Amazon AutoRip and E-books

In case you missed it, Amazon has introduced a new service that gives you free mp3 files when you buy AutoRip CDs. Thousands of AutoRip CDs are already available for purchase. The move will encourage more folks to buy music from Amazon. This does bring up a very interesting question though: should Amazon offer electronic versions of your favorite books for free when you buy the paper version?

At the moment, you will have to pay twice to get the paper and e-book versions of your favorite books. Amazon already gives Prime members the chance to borrow books for free. But that has its limitations. Providing loyal customers the chance to get both paper and electronic versions of books in one shot would be a great move by Amazon. The problem is it will not happen. Amazon is selling a ton of e books. It simply does not have the incentive to offer them to its customers for free. Besides, book publishers will not accept such a move without a fight.

This is not to say that Amazon won’t adopt an AutoRip-like plan for books in the future. But it probably won’t happen anytime soon. We can still dream though.