while the major labels' price-fixing has drawn the attention of the government in the past and appears to have hurt sales, it seems that the record companies have compounded their misery by killing off the single.

both the RIAA's own numbers and comments from music retailers seem to indicate that the labels have been killing other formats to drive music purchases away from cheaper singles and towards the more expensive and profitable full-length CD.

the president of the National Association of Recording Merchandisers, Pam Horovitz told an audience:

"This lack of understanding of consumer needs is playing out in other strategic decisions as well. For example, we have been in a song driven marketplace for a number of years and yet the availability of singles continues to decline in what retailers believe is a frequently misguided attempt to drive CD sales. When there is no way for the consumer to purchase just the one song they want, why are we all surprised that they take advantage of the widely available alternative ñ which is a free copy from one of the various file sharing services?"

the RIAA's numbers support Ms Horovitz' argument: since 1997, shipments of CD singles have free-fallen from over 66 million units to 17 million -- they now represent less than one percent of the total dollar value of all CDs sold. had CD singles represented as much of the overall market as they did in 1997 (the peak of the format, with 66.7 million units shipped), the major labels might well have seen a modest increase in music sales compared to 2000, rather than a drop.

with the increasing evidence the evidence that a botched major-label money-grab of bad pricing and foolish product mixes was responsible for recorded music's woes, it becomes harder and harder to accept Big Content's party line that "the internet dunnit".