Last year I would argue that free albums shouldn't count, but I mean a free album is just as good as a stream and streams count more than ever nowadays, and since Billboard decided to i̶n̶f̶l̶a̶t̶e̶ album "sales" by adding streaming a̶n̶d̶ ̶l̶o̶s̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶a̶l̶l̶ ̶c̶r̶e̶d̶i̶b̶i̶l̶i̶t̶y̶, I don't see the harm in counting free albums. Popularity is popularity, that seems to be the motto Billboard is living by nowadays with it's ridiculous chart methodology.
Rihanna's team is making this more embarrassing than if she had just released it and underperformed. They are showing how desperate they are at being #1, and they have no faith in her star power. I'm so pissed that I won't get new music right now for 2016.
It's just so much more irritating when a stan of some random local urban act like Ciara or Beyonce comes to a Rihanna thread to "shade!!1 ;]" than when it's a stan of someone aleast actually successful. Do you do that on purpose?
That was not actually 0.99 for Born This Way, the consumer paid 0.99 but amazon actually paid for the remaining full price so basically it counted as sales because it was something Amazon did.
I'm sorry free albums shouldn't count. Just like free singles (a la Katy Perry and Pepsi) shouldn't count either.
Agree. It makes no sense to count albums they gave away as "legitimate purchases" for the charts. They could just distribute millions of albums if they wanted and fake their way to the top. to Billboard keeping it fair.
to Billboard keeping it fair.