Downloading actually leads to people buying more CD's.
A Canadian report found that among regular downloaders, CD sales were actually higher compared to that of the average person.
A study recently done in Canada discovered that people who have downloaded the most music are actually the most likely to buy CD's. The vast majority of people surveyed in the study had a positive relationship between the amount of music downloaded vs the amount of CD's purchased. In this case, if an artist begins to allow people to download their music online for free, they will be finding new listeners who will then in turn purchase their CD's more often.