Kanye West and 50 Cent’s ego-tastic battle of the record sales kicked off yesterday, with industry insiders placing Mr. West ahead of 50 in the early runnings. Still, it’s too early to confirm any numbers until Soundscan chimes in.

Further hyping the hype (if that’s even possible) is Kanye canceling his face-off with 50 live on MTV due to his dissatisfaction with the network after the VMAs didn’t go as he planned (no main stage performance, no awards won).

But forget all that: Fiddy isn’t going to quit the music business, and Kanye isn’t going to boycott MTV for very long. All this media hoopla boils down to selling records, plain and simple.

Sad as it may be, the record industry thrives on media outlets like MTV/VH1/Clear Channel to bolster sales in the burgeoning music market. This year record sales have dropped 14% from last year; industry bigwigs hope to reverse the curse with both rapper’s albums, along with a new release from Country-crooner Kenny Chesney. 50 Cent himself said on record that the “battle” is just competitive - no beef. A paparazzi circus wins hand-over-fist against the merits of music seven days a week.

Talk about eggs in a basket: gambling on three albums to balance a lackluster year in sales is a tall order, especially when records worth promoting get kicked to the proverbial curb in lieu of guaranteed chart-toppers.

With the actual cost of a CD being less than pennies - not to mention MySpace music pages (free) rendering most official artist/group websites (not free) nonexistent and out-of-hand downloading woes - why can’t the retail price of albums drop a few dollars? I’m a firm believer in consumers wanting to purchase rather than download; but it becomes a hard argument when the average album is either a ludicrous $15.98 or a right-click away.

Kanye West, 50 Cent and the RIAA: making boatloads of cash at our expense.