The music industry is still losing out to internet pirates on a huge scale, with an estimated 95% of music available online being downloaded illegally.

… research carried out in 16 countries by the record industry body found that an estimated 40bn files were illegally shared in 2008. The report took responses from a number of consumer surveys over the last three years about downloading habits and compared them with the 2.3bn legitimate online tracks that were sold in 2008. It concluded that piracy rate last year was as high as 95%.

It is not easy to reconcile the IFPI results with the Music Ally claim that “In December 2007 the ratio of tracks obtained from file-sharing compared to tracks obtained as legal purchases on an ongoing basis was 4:1. In January 2009 the ratio had narrowed to just 2:1.” The study methodologies are different. The IFPI ratio given above is for downloads only and does not include tracks that are legally ripped from an owners CD collection. On the other hand, the IFPI ratio also ignores tracks ripped from shared CDs, shared USB flash drives, or nearby wireless transmission.

The survey may be worthwhile to indicate general trends. But I wouldn’t accept a single figure from the survey, and more than I’d believe a Washington D.C. resident who said they’d never driven beyond 65MPH on the Beltway.