According to research from Government-backed watchdog Consumer Focus, only 2 percent of UK adults are aware of Spotify. The research also found that 4 out of 10 people were unable to name any legal online music service. Of those that could name a service, 85 percent had only heard of iTunes and Amazon. Only 1 percent had heard of Last.fm or 7Digital.

The research, which was carried out among a “representative” selection of 1995 UK adults aged 15-plus, concludes that more must be done to make consumers aware of legal online music services in an effort to combat illegal downloading. That’s fair enough, but can it really be true that only 2 percent of UK adults are aware of Spotify?

Spotify has well over 2 million UK users – that’s more than 3 percent of the UK population right there. And the current invitation system is restricting the number of users in this country. Every Spotify user has probably got at least a handful of friends and family who they’ve told about Spotify, but who haven’t yet signed up. So the real number of UK adults who have heard of Spotify is actually much higher than the percentage figure offered by this research.

The problem comes with the fact that the survey covered that “representative” selection of the population. Among that selection would no doubt have been many people who had no interest in either the internet or music. Those people are about as likely to illegally download music as they are to pop to the moon for a platypus sandwich.

The survey would have been much more useful if it had covered internet users, or more specifically internet users who consume music online. Among their number, it’s likely that a vast majority would have heard of Spotify, and the other online music services. Whether they are likely to use them rather than illegally downloading is another matter.

The chief executive of record industry trade body the BPI, Geoff Taylor has criticised the tax payer-funded research, and is quoted in The Telegraph as saying, “It’s just not credible to suggest that people who are downloading illegally haven’t heard of iTunes, Amazon or other legal music services.”

The BPI and Ovum launched separate research on the same day concentrating on how UK Internet Service Providers could launch bundled digital music services. The BPI report concludes that online music services could earn UK ISPs £100 million by 2013.