The
trend towards streaming continues to accelerate, which is good news for Musicians
who’ve made the switch to Streaming.
Downloads
is no longer necessary based on the Nielsen Stats comparing Music Sales within
the period January to June 2014 to the same period in 2013 as stated in my blog article entitled
“Nielsen
Stats record continued decline in Music Downloads - Developed World Streaming
will catch on in Developed World once we get 4G LTE”.
The
Streaming Category of Music includes the following services, which have
basically made Music into a utility where you get a la Carte Serving of songs streamed to your smartphone via 4G LTE:
1. Spotify
2. Apple's
Beats Music,
3. Pandora
4. Sirius
XM
5. Vevo
6. YouTube
According
to the RIAA stats as stated in “Streaming
Music swiping sales from Music downloads”, published September 26, 2014
11:27 AM PDT by Joan E. Solsman, CNET News,
for the first six (6) months of 2014:
1. 28%
increase in US revenue from Music Streaming Services
2. US$859
million compared to $673 million for the first six (6) months of 2013
3. 14%
decline in Physical Digital Music Purchases i.e. CD's DVD's
4. US$898
billion in sales from Physical Digital Music Purchases i.e. CD's DVD's
As
expected, Digital downloads saw a continued decline or the first six (6) months
of 2014 as predicted by Nielsen:
1. 12%
decline in digital Downloads
2. $1.3
billion in Revenue from Digital downloads
Streaming
seems to have started just in the nick of time. Steaming took up the slack for
the falling rate of Downloads. The contribution of Streaming has increased for
the first six (6) months of 2014:
1. US$2.2
billion of total Industry Revenue from Streaming, downloading and Physical
Digital Music Purchases i.e. CD's DVD's
2. 27%
of total Industry Revenue from Streaming
3. 20%
of total Industry Revenue from Streaming in first six (6) months of 2013
4. 28%
of total Industry Revenue from Physical Digital Music Purchases i.e. CD's DVD's
When
broken down by Services, their growth in the first six (6) months of 2014 is
even more dramatic:
1. 57%
increase in Spotify's Free version
2. US$165
million in revenue from Spotify's Free version
3. 23%
increase in Paid subscription services, like Spotify Premium, Rhapsody or Beats
Music
4. 7.8
million Subscriptions
5. 5.5
million subscriptions in the first six (6) months of 2013
RIAA Stats on Music
Streaming – 4G LTE and cheaper Cloud Storage means downloads extinct
With
4G LTE and lower prices for Cloud storage, a trend even the Apple iCloud is
finally following as noted in my blog article
entitled “US$19.99
1TB Cloud thanks to Apple iCloud Price Drop – Apple iCloud for Windows out to
counter Bad Press from Celebrity Hacking”, you can Stream your Music
whenever and wherever you are on your smartphone and Tablet. Similar stats from
the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry indicate that
streaming has benefits.
According
to their stats, Streaming has resulted in a 51% increase in streaming
subscription services, netting the Music Industry US$1 billion for the first
time in 2013. Streaming is not just a trend for Digital Audio but also Digital Video.
It
is the driving force behind the increasing popularity of Lyrics Videos as
stated in my blog
article entitled “YouTube
and the Lyrics Videos Trend - How Lyrics Videos ride the Streaming Trend as Musicians
Cash in on Sing-Along Craze”.
It’ll
continue to be the money-maker for the Music Industry until Americans and the
World get crazy about downloading again. The coming spread of high speed 4G LTE
to the Caribbean promises the possibility of VoLTE (Voice over LTE), which
heralds the advent of HD Audio and Video calling in Jamaica as noted in my blog article
entitled “Digicel
and LIME going VoLTE - Why GSM extinct
and Spectrum reused for M2M Services in HD Audio and Video Caribbean VoLTE-Age”
Streaming
over 4G LTE (Long Term Evolution), which is no different from listening to the
Radio, will gradually replace the need to download altogether.
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