No Rock And Roll Fun

GERMAN SALES DROP SLOWS: The naughty German record market has started to behave more to the liking of the Music Industry - although sales fell, they were only 1.4 per cent down on levels a year ago; this compared with drops closer to 40 per cent last year. Naturally, this is all being put down to the "success" of harrying file sharers, although surely if file sharing had been responsible for the drop in sales, and that has been beaten, you'd expect sales returning to their former levels rather than just levelling off? The alternative analysis - that the music industry has managed to drive away large numbers of its customers by substandard product, cutting back the number of releases available, an insulting pricing structure and a total inability to grasp the changes in their own market brought about by new technology - seems to have been missed out of the report here.