Last.fm announced today that it has made its service available to Japan and will start streaming music to the country in an effort to expand its presence across the world. Lost amidst the otherwise mundane news, the company also included an interesting fact: since offering its free on-demand service that lets you stream full songs three times, its click-through purchase rates are up an astounding 119 percent.

The company (rightfully so) believes this success is due to its willingness to let you stream the entire song before you decide whether or not you want to purchase it.

It may seem like a small piece of a far more complicated puzzle of music downloading and purchasing, but it’s an important element. I don’t know how many times I’ve used iTunes or tried to buy a song on Amazon’s MP3 service only to find that the thirty-second clip didn’t let me hear any lyrics or failed to capture the section of the song that I actually knew and enjoyed. And when that happened, I was forced to hold off my purchase.

But if I had been able to listen to the entire song, I would have bought it right then and the music industry would have had itself another satisfied shopper.

Of course, it’s that same music industry that doesn’t allow me to stream songs in full and only begrudgingly allowed Last.fm to do just that. But if it finally wakes up and realizes that it shouldn’t be scared of users, but more inviting to them, it stands to reason that more people would be buying songs, if the Last.fm statistics were representative of buying preference.

But once again, the debate on this issue goes back to trust. Can the music industry find it within itself to finally trust the users and allow them to consume songs at a rate that they desire? So far, it can’t.

Regardless of the progress Last.fm has made, we’re still fighting against an industry that has a deep distaste for users and has gone out of its way to make sure you don’t have the kind of freedom you should expect when you license the right to play a song.

The only thing working in our favor is the simple fact that business and money rules all else in the music industry and more times than not, these companies would be willing to jump on the bandwagon if there’s a proven record of streaming an entire song yielding higher revenue. Unfortunately, the revenue probably won’t hit a suitable level unless full songs can be streamed on iTunes before purchase and the chances of that happening are, well, practically zero.

And so we find ourselves in a Catch-22. In order to have the ability to stream entire songs, we need to buy them and show the music industry we like that feature. But in order to have that option, the sales need to be high enough for them to justify allowing major vendors to offer the option.

Maybe one day the music industry will wake up and realize that sharing music and changing business models aren’t bad at all. But until that day, expect more of the same.