A couple of days ago, Amazon announced that, when you purchase a CD from the company, you'll not only get the physical CD, but also digital files of the music in your Amazon cloud player.
Not only that... If you've bought a CD from Amazon in the last 15 years, you'll get digital copies of that too.
This doesn't happen with every CD that Amazon sells, but enough of them that many people in the music business are a bit upset.
Here is a notice about the service that I got in my email box...
Upset? Don't be. This is good for the music business and good for independent artists especially.
Why? It extends the "life" of music.
As a musician (or songwriter), the biggest music business issue you face right now is getting your music heard. Without that happening, your music might as well not exist.
I've seen a few conversations online regarding Amazon Auto Rip and many musicians are asking, "How will I get paid?"
First of all, you got paid the first time. You'll also picking up a "secondary payment" because, thanks to Amazon Auto Rip, your music is once again on the minds of the people who purchased it.
I have 31,572 songs in my Amazon Cloud Player. There are 3473 albums.
This kind of volume makes it easy for things to get lost.
Amazon Cloud Player has caused me to think about music I've bought over the last 15 years and listen to a lot of things I haven't heard since my initial purchases.
That gets me excited about the music again.
That gets me excited about the artists again and wondering what they're doing.
That gets me looking things up... Do these artists have new music out? Are they touring?
The real "insult" of Amazon Auto Rip isn't that artists aren't being paid twice, but that Amazon Auto Rip is doing a better job of getting people excited about music than most of the artists themselves.
My suggestion for artists, publishers, and labels affected by Amazon Auto Rip is to find a way to leverage all the promotion you're getting because of it. If people were willing to buy something from you once, they'll likely be willing to buy something else from you. So sell it to them!