Amazon has just announced a new feature called AutoRip, which instantly provides folks with a free digital copy of an album when they buy the physical CD from Amazon. It’s a neat idea, but given the ease with which customers can create their own digital files, it seems that AutoRip’s overall utility is minor. Further, for music buyers who’ve moved to purchasing nothing but digital files, the whole thing is rather moot.
Still, AutoRip is painfully close to something I’ve found myself pining for since starting to use a Kindle e-reader: free Kindle copies of purchased physical books. Unlike CDs, there’s no easy way for book purchasers to create their own digital copy, so an “AutoRip for Books” would provide much more benefit. Someday, perhaps.
