In some ways I was right. iTunes does well out of single tracks. Physical single sales are dead. People want to buy what they can't buy physically, that is, cheap single tracks.
Universal just launched (in the UK) a website for selling rare/unreleased albums and tracks. This is absolutely the kind of thing that online digital music stores are built for. Tracks that small groups of rabid fans want, but not enough rabid fans to warrant a physical repressing.
My only complaints are the usual. It's UK only (a nice change from USA only) and by its very nature, only from the Universal UK catalog. Who is on Universal? I have no idea. I don't care. You have no choice but to go and search.
Where is my non-label-or-store-affiliated online music for-sale search engine?
If only a similar store opened in Australia. So many deleted CDs from the 90s could be put back on sale at little to no risk.