Apple’s iTunes Store still No. 1

Confirmation for Apple’s iTunes Store which is the first in the U.S. distributor of music.

Available since April 2003 across the Atlantic, iTunes Store has claimed its first billion music tracks downloaded in February 2006 to reach the second one billion almost a year later. DRM or not, the craze for iTunes Store has been increasing and several bars have been crossed, the 3 billion of securities sold worldwide in July 2007, 4 billion in February 2008 and most recently that of 5 billion during the month of last June for a rich catalogue of more than 8 million shares.

A study by NPD Group confirms the boom for iTunes Store that the USA is now number less now the first record.

In the first half of 2008, NPD Group gives the following ranking for the 5 largest sellers of music:
* ITunes
* Wal-Mart (Walmart, Walmart.com, Walmart Music Downloads)
* Best Buy (Best Buy, Bestbuy.com, Best Buy Digital Music Store)
* Amazon (Amazon.com, AmazonMP3.com)
* Target (Target and Target.com)
For NPD Group, this classification is the translation of the abandonment in the course of physical CD for the dematerialized music, which benefits the most to iTunes which should remain at the top for a long time. But NPD Group predicts a bright future for Amazon, which last year launched its platform for downloading music online with a major advantage, only to sell digital music without locks or DRM.

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