In the US
and Europe there are market research firms that release a monthly report about
how the industry is doing, hardware and software sales, these are the NPD Group
and the Gfk. As they are the only companies to do that business in those areas their
numbers are, for the most part, not revealed to the public, that of course
isn't an issue in Japan where we have 3 trackers that release data on a weekly
basis.