This particular debate is identical to that which currently haunts literary circles prophesying the death of the book. The idea that technologoical advances can only be attained at the cost of its predecessor seems somewhat limited to me. In literature, forms of storytelling existed long before the novel and the book. The oral tradition for example, or even, quite fittingly in song. With the creation of writing these methods were not abandoned. They exist still today. Over the millenia literature expanded to include poems of different types from the haiku to the epic. The novel was born and subsequently a galaxy of genres evolved within that medium. Now we have this proposed threat from modern technology. A similar threat was percieved when the printing press was invented yet it did not bring about any literary apocalypse but instead it expanded the literary universe. When new mediums and methods are created they simply add to the options of the artist. The book will not die. It will just be given more rivals.
The same goes for the album. Did the birth of the recording industry replace live music? No. It supplemented it. The technology of the internet and the downloading culture it facilitates is not going to stop or prevent artists from composing collections of pieces that correspond within their ordained organisation. What it does do is alter how they expose their art. It also allows the listener greater control over what they hear. They can if they wish take only those pieces which they enjoy most and discard the rest or they can follow the intentions of the artist and keep the collection as a single work of art. I believe it is the seemingly increasing prevailance of this capacity for choice the listener posesses that has led to the idea of the Death of the album. Because people seem to be deconstructing albums to suit their taste the music world has become alerted to a threat to its most revered form. However, this attitude is not new. It has merely become exposed because of the communality of the internet. Long before we were able to detect people ripping albums apart listeners in their own homes skipped over songs the didnt like and made compilation tapes of those they did.
For every person that wants a single song there is another who wants a large scale collection. For every artist that thrives on singles there ill be another that focuses his energy on albums. This is how it has always been and I cannot see how the internet will bring it to an end. What I can see however, is the genesis of new musical forms, hitherto inconcievable.