I've thought about this too and I have a tendency to do that some as well. I tend to buy songs from artists that I really like some of their songs but perhaps their whole album is not really my taste. Linkin Park is a good example...I have listened to other bits of their album but I tend to only like a few songs and I have language issues so buying by the song is better for me there. Now if I could only buy the clean version of Blvd of Broken Dreams things would be good.

Thinking about my own purchasing pattern, I still by albums by artists that I tend to love most of what they do and the ones I buy just songs are those that I would never buy the album. The down side is that sometimes you find your gems by buying the album.

Singles had pretty much disappeard in the US...I think this is bringing the single back so it may not be that much different than the days when we used to have a singles market. Of course, I think some of the reason singles disappeared is that the labels were trying to get people to buy the album so it probably will impact album sales.