Legal downloads pass 500,000 mark

Although sales of CDs have continued to fall in the UK, it looks as if the legal music download sector is beginning to bear fruit.

According to figures from the Official UK Charts Company released by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), half a million tracks have been downloaded from legal sites and services such as OD2 and internet service providers such as Tiscali and BT.

The BPI said the download market is growing at a steady but moderate rate, although it is still way behind that in the US. There, iTunes alone has sold more than 70 million songs through its online store in just over a year.

With UK CD sales for the first three months of this year 4.3 per cent down on the same period last year, the figures for legal downloads are seen as an important indication that peer-to-peer (P2P) sites may be beginning to lose their appeal for many.

"This is shaping up to be a breakthrough year for the music industry," said BPI chairman Peter Jamieson in a statement.

This time last year there were virtually no legal downloads, according to the BPI.

Most people used P2P sites such as Kazaa and Grokster to swap music files. This has led to a spate of lawsuits against P2P users in the US brought by the Recording Industry Association of America.