Maybe if the David Bowie song continues selling then the OCC may have a rethink because at the end of the day the song is still being paid for as an individual download with the purchase price removed from the cost of the album once it's available something many of use do throughout the course of the year when we use the iTunes 'Complete My Album' option the only real difference is that the record company are manipulating which song you can instantly download but they have manipulated the charts since they began anyway :lol:

 

If this had of been made available as a single then I'm sure it would have had an horrific chart run and I'm sure the record company would rather flog thousands of Bowie album downloads for £11 rather than the same amount of a 99p single.

I think when people do the complete my album thing they credit an album sale but lose a single sale (as they have "returned" it much like what happens if you returned a CD to a shop). Sure I remember MW talking about it b4 as something had a weeks negative sales as a result. If that were the case with these album pre-orders a single could chart at no1 on the first week then when the album came out say the following week it could disappear from the chart completely and lose all/most the sales which actually made it no1 the previous week. To me, that would seem a very unjustified no1!

 

Aside from that shame on you David Bowie for making your song iTunes only and not giving consumers more choice. Interestingly I don't think other digital retailers have a "complete my album" type function so it is an iTunes type issue. Also to track sales of the album preorder vs an individual track download wouldn't they need to have separate catalogue numbers from the record company or wouldn't it rely on iTunes arranging to count them separately rather than it being the OCC neglecting to? It may not be their issue - maybe they genuinely can't separate it the way things stand

I think when people do the complete my album thing they credit an album sale but lose a single sale (as they have "returned" it much like what happens if you returned a CD to a shop). Sure I remember MW talking about it b4 as something had a weeks negative sales as a result. If that were the case with these album pre-orders a single could chart at no1 on the first week then when the album came out say the following week it could disappear from the chart completely and lose all/most the sales which actually made it no1 the previous week. To me, that would seem a very unjustified no1!

 

Aside from that shame on you David Bowie for making your song iTunes only and not giving consumers more choice. Interestingly I don't think other digital retailers have a "complete my album" type function so it is an iTunes type issue. Also to track sales of the album preorder vs an individual track download wouldn't they need to have separate catalogue numbers from the record company or wouldn't it rely on iTunes arranging to count them separately rather than it being the OCC neglecting to? It may not be their issue - maybe they genuinely can't separate it the way things stand

 

Yes iTunes do take a sale away from a single if you use the 'Complete My Album' function however in most cases this means nothing - I bought the Calvin Harris album a few weeks ago and had already purchased 3 of the songs which by the time I got the album had all been huge hits and long since peaked meaning taking a sale away from a song that is hanging around at the bottom of the charts counts for nothing, I remember a Taylor Swift song had minus sales one week in the States though due to the same reason!

 

Of course all this could be avoided (and I think ultimately will) by making it so that you either buy a "single" (remixes/ b sides as was) OR an album. Cherrypicking will become a thing of the past. That would improve album sales whilst keeping singles always available. I always wonder why they never did that initially!

I don't think that would improve album sales. The people who cherrypick are surely mostly doing it because they don't want to pay the full amount for an album so are just picking the best individual tracks?

Yes but if your only "legal" way of getting anything more than the "singles" is to buy an album (like you used to pre 2004) then you only have one option. Unless people download it illegally.......oh. :o

 

Mind you back in the day there were pirate copies and taping albums from mates etc so it's always been around.

Of course all this could be avoided (and I think ultimately will) by making it so that you either buy a "single" (remixes/ b sides as was) OR an album. Cherrypicking will become a thing of the past. That would improve album sales whilst keeping singles always available. I always wonder why they never did that initially!

 

Would cause the reverse for me personally - I would have never bought recent albums by the likes of Rita Ora, Calvin Harris etc, were it not for the 'Complete My Album' option.

Would cause the reverse for me personally - I would have never bought recent albums by the likes of Rita Ora, Calvin Harris etc, were it not for the 'Complete My Album' option.

Maybe now that we've had the option maybe it wouldn't work, just seems like the record companies have missed a trick here though.

Record companies were so eager to improve ailing singles sales in the middle of the last decade they let iTunes et al sell every song on an album individually, assuming album sales would stay healthy. It'd be interesting to see how they'd be if we hadn't had the recessions.

I don't think the OCC do actually take off sales for people using 'Complete My Album', the effect is very, very pronounced in the USA even with airplay involved in their chart ('We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together' dropped out of the top 10 from about #4 the week her album came out then recovered again the following week) so in the UK's sales-only chart it should be even more obvious. It could just be that far more people use 'Complete My Album' in the USA but I don't see why that would be the case.

Yeah I don't think they minus sales in the UK!

I got a bit concerned that Britney might be denied a number one again, so I'm glad Bowie will be chart ineligible! Not keen on the Bowie track at all...

Another good reason Big Top 40 will again get double the listeners of Radio One. A new shite presenter & a top 40, biased to stupid blown out rules.

 

Consider January 74 & 75. Christmas is well over, but shops cut the price of Christmas titles to clear. What happens? 2 false number ones into mid January. And that was a carve up. Mr Bowie a lesser fix than that one. 44 years in & still about as good as the day it started.

 

Sitting round the radio on Sunday 16th February 1969. Alan Freeman: "We've got brand new computerised chart for you, compiled by the British Market Research Bureau". Though they weren't propared to make an understandable explanation, why they have difficultities getting sales info on the Mrs Robinson E.P. Number 19 in the final BBC Top 30 & not even in the top 60, for BMRB (as apparently they couldn't track E.Ps). An event that lasted 6 years. Official? What's official about something that doesn't include certain paid for titles? It's like going to speak to a Policeman, that refuses to tell you what time it is, as he hasn't got a watch!

 

Then we shouldn't forget ageism rules ok in the singles chart. Like Doctpr Blind says, the charts mean nothing & I doubt Bowie had any say in how his release is handle. I give you, it's a gimmick, but what isn't? X Factor is a gimmick, but they let the talentless shite into the charts, increased by big physical sales, which should be stopped immediately & the download era, run on it's own, for then Gabrielle Aplin would not of falsely gone to #1, with her gimmick of being released in John Lewis, for commercial purposes. Argh!

 

I've just realised who you remind me off - that other nutter, Alex Jones.

 

I got a bit concerned that Britney might be denied a number one again, so I'm glad Bowie will be chart ineligible! Not keen on the Bowie track at all...

 

Even if it was eligble (which we don't know it isn't, for certain), I can't see it staying at #1 on iTunes all week, never mind the two days start it gave everything else.

 

Also, it doesn't appear to be on Amazon, and if that's true of other non-iTunes sites, that's hardly gonna help...

Edited January 9, 201313 yr by vidcapper

Even if it was eligble (which we don't know it isn't, for certain), I can't see it staying at #1 on iTunes all week, never mind the two days start it gave everything else.

 

Also, it doesn't appear to be on Amazon, and if that's true of other non-iTunes sites, that's hardly gonna help...

iTunes says it's an iTunes special pre-order. Though checking it, I'm not entirely sure if it will be ineligible to chart. This pre-order is a bit different to Madonna's MDNA pre-order promotion.

Really hope Bowie's single will beat everybody. Come on, legend!

If Britney misses out on #1 I will die! #moveslikejagger

She has missed it out for a few weeks already but you're still posting :P

She has missed it out for a few weeks already but you're still posting :P

 

Maybe because this week is the week it's meant to be #1. Everything was dead set before Bowie's release :drama:

If there's a chance that this week's biggest selling track can't make number 1 then they should urgently look at a change of rules, and they did set a precedent for changing eligibility rules "on the hoof"- at the end of 2006 Fairytale of New York should have been chart ineligible as it had already had the maximum 52 chart weeks allowed following the 2005 physical re-release, and before the chart rules changed at the start of 2007 to allow all downloads regardless of a linked physical release. But it was included in the last chart of 2006 to avoid a hard to explain sudden disappearance from the chart, when it could have re-entered the following week anyway.

 

Even in that really messy 2006 era when singles were getting deleted out if the chart at record companies' whims and downloads could only count in the week of or the week before the physical release, I don't think a non-chart eligible single was ever the week's true best seller, Gnarls Barkley Crazy was deleted after it fell from Number 1 and if I remember correctly from reports at the time it would have only gone as high as number 3 for the early weeks of download sales when it was chart inelligible?

At the end of the day record companies and acts know the rules and if they choose to flout them then they and their fans don't really have a genuine grievance. There is a case for not excluding sales of those copies paid for separately as a "single" but certainly not the ones sold as part of the album preorder.