If this pace keeps up, in a handful of years, you'll be bemoaning the state of the Internet just like you do commercial radio right now.

If you have *ANY* reporter friends, tell them to dig deeper into these "stories." The TRUTH, I'll bet, is that Indie artists are taking the Majors to the cleaners on Sales figures.

Didn't Gartner or somebody publish such stats within the last year? How hard could it be to dig that out and at least pretend to be fair?