I'm sorry to see Borders selection diminishing! In retrospect, I've probably contributed to the problem. Of the approximately 180 CD's I bought last year, only about 30 of them were from Borders. I'm sure there are lots of folks like me who predominantly purchase music CD's through online channels, often directly from artists themselves. I'm sure that's the main issue for Borders, not so much the emerging market for downloads (dominated by iTunes).
Regarding downloads, I don't think Borders ever had the youth market. The kids never seemed to buy their CD's at Borders where I live, they were buying them at the mall CD stores. Most of the teens in my life have iPods full of downloads, and haven't bought a CD in years. So the cutback is more likely to be a response to loss of business among traditional Borders customers, rather than new customers they never had.
Not that I'm representative, but I know I'm buying more music than ever. So far, electronic music storage hasn't reduced my purchasing of CD's. After a Christmas bonus, I invested in a ModWright Transporter, and my music listening has been accelerated! It's the best digital I've heard in my system, and I've had some fairly high-end CD players from Resolution Audio, Musical Fidelity, McIntosh, and Lector. It's been an encouragement to me to buy even more CD's, whereas the majority of my listening used to be vinyl. Not that my case is typical: how many people are only now discovering CD's can be high quality, like me? Talk about the tail of the curve!.
Anyway, IMHO High res digital downloads are still just a wish, for the most part--at least I haven't found much music to buy that I want. Also, despite having ripped over 1,000 CD's to hard disk, I still like to have the insurance of the CD as an archival medium. I'd love to see my favorite music via high-res downloads, but I still like to have the CD too. Maybe I just don't want to believe that people can really live with MP3 quality for all their music??
A long-winded way of saying I think it's the internet CD business, not electronic downloads that's killing the Borders business.
Regarding downloads, I don't think Borders ever had the youth market. The kids never seemed to buy their CD's at Borders where I live, they were buying them at the mall CD stores. Most of the teens in my life have iPods full of downloads, and haven't bought a CD in years. So the cutback is more likely to be a response to loss of business among traditional Borders customers, rather than new customers they never had.
Not that I'm representative, but I know I'm buying more music than ever. So far, electronic music storage hasn't reduced my purchasing of CD's. After a Christmas bonus, I invested in a ModWright Transporter, and my music listening has been accelerated! It's the best digital I've heard in my system, and I've had some fairly high-end CD players from Resolution Audio, Musical Fidelity, McIntosh, and Lector. It's been an encouragement to me to buy even more CD's, whereas the majority of my listening used to be vinyl. Not that my case is typical: how many people are only now discovering CD's can be high quality, like me? Talk about the tail of the curve!.
Anyway, IMHO High res digital downloads are still just a wish, for the most part--at least I haven't found much music to buy that I want. Also, despite having ripped over 1,000 CD's to hard disk, I still like to have the insurance of the CD as an archival medium. I'd love to see my favorite music via high-res downloads, but I still like to have the CD too. Maybe I just don't want to believe that people can really live with MP3 quality for all their music??
A long-winded way of saying I think it's the internet CD business, not electronic downloads that's killing the Borders business.