"We as consumers have been trained by the music industry to go out and buy a new piece of plastic every few years," said the 51-year-old Petersen, editorial director of Mix, a San Francisco-based magazine that covers professional sound recording. "Why do we keep buying the same things?"

Petersen and many other music-biz insiders agree that, in the next decade or so, the CD will very likely be surpassed as the album format of choice.

"The new format is no format," predicted Petersen, a 24-year industry veteran who also owns a record label, a recording studio and a music-publishing company. "What the consumer would buy is a data file, and you could create whatever you need. If you want to make an MP3, you make an MP3. If you want a DVD-Audio surround disc, you make that."

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