[photopress:mattyroxxx.jpg,full,right]Artists whose songs are used in Guitar Hero and Rock Band get royalties from the sales of the games, and the games have sold like insane nutty crazy. In fact, revenue from both games in 2007 surpassed that of actual musical digital download revenues, which was the largest growing sector of sales for the music industry.

In other words, more money was generated by having a hit on a video game than on iTunes. This could be the first signs of a new economic model for bands: release your music for free, and make money on the inclusion rights. In fact, I’ll be that within a year I’ll be writing to you about a band that’s using just such a strategy, if they’re not already out there.

Rock Band, Guitar Hero Sales Outperform Digital Music Sales in 2007 [Primotech[