The gap between digital sales and album sales continues to widen according to this report from Variety. CD sales have dropped by 16% in comparison to 2007’s figures, while digital album sales have improved by 34%. The online market is still small, only accounting for 15.5% of all album sales, but there can be little doubt that this figure will continue to grow.

The article also points out that this has been a good year for Universal, who have released the top three best-selling albums of the year with Lil Wayne’s Tha Carter III, perennial festival favorite Jack Johnson’s Sleep Through the Static (who buys his records? Seriously, have you ever met anyone who owns a Jack Johnson album?), and Mariah Carey’s Einstein tribute E=MC2.

The good news for buyers of the physical format is that vinyl sales continue to rise. As regular Prefix readers will be aware, sales of vinyl have almost doubled this year, rising from 454,000 in ‘07 to 803,000 in ’08.