iTunes now 25p of US Music

Exactly one quarter of all music sold in the US now comes from iTunes, the NPD Group said today. Its portion of the market for the first half of 2009 is up from 21 percent in 2008 and represents 69 percent of the digital-only market. By comparison, Walmart now has just 14 percent of all music while Best Buy claims third place with an unspecified amount. In digital, Amazon MP3 is a distant second with just 8 percent of the market.

The researchers add that downloaded music still represents a minority of all music sales in the US at 35 percent but that it's growing quickly enough for Internet sales to match CDs in volume by the end of 2010. Physical sales are still led by Walmart (20 percent), with Best Buy second (16 percent) and both Amazon and Target tied for third (10 percent).

Apple's lead suggests relatively little progress for Amazon and that removing copy protection at other stores has had little impact on driving customers to competitors. Labels like Universal are known to have consiously withheld DRM-free songs from iTunes from late 2007 onwards in an attempt to reduce the effect of the iPod designer's "golden handcuffs" but gradually relented to where all iTunes songs were no longer restricted by April of this year. In exchange, however, Apple, Amazon, Walmart and others all agreed to institute variable song pricing that charges more for newer or very popular tracks.

By Electronista Staff