Not too long ago, last year in fact, digital music sales (streaming and downloads) surpassed those of it’s physical counterparts in CDs and Vinyl. This was the biggest shift since CDs ripped the throne from Cassette Tapes back in the 80’s. Now there’s a new form of music consumption that has taken the place at the top of the mountain and that is music streaming.

Though close music streaming hasn’t quite yet beaten digital sales but has overtaken all physical media on it’s way to crowning itself the new king of the industry. Streaming is clearly the worlds preferred way of listening to music but with it’s freemium models abound it doesn’t garner the same revenue as full sales, which is all the more reason to be impressed with streaming revenue reaching $1-billion dollars for the first time ever.

Courtesy of RIAA
Courtesy of RIAA

It has been a massive year for streaming with the introductions of massive players such as Tidal and Apple Music adding to the giant streaming landscape. The important thing to note here is the clear shift taken by already giant companies in the music industry towards music streaming. Companies such as Google, Apple and Amazon who all already featured successful digital music stores have taken the leap into streaming, evidence that the industry acknowledges the prevalence of streaming in our current age of music consumption.

The primary concern with music lovers in the increasing moves towards streaming is the inability to collect your music and properly own it as you could before. Though there are still innumerable CDs and Vinyl’s out there could the advent and success of streaming be the end of prideful, hard-earned music collections? Probably not, at least for a while as CDs alone sold $6.83 billion worth of product just last year. Though as streaming rises while all other formats slowly fall the end of physical media could be at hand.

Would you miss music in it’s physical form? Let us know below.