Even more doom and gloom for the US music industry as another set of figures, this time from PricewaterhouseCoopers, show record sales continued to slide in 2002, and that the slumps last year were generally higher that in 2001. CD shipments, for example, were down 8.9% - they went down 6.4% in 2001. Total unit shipments (ie including other formats) were down 11.2% - they went down 10.3% in 2001. Total dollar value of CDs sold was down 6.7% after a 2.3% drop last year.
Needless to say the Recording Industry Association of America lay the blame with virtual and real world pirates – outgoing chairman Hilary Rosen: "A major cause of the decline in 2002 includes the ongoing problem on online and physical piracy. As we have seen piracy rise, we are responding aggressively online and have dramatically upped the activities of our Anti-Piracy Unit, increasing our seizures of counterfeit and pirate CDRs by 90% in 2002."
Piracy – especially bootlegged CD-R based piracy – definitely plays a part in declining sales and the increased action against the bootleggers by the RIAA and its sister organisations around the world (which has doubled in some places) should be welcomed. But, as reported ad infinitum, some in the industry feel the only way to overcome the doom and gloom longterm is for the record labels to find new income streams, and new ways of engaging with music fans other than through just CD sales.