iTunes has passed Walmart to become the biggest distributor of music, period. It’s the number one digital distributor and the number one overall distributor. Big stuff.

iTunes accounts for 19% of all the music sold today, compared to Walmart’s 15%. The next closest digital distributor is Rhapsody, with 1% (although Amazon is at 6%, but that’s a combination of digital and physical CD sales). Digital downloads, in general, account for 30% of all music sold.

Interesting and telling stat: 48% of teenagers didn’t buy a single CD last year. I think that’s only going to increase and digital sales will become one of the only ways to buy music (unless you buy a CD/memory stick/some-new-format directly from the band at a show).

I think the next thing will be artists selling download cards at shows instead of discs. I’ve been toying with the idea myself. It just seems to make so much more sense, ya know? The fan buys the card for the same amount as a CD or an album download, they go home, load up iTunes/Amazon/artist’s site/wherever and put in their claim code. They can then download the album, maybe in their choice of formats – depending on the site, and load it wherever they please. CDs are bulky, take up more space than the download cards, they break easily, and then are only used to rip MP3s into a computer and are now a pain for the fan to store. So skip a step and sell them a download in person. Autograph the card and the fan has a cool keepsake.