ROYAL MAIL ENCOURAGE DOWNLOADS

Apart from helping flog a few extra Sam Cooke compilations through the choice of You Send Me as the theme for their campaign, what effect will the Royal Mail's greedy attempts to grab a few extra pennies from odd-shaped packages have on the music industry?

Making CDs less attractive to send, as today's Sunday Mirror "investigation" points out ('investigation' is a bit of a posh term for what seems to have been little more than getting a new price list and a pair of scales):

A Jiffy bag with three DVDs will now be classed as a packet and cost £1.27 to send first class, compared with 99p under the old charges, while a paperback book will cost £1.70 compared with £1.14.

In other words, it's going to push up prices, just slightly, but significantly, for bands using jiffy bags to send out their demos, and for people attempting to sell CDs to fans. It might only be a few pence, but it's a powerful disincentive to the sale of physical product for online shoppers. Is it really a wise move for the Post Office to be encouraging people to download instead?

music royal mail sam cooke