iTunes For The Win

Big news; Ars Technica is reporting that Apple is the number one music retailer in the United States:

The news was announced in an e-mail sent this afternoon to some Apple employees, a copy of which was seen by Ars Technica. It includes a screenshot of an Excel file showing the top ten music retailers in the US for January 2008, and Apple is at the top of the list. The iTunes Store leads the pack with 19 percent, Wal-Mart (which includes the brick-and-mortar stores as well as its online properties) is second with 15 percent, and Best Buy is third with 13 percent. Amazon is a distant fourth at 6 percent, trailed by the likes of Borders, Circuit City, and Barnes & Noble. Rhapsody is in the tenth slot with 1 percent.

Wow. Take a look at those numbers – for every five songs sold nationally, one is bought on iTunes. Not bad for a store that didn't exist five years ago.

To my mind, this just goes to show how the old media business models are in upheaval; this is a lead Apple may not be able to keep up in the long term, but the days of the RIAA's hegemony are over. Hollywood faces the same challenges, and the next decade will feature a lot of similar rises and falls before the market figures out a new structure it can support.

Either way, NBC-Universal had better get back on iTunes!

Apple backs the news it up with a press release of their own.