While that read was fresh in my mind, I decided to check out the current Billboard top selling albums. I check the charts on a semi-regular basis for the sake of curiosity. This week I noticed something different. There appeared to be an increase in the number of gold and platinum symbols (the black circles and triangles that are placed next to the album title on the charts). I was curious to see if maybe there was a new shift in head vs. tail economics. I then proceeded to check out Billboards RIAA certification page and found some surprising data. The webpage shows which albums were certified for reaching 500,000 (Gold), one million (Platinum), and two million plus (Multi-Platinum) sold and at what time the release was certified. 

Keep in mind that I am presenting this without specific sales figures. However it's no secret that recorded music sales have dropped about 5-10% year to year since 2001 as it has been widely reported on Digital Music News as well as other music news sites. Therefore it's safe to assume that the overall body of music sales is smaller. If the head has dramatically decreased the last seven years while the tail has shown modest improvements, the head/tail proportion is going to different than it was in 2001. And maybe it has. But as sales decreases beyond 2008, if the number of blockbusters actually grow then one can argue that the head is growing again, thus making the tail smaller.

Here is some data I picked up from the RIAA page.