Global music sales are presently around $US 37 billion, however there are indications that physical music sales - predominantly compact discs (CD's), mini discs (MD's), cassettes and vinyl - have reached a state of market saturation,

... Introduction Global music sales are presently around $US 37 billion, however there are indications that physical music sales - predominantly compact discs (CD's), mini discs (MD's), cassettes and vinyl - have reached a state of market saturation, and may even be declining for some music formats. For example, Diebold, a leading German management and technology consultancy company, observed that global music sales fell from $41.5 billion in 1995 to $38.5 billion in 1999 (1). This decline is possibly because of the increase in Internet users worldwide and the creation of MP3's and companies such as Napster. Understandably, these research findings raise concerns about the future of music as a product, particularly with regard to youngsters, whose future music purchasing habits are being influenced by the availability of free music over the Internet. Offsetting these concerns about the future of music, as a product is the fact that delivery of music over the

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