Dima said:
i honestly find very difficult for an album to sell even only 500k copies out of the market you considered...other markets are really small for U2 (as for any other European/American Act) so i believe actual sales for ATYCLB is about 10-10.5 million (even if Paul McGuinness or Universal say more i don't trust them: it's all part of the promotional game to inflate a little bit sales)
Well lets take a look at some conservative estimates of the ROW countries sales for ATYCLB and I'll then give my basis for these estimates.
Argentina: 200,000
Chile: 100,000
Columbia: 20,000
Hong Kong: 20,000
Indonesia: 100,000
Israel: 50,000
India: 20,000
Korea: 50,000
Maylasia: 50,000
Mexico: 200,000
Philippines: 50,000
South Africa: 100,000
Singapore: 50,000
Taiwan: 10,000
Thailand: 20,000
Turkey: 50,000
ROW: 100,000
TOTAL ROW and ROW specific countries: 1,190,000
United States 4.2 million
Europe 4 million
Canada 500,000
Brazil 400,000
Australia 350,000
New Zealand 45,000
Japan 160,000
TOTAL CONFIRMED sales from these regions: 9,655,000
Unconfirmed sales in confirmed regions:
United States: at least 300,000 copies have been sold of ATYCLB beyond the 4.2 million figure Soundscan has, because Soundscan covers 90% to 95% of all sales to consumers, not 100%
Europe: Here potentially another 500,000 has been sold of ATYCLB, but being conservative, we'll say 250,000.
Canada: Perhaps another 50,000 copies has been sold here as well. ATYCLB could well be very close to 6 times platinum.
Other regions: 50,000
TOTAL unconfirmed sales in confirmed sales regions: 650,000
Grand Total album sales for ATYCLB: 11,495,000
Realize I consider this to be a conservative estimate. Also remember that when record company people talk of total albums sales worldwide, they are talking about total number of albums sold to retailers(stores), not consumers. This is often referred to as the shipment figure.
Now back to the estimates for the ROW specific countries. On average, an artist will sell far more albums than concert tickets in any region. There are some exceptions to this but 90% of the time an artist will sell more albums than concert tickets in any region.
Argentina: U2 played 3 shows here back in 1998 to over 160,000 people. The three combined shows in Buenos Aires gave U2 its highest GROSS Boxscore figure for the POPMART tour and I also believe its highest attendance when the three shows are combined. That ATYCLB had sales of 200,000 copies here I feel is indeed a conservative estimate.
Chile: Once again, U2 did a soldout show here to 67,000 people in 1998. I consider 100,000 in sales for ATYCLB to be conservative.
Israel: U2 played to 40,000 people here back in 1997. 50,000 in sales for ATYCLB is indeed a conservative estimate.
Mexico: U2 played to 110,000 people at two shows in 1997 in Mexico City. I think 200,000 in sales not a conservative estimate, but the likely sales figure for ATYCLB.
South Africa: U2 played to nearly 100,000 people at two shows here back in 1998, so 100,000 in sales is indeed at conservative estimate.
The rest of the countries were estimates based on sales by other artist who do not sell nearly as well as U2 around the world. In addition, the POPMART tour almost visited several of these countries back in 1998.
So, I think that sales of ATYCLB are easily 11.5 million and likely closing in on the 12 million mark.
POP was certified Platinum in Spain back in 1997.
let's hope you-all-know-who doesn't read this thread 
