If you need another proof that download sales are declining steadily as music lovers increasingly rent their music rather than buy it, here's one.
Spotify's head of label relations in Europe, Kevin Brown, revealed last week to an industry outlet that his company is earning more cash across Continental Europe from sales of music subscriptions than iTunes does by selling individual song and album downloads.
As a reference, iTunes back in the summer of 2004 enjoyed a commanding 62 percent share of European music sales.
But having added more than a million active users in the United Kingdom alone in the last four months, Spotify seems poised to beat iTunes. Small wonder Brown is adamant that it's only "a matter of time" before the Swedish startup overtakes Apple's digital music store in Europe in terms of revenue.
Why isn't Apple doing something about it? Doesn't the firm see the signs on the wall already? Didn't Tim Cook and Co. get the memo that music downloads are dying a slow death? Read on...