The Future of the Digital Content Revolution

More on what I think lies ahead in the recorded-music business. Don't miss the first part of this column.

2. The album, per se, is dead; singles will rule. For years, you and I have been buying pop albums with one or two tunes we really want, and eight to 10 pieces of filler. Those days are over. And because there is no workable model for ongoing sales of singles at retail -- delivering a physical disc of some sort to the buyer -- this means that recorded-music sales are going to undergo a tectonic shift toward electronic sale by download.

At about 75 cents per cut, this could work. At the $1-plus prices being talked about in record-company boardrooms, it just collapses. (Note that because we still have problems making "micro-payments" economically viable -- the ability to sell things over the Web for less than a dollar, without transaction costs eating up most of the revenue -- there are problems to be solved here beyond sustainable per-item pricing.) ...