One can’t help but note the interesting timing of this study. It should be noted though, that the study is showing what is happening in the United States. So the connection between Canada and the United States is purely hypothetical from looking at the numbers presented in this particular study (although countless studies have shown Canadian digital sales growth outperforming growth in the United States) but if there is a similar trend happening in Canada, no wonder the primary concerns from Canadians have to do with fair dealings and digital locks. We’re witnessing an industry who is pointing at their paying customers and screaming “illegal pirates!”

The NPD group study also suggests that Apple’s iTunes has a 25% market share in the digital music sales as well.

In fact, many who point to the digital revolution and say that it’s the future may find the comments by a vice president surprising as well.

“Many people are surprised that the CD is still the dominant music delivery format, given the attention to digital music and the shrinking retail footprint for physical products,” said Russ Crupnick, vice president of entertainment industry analysis “But with digital music sales growing at 15 to 20 percent, and CDs falling by an equal proportion, digital music sales will nearly equal CD sales by the end of 2010.”

The trend of moving from physical to digital is particularly evident, even if digital music buyers are still the minority:

CDs comprised 65 percent of all music sold in the first half of 2009 compared to paid digital downloads, which comprised 35 percent of music sales. By comparison, paid digital music downloads comprised just 20 percent of sales in 2007 – growing to 30 percent of the music market last year.

“The growth of legal digital music downloads, and Apple’s success in holding that market, has increased iTunes’s overall strength in the retail music category,” said Russ Crupnick, entertainment industry analyst for The NPD Group. “But the importance of the big box retailers shouldn’t be dismissed, as long as the majority of music consumers continue to buy CDs.”

Still, if in 2007, digital sales accounts for 20% of all sales, then in 2008, it accounts for 30%, then in 2009, it accounts for 35%, one wonders what the market will look like in, say, 2019. If the percentage goes up by 5% every year from now till then, that means 80% of music sold would be online download sales. Who knows what technology would bring us by then on top of it all provided copyright law doesn’t continue to prohibit innovation as seen in the RealDVD case.

Perhaps one of the concerns that record labels should address is how to market sales online to the public. Clearly physical sales is dominant, but it’s a very real possibility that this market domination of the physical CD won’t last forever if this study is anything to go by.

Have a tip? Want to contact the author? You can do so by sending a PM via the forums or via e-mail at drew@zeropaid.com.

According to the RIAA press release, the lawsuits went to the following:

The RIAA’s thirteenth wave of letters went to the following colleges this week: Boston University (35 pre-litigation settlement letters), Columbia University (50), Drexel University (33), Indiana University (40), North Carolina State University (35), Ohio State University (30), Purdue University (28), Tufts University (20), University of Maine System (32), University of New Hampshire (32), University of Southern California (50), and the University of Virginia (16).

The RIAA calls it a “deterrence” program. Of course, this is round 13 of lawsuits. The total number of lawsuits in this round is 401. So how does the RIAA feel about this deterrence program? That, interestingly enough, was also included in the press release.

“One year into our legal campaign, we’ve seen an emerging legal marketplace that would have struggled to gain traction were it not for our efforts to clamp down on online music theft,” said Cara Duckworth, Director of Communications, RIAA. “The exponential growth of illicit peer-to-peer has stabilized and music lovers know what they can and can’t do when getting music online. This has fostered a climate that helps music companies earn a fair return so that they can invest in the next generation of artists and new bands can have a shot at realizing a dream.”

The word ’stabilized’ may ring a bell to some who witnessed CEO Mitch Bainwol two years ago claiming that file-sharing was “contained”

Of course, there was a further warning in the press release:

“The future of music is brimming with innovation,” said Duckworth. “For those who choose to ignore all the content-rich alternatives and get music the wrong way, they run the risk of legal action, potential disciplinary enforcement from a university and crippling both their computer and the university network.

So, should students be nervous over downloading the latest 50 Cent album? For that, it may be best to consult the US consensus which has an interesting statistic (PDF) which says that in 2005 of the 2,675,000 students that completed high school, 68.6% enrolled in college. Simple math suggests that 1,835,050 students had enrolled in college. Roughly speaking, thats about a 0.22% chance of getting a pre-litigation lawsuit. This is only if all the lawsuits went to first year college students coming straight out of high school. Add the rest of the population and that chance would simply decrease to depict a more realistic scenario. While calculators seem to have difficulty calculating the actual number, the odds are also 1 in 4,576. The odds of getting 4/6 numbers in the Lotto 6/49 according to Wikipedia is 1 in 1,033. The odds of hitting three numbers in the PowerBall according to Wikipedia is 1 in 11,927.

So while the odds are relatively close together still, the admission from the RIAA that file-sharing has gone up since the last time they said the growth has stopped may strike many as interesting. Another interesting aspect is that last week, Oklahoma State handed over the names of alleged file-sharers. The campus doesn’t appear in this round of lawsuits just like the previous round of lawsuits.

The news of the current round of lawsuits come after the RIAA demanded that royalty rates for artists be lowered. The move has made many doubting the idea that the RIAA is suing music fans to help the artists careers.

digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/tech_news/RIAA_Filesharing_Growth_Has_Stabilized’;

ZeroPaid has already reported on the MPAAs error in a 2005 and also reported on the fact that the MPAA isn’t backing off of its attack. Despite faulty numbers, the congress in the house has passed the College Opportunity and Affordability Act of 2007 which contains the “Campus Digital Theft Prevention” requirement.

Interestingly enough, there is currently two versions of this act. There is the version introduced (H.R.4137.IH) in the house and one that was reported (H.R.4137.RH) in the house. The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) has reported that the senates version does not have the “Campus Digital Theft Prevention” requirement while the version that passed in congress has the requirement.

“The House and the Senate must meet “in conference” to reconcile differences in their respective versions of the same college funding bill, and the Senate’s version of the COAA does not contain the mandate for exploring alternative downloading services and network filters.” The EFF explained, “There’s still a chance that members of Congress involved in the conference process will see through the smoke and mirrors to stand up for students and universities in rejecting this unnecessary and dangerous mandate.”

“Short of appointing a copyright hall monitor for every dorm room,” The EFF commented earlier in The Washington Post, “there is no way digital copying will be meaningfully reduced. Technical efforts to block file-sharing will be met with clever countermeasures from sharp computer science majors. Even if students were completely cut off from the Internet, they would continue to copy CDs, swap hard drives and pool their laptops.”

Effectively speaking, the requirement has two provisions: the first is to block “unauthorized” traffic and the other provision gets colleges to push students to use “authorized” services like iTunes.

“Intellectual property theft costs over 140,000 American jobs each year — a significant loss in this volatile economy,” Dan Glickman, chairman of the MPAA told The Holleywood Reporter, “We are pleased that Congress is taking this important step toward helping us find ways to curb intellectual property theft on college campuses.”

While not in law yet, it’ll be interesting to see how the bill fairs in the senate, particularly when there is, in fact, two versions with big differences.

digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/tech_news/US_Congress_Passes_Anti_Campus_File_sharing_Requirements’;