Rock Band music sales close to early iPod music sales

MTV's Rock Band video game continues to fly off the shelves, but more importantly for the music industry the game resulted in more than 6 million song downloads since its launch on November 20, 2007. (Hypebot)

iTunes Competitors: We're Number 2! No, We're Number 2! (AMZN, AAPL)

Amazon's MP3 store, launched last fall, is now number two behind iTunes, says USA Today. No way, says eMusic CEO David Pakman: We're in second place -- just like we've always been! There's no way to actually referee the dispute, because USA Today isn't playing fair: It doesn't actually provide any sales or market share numbers for Amazon. Instead, Pakman says on his blog, reporter Jefferson Graham called the four major labels and asked them who their second biggest digital retailer was, and they said Amazon. (Silicon Alley Insider, USA Today)

Australian music sales fall 10 per cent

Rising digital sales failed to prevent Australia's music industry losing 10 per cent of its income last year. A 4 per cent slump in CD sales caused the worst damage, according to statistics from the Australian Record Industry Association. But last year was a good one for Australian artists, with 36 local albums featuring in the top 100 and four - by Silverchair, Powderfinger, The John Butler Trio and Missy Higgins - in the top 10. (News.com.au)

MTV: 'Rock Band' Song Purchases Double

MTV has revealed that more than 6 million songs have been purchased as new playable levels for the popular "Rock Band" video game—doubling the number of purchases as of just two months ago. In late January, MTV announced it had sold 2.5 million songs since the game's Nov. 20 release. The game now has more than 70 songs available for individual download. A new Rock Band Music Store feature will allow gamers to browse, preview and purchase tracks through an interface included in the game. (Billboard)

NIN: New Album Pulls In $1.6M In First Week

The online release of the new Nine Inch Nails album "Ghosts I-IV" resulted in just under 800,000 transactions in its first week, totaling $1.6 million in revenue, the band revealed. Orders include free and paid downloads, as well as online orders for physical products like various limited-edition vinyl releases, CDs, and a dual-CD box set. (Billboard)

Online, Mobile Percentages Keep Tilting at Majors

Just last month, top digital executives Ted Mico (Island Geffen A&M) and Thomas Hesse (Sony BMG) pointed to breakdowns of nearly 40 percent during discussions in New York. And earlier this week, Rio Caraeff, a top mobile and digital executive at Universal Music Group, offered more data. "Our mobile business is about half of our digital business, and our digital business is about 40-60 percent of our new releases," Caraeff told Digital Music News during the Mobile Monday symposium in Los Angeles. (Digital Music News)

Apple's iTunes Store Has Sold 4 Billion Tracks—But Is It Profitable?

The Cupertino, Calif.-based company announced it had sold its 2 billionth download Jan. 6, 2007; its 3 billionth July 31, 2007; and its 4th billion Feb. 27. As such, Billboard estimates that the store sold 1.7 billion downloads last year, and that of that amount, 940 million tracks were sold in the United States and 732 million were sold abroad, as the company operates stores in 21 other countries. (Billboard, MacDailyNews, Wired)

Charlatans Claim Success For ‘Giveaway’ Model

U.K. alternative rock band the Charlatans is claiming success for the “giveaway” approach taken with its new album, “You Cross My Path,” which the act says has been downloaded in its entirety more than 60,000 times since it was made available last Monday (March 3). The album is currently exclusively available free on the Web site of U.K. modern rock station Xfm’s website (www.xfm.co.uk). (Billboard)

$300 Version of NIN Album Sells Out; #1 on Amazon MP3

A $300, limited edition of 2,500 version of Nine Inch Nails' new album "Ghosts I-IV" has sold out from the band's website just a day after the album went on sale in various formats and was made available for limited free download. The band's publicist says that the $5 downloadable version of the album was also propelled to the top spot at the Amazon MP3 store, the only place it was available for purchase other than NIN.com. (Digital Media Wire)