I have not purchased a CD since I was 19, some 10 years ago. Digital music is just so much more convenient and awesome, even if the quality is sometimes quite inferior. I love my rockboxed Sansa E280R too! Best MP3 player ever

did they actually need to make a study to prove this?!! like wow.

What?? They are still selling musics on CDs??

I don't buy music CDs for nearly 10 years already..

Hmm.. I have bought about $15 worth of digital music and the rest in CDs (guesstimate $250) majority used CDs. You know why? CDs are so much cheaper than digital and you get the hardcopy/"collectors value."

Maybe if digital's cost got slashed by 75% I might buy more. Or if there was a better distribution model (sell you the album jacket with a blank CD and code to go download a high-fidelity version AND mp3)

I have not bought one cent worth of digital download music. I always question the quality. I only use iTunes and Amazon to preview a CD and if I like the rest of the disc I buy it. Then I get to choose how I listen to my music and what format and compression to use if any. I will most likely be buying my first PMP for myself when the ZuneHD arrives.

You're kidding right? CDs are ANYTHING but cheap. I can STILL count on a single hand the number of CDs that I bought in the past that had enough tracks on it that I liked to warrant paying the price tag. Not to mention the number of CDs that were utterly destroyed by pets, kids, or just long term exposure in car (and no, not directly to sunlight).

You want tracks to be 25 cents?? CDs sell for like 10$, that's about 9 tracks taxes in. When was the last time anyone here bought a CD and they liked over 9 tracks on the CD??

I haven't purchased a CD in 6+ years. Why would I spent $14 on a CD that has two or three songs I'll listen to when I can get those two or three songs for $2-$3.

I buy a CD for no more than $8 (if you include shipping) unless its a brand new must have CD from a favorite band (only one favorite band is still alive)

I have about 40, $250 worth, CDs. A modest collection for sure, but compare it to my digital purchases. Choose any of the 40 CDs from my collection and I would be happy to listen to it a few times through without skipping a single track. The CDs I buy are because I like the band and the album. The $15 I've spent on digital are the must have singles or whatever that I dont already have. None of my CDs have been destroyed, I keep them in a CD rack at home or in a CD book in the car.

I would be happy with tracks being maybe about $.50. A digital track just doesn't have the same cost or value as a CD track. It's lower quality and a hell of a lot cheaper to sell (no CD to burn onto, no need to work with stores to distribute, to physical delivery needed, etc.)

And once again, every CD I have I like the vast majority of the tracks.

dechy,

The last two Green Day albums, Silversun Pickups - Swoon, Tool - 10,000 Days, Dido - Safe Trip Home, John Fogerty - The Long Road Home Concert. There are others I can't think of right now.

There are some good complete albums out there.

Yikes! I remember when CDs did this to vinyl. Back then, I would buy an LP once a week (they were real cheap ~$4) and swap/tape friends albums like baseball cards. This was the era when 10 million copies sold were not uncommon because of this "piracy." Then, in the mid 80's, the record companies got greedy and jacked up the prices to $12 for CDs that were 75% cheaper to make than vinyl. I stopped trading but I also stopped buying (1 cd/yr since). That's why the record companies have been slowly dying and there are so few new artists appearing every year. By focusing on minimizing their costs, (i.e., fewer artists at highest possible sale price) instead of maximizing sales (many artists, low price, highest possible volume) the labels set themselves up to fail. Hopefully, this transition can restore the balance for new bands and music to re-emerge.

When digital music is of the same QUALITY as a CD, then i'll be joining the bandwagon too. Codecs are getting better, but I can still tell the difference between CD and MP3.

But until then, i'll stick with uncompressed, unfiltered and unmodified CD and DVD music.

I love me some cd's. Whether you can hear it or not I like having a high quality source.

Also a hard copy is nice. Oddly enough I use steam and hardly even buy games in disc form but music is different, long live the physical media.

I'll stick with CD's. Better sound quality than the compressed formats such as MP3 or itunes. Even if you have uncompressed digital media on a hard drive it tends to degrade slightly over time. Factory pressed CD's are much more stable.

Pre-RIAA extortion, I used to buy CDs - but mainly through used sources. There is something about finding a treasure you enjoy in a bin of junk. I only bought albums I know I enjoy new (usually via friends who had them).

While you may knock all the tracks on a CD (yes, some of them really suck), it is one way explore new music. Also, taking a gamble on a $2 used CD is another good way.

I guess my concern with digital music is how people find their music - do they buy what they hear on the radio? What sounded cool in an advertisement? Only what their friends are listening to? Would you ever buy a $0.99 song just for the heck of it to see if you like it?

My other concern is what do I own when I buy digitally - do I get to migrate it to my new computer or mp3 player? Am I locked into only using specific licensed devices? Can the company come in and revoke my license and delete my file? Of course, with the RIAA claiming that they are unsure that ripping CDs is legal, it was another reason for me to avoid music.

So where do I get my music now? I don't listen to much any more - but on the rare occasions I do, I go see local bands and then pick up a copy of their home-burned CDs that they sell if I like the music. Otherwise, I tune in Wisconsin Public Radio, tune in the classical radio station, or pick up a book and read.

I have NEVER purchased a song from ITunes and I NEVER WILL I own all my CD's nearly 1300 of them all Ripp'ed to FLAC & MP3 on the first day of purchase stored on my archive drive and the CD's are boxed up and never played I always burn my own MP3 mix Cd's and Job's and Woz can KMA I don't own any Apple Items I don't run any apple Software and I like it just fine that way. I have a 120Gb Empeg unit in my Truck loaded with about 22k tracks I am happy as a clam just the way I am.

haha no doubt... this study was completed by Captain Obvious.

It's called discography... search it in a torrent tracker. ive got 100's of gigs of music.

i have no intention of ever just owning digital copies of music and films.
NO WAY EVER !!!!
i will buy physical films,music,and books.
and i never buy any music from any RIAA LABELS/BANDS and most films i buy are used as i hate the MPAA as well.

I prefer to purchase CDs for the artwork as well as the quality. MP3's are convenient for on the go when your MP3 player space is limited but at home with my 2 1TB hard drives, I expect the highest quality I get.

wow, two articles in a row read:
"Digital Music Rising; CDs On The Way Out"
"iPhone is Most Popular Camera on Flickr"

thanks apple, for destroying the quality of music and now photography.

Let me give you a musician's standpoint on the matter. Digital music is a god send! No longer are we at the mercy of a record label to distribute the music. Thanks to sites like MySpace, iTunes, Amazon, etc, I now have a voice. You have the opportunity to purchase music directly from the artist with NO label interference whatsoever. Yes I prefer to have the physical cd in my hands but why are cd's still costing us >$10? My friend and I produced pressed 1000 cd's (no cd-r's) for $1200. That's $1.20 a cd! And that's not a company like Sony that can produce their own product at MUCH lower cost per disc. But even the $1.20 argument, you mean to tell me that 80% of the cost of a cd goes into distribution?? Come on. The music industry must die and artists must be able to sell their own music for their own profit.

I am going to look at this from a technical standpoint. First, I still have a record player, and even though DSP on CD players has gotten really good in the recent years, Many CD's by default have an un-natural "tinny" sound to them without the DSP processing.
Second, since digital recordings use bits, and are not a continuous like analog recordings, bit rate makes a difference in the quality when listening to MP3's
a MP3 recorded at 320 Kbit/s, while it may sound good, really is not what would be called a high quality digital recording. And this junk that ITunes, and other online stores are selling for $0.99 per song for a 96 Kbit or 128kit mp3 is a rip off. It shows how naive people really are.
People want mp3's to save space over conventional wav files or other lossless formats. If an mp3 is to have the full quality of a cd, then each track will be 40-100mb each and have a bit rate of 640 Kbit/s or 1280Kbit/s and you will need a 1000mb (1TB) mp3 player to have any sort of mp3 collection.
I am actually waiting for Blu Ray Audio Disc's with 7 or 10 channel audio at super high bit rates, they are around the corner, and the RIAA will institute their typical price fixing as they did with CD's.

I think everyone agrees with you, our major gripe is only being able to get 128kbps mp3s from stores. if we could get wavs or flacs we'd be all for it! I for one just immediately rip all my CDs to flacs anyway.

When I can just here about a band, type it into google, be directed to the band's site, and buy non lossy compressed CD quality (or better!) tracks directly from the band with GOOD drm, that doesn't hinder the user from creating backups or playing the track on different devices (i'm sure its possible). THEN I will be all for digital distro. Then it will be a God send.

I'm a casual music listener, but I do appreciate audio quality. I must say that at 192kbps my music sounds fine coming through my home theater system. I can tell the difference between 192kbps and 320kbps..but only if I really focus on listening to the high instruments. I usually listen to music while at my computer or in my car, in these situations I've never noticed the difference...some of my music is even 128kbps!

I suppose if I were a musician who devoted many hours a week to purely listening to music I might be more concerned with the quality of my music.

I think iTunes should offer an option to download tracks in high-quality at no extra charge, the default would be 128kbps but if you're really after quality you should be able to change your preference to 320kbps...maybe even lossless (though that may increase opperating costs due to bandwidth). This would entice more people from the audiophile demographic to use their service and therefore increase their profit as well as reputation.

When companies will start offering a choice of downloading high definition quality music 24-bit 192Khz or original master quality in open/lossless format. Then it will be the end of CDs for sure. Until then, I don't think so.

Amazon's MP3's FTW

BTW, Amazon sells tracks at 256kbps. I don't know why the complaints about the quality of digital tracks. It's not like CD's aren't uncompressed either.

You are obviously confusing dynamic compression with lossy compression. CDs are (by definition) 44.1kHz sample rate, 2 channel, 16 bit per sample, i.e. 1411.2kbps.

Anyway, currently I remain a purchaser of CDs and shun the online lossy download services. Until I can download in a lossless format (open source of course, without any form of restrictive DRM) I will not be changing my purchasing policy (my archiving method is identical to Belezeebub above).

If iTunes started to sell non-DRMed flacs I would start buying from them.

the only medium i'll pay for music is vinyl. i don't even care if the album was recorded digitially prior to pressing.. i just love the warm sound.

There's a band called King Crimson and they have the right model. You can get a high quality mp3 or for a little bit more, you can buy the FLAC version. Honestly, a properly encoded 256K MP3 or 160K MP4 is pretty darn near cd quality. Most online vendors are selling their MP3's at higher bitrates. I record my own tracks in 24 bit/48K and I can hear the difference when I dither down to 16 bit/44K (cd). So to call a CD a pure format no longer holds water.

Just my two cents