Thriller (Michael Jackson album) the opinion that he was a "musical phenomenon" and that "in the world of pop music, there is Michael Jackson and there is everybody else". Jackson changed the way the industry functioned: both as an artistic persona and as a financial, profitable entity. His attorney John Branca observed that Jackson achieved the highest royalty rate in the music industry to that point: approximately $2 (US$ in dollars) for each album sold. As a result, Jackson earned record-breaking profits from compact disc sales and from the sale of copies of the documentary, "The Making of Michael Jackson's Thriller", produced by Jackson
Thriller (Michael Jackson album) was certified 33× platinum for a total of 33 million album-equivalent units. The album topped the charts in many countries, sold 4.2 million copies in the UK, 2.5 million in Japan, and was certified 15× Platinum in Australia. "Thriller" sells an estimated 130,000 copies in the US per year; it reached number two in the US Catalog charts in February 2003 and number 39 in the UK in March 2007. It remains the best-selling album of all time, having sold over 66 million copies worldwide. "Thriller" was ranked as the third best album of all time on the "Billboard Top