"Fact. The vast majority of the record buying public are teenagers to early twenties. They are generally easily led and subject to fads fashions and peer pressure. They will buy almost anything and generally cannot look at things objectively."

It's actually not true that the vast majority of consumers are teens and in their twenties. There are differences between the countries, but more than 51% of record sales in the US are to consumers +25 (-45). Furthermore access to Internet show a positive effect on consumers 25+ (source: http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~felten/boorstin-thesis.pdf ).

The music business in Australia had the best year ever in 2003, just 6 years back, and the record companies are just in the beginning of converting their distribution and marketing to the Internet paradigm, so sales are expected to rise in the coming years, even despite the current economic crisis.

In fact digital album sales were up 32% in 2008, and digital track sales 27% (source: Billboard/Soundscan http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/consumer/billboard-soundscan-digital-album-sales-up-32-in-2008/). So the downward music business sales numbers are only valid in terms of distribution formats (CD's) that are about to be replaced by others (MP3's).

This does not imply that current music is poor, even though songs today fight way harder odds of cutting through the clutter on Internet, in fact quite the opposite! Music is better than ever before. News have an interest in the negative angle, but as we come of age we should know better than to digest the news, uncritically?

Also, I think the youngsters are way smarter than this typical generation gap portrait. Some might get music just because it will annoy their parents (and that's a pretty healthy identity process), but they are also VERY critical when it comes to being entertained. So they are rightfully the drivers in the music industry, making us create music that is entertaining line by line, as music business is about ENTERTAINMENT.

That word cannot be emphasized enough IMO, and it sure is not entertaining reading rant after rant here about how bad everything is. It makes these threads loose credibility, and look like JPF songwriters don't have their feet planted in reality..

Just my two cents, get ready for the future, cause songs will be sold, artists will thrive, and they will want more great music than ever. And with the line by line demands to music, it is harder to create great entertainment than ever - that is why collabs are so rampant (to loop back to what this thread is about)!

Everyone has to bring their absolute best to the table, no matter if we are writers, composers, musicians or producers!