New Trend at Amazon.com: Offer the CD-R not the in-print import

I hope your correct. I really do.

 

They can be legally re-sold like any physical product you buy. That does not take into account that CD-R copies command significantly less on the secondary market and in most cases are worthless. If people wanted CD-Rs, they'd illegally download the lossless file and burn it themselves.

The thing I've noticed with the CD-Rs that Amazon sells are their extremely high pricing in comparison to a normal CD. It's not a very effective market solution to sell an inferior replacement for higher than the original CD. The wacky music licensing that the labels force on Amazon to allow the CD-Rs probably is the cause.

 

So it's illegal to sell CDrs you purchased legitimately and burn yourself, but totally legal to sell CDrs burned by Amazon?

There's no real money here, but I find that seperation of copyright law to be a very fine line drawn in the sand.

 

It is all due to the original rights holders in this case, the music labels and musicians. They get paid when Amazon sells a CD-R, they get nothing when you sell a CD-R you burned yourself. That is the difference. The copyright holders are authorizing Amazon the ability to provide this service...at a cost.

 

This.

It's all about authorization from the labels. And they probably allow this just because it's cheaper to distribute. Same reason why they allow MP3 versions, or why the MPAA allows them to sell digital video downloads.

 

Legally buy from itunes(etc..), you burn a cdr = not allowed to resell the disc.

Legally buy from amazon, they burn a cdr = allowed to resell disc.

 

I have only purchased one CD-R re-release and it was from ArkivMusic. I wanted it. It's not a title that shows up on the used market in the US. It's not even listed on the US Amazon site. It is on the UK Amazon site. I could have figured out how to order from the UK Amazon site and paid the extra cost in shipping. But that would have still been more than the cost of the ArkivMusic re-release.

The bummer is that the booklet printing isn't all that great. And the booklet got folded and stapled off-center. So I lost a few mm off the right side of the cover image. A bummer for someone who likes to scan cover art. I probably should have just gone with figuring out how to order a used CD from Amazon UK.

The back of the CD packaging has this printed:
Reproduction authorised by Decca Label Group, a Division of UMG Recording, Inc.
Distributed by ArkivMusic

I'm sure the Amazon CD-R re-releases have a similar authorization message printed on the packaging.

At least I was able to buy it for a reasonable price. Sure beats the crazy rare OOP prices that can happen with these sorts of hard to find titles.

 

Long as you don't put labels on them (or leave them in the sun) you're probably fine. I have perfect, unlabelled CD's that are older than that. The labelled ones are a different story.

 

Amazon delivered Mingus At Antibes and it is a CDR with the inserts printed on less than high quality paper, so the information is a little fuzzy. Sound is fine however.

 

I hate this and have purchased a few myself. It drives me crazy that in many cases you're buying nothing more than a cheaply produced duplicate of a real compact disc title and paying more for it than you would have for an authentic pressing with quality artwork, etc.

 

sound is fine for now...accepting a lower product keeps it in production...
I'd really have a tough time paying for a CDR no matter how good the artwork is...POX ON IT!

 

Amazon has been doing this for at least three years now.

 

Michael, I was annoyed to even receive it because I hadn't noticed the disclaimer on the web page.

 

I agree. I've noticed more and more titles being offered this way. I've already done some panic buying over a few titles and imported them from amazon uk and the secondary market.

 

Thanks to the original poster for the warning. It seems like amazon's CD-R production chain is not overly in demand so they have hijacked their search engine to feed it with customers. It's sad that so many search engines these days do not yield proper results but merely sponsored results.

 

I received my first CD-R from Amazon, though I did not order it intentionally. The album is Big John Patton Got a Good Thing Goin' On. Amazon lists it as a CD-R on demand, but I ordered a new copy from Marketplace seller Quick_N_Easy Marketplace. Their description does not say that orders are fulfilled by Amazon and does not say that they are selling a CD-R. They just give the following generic description:

Despite ordering from this seller, the disc came from Amazon (Amazon shipping box, Amazon receipt). However, in trying to return the CD-R, I have to communicate with the Marketplace seller. I have submitted my return request for approval and am waiting for a response.

What a pain in the a*s. You order from a Marketplace seller that you think has a new pressed CD, and you instead get the CD-R from Amazon.

I will say, the CD-R from Amazon is very nice as far as these things go. The inserts are well printed in that the colors are sharp. The CD-R has an excellent reproduction of the Blue Note Rare Grooves label design. It's a high-quality reproduction, but it's still a reproduction. I want the original CD.

 

Keith, isn't the whole listing for the CD-R? I would expect MarketPlace sellers who sell items under that listing to sell exactly what is advertised... a CD-R!

If you want a pressed CD, there should be a different listing, right?

 

I wasn't sure of that. To me, a pressed CD should be the default item, and a CD-R should be the exception, more of a disclaimer under a listing for the pressed CD. This whole thing of CD-Rs on demand is foreign to me. Besides, I didn't think so many sellers would be selling the CD-R. I was surprised to see the disc come Amazon and not from the actual Marketplace seller.

 

Amazon needs to make a completely separate format category for the CD-Rs. MP3s are a completely separate category. CD-Rs need to be separated the same. There is no way you're going to accidentally end up buying the MP3 version of an album on Amazon when you intended to buy the CD. We need the same kind of distinction between the CD and CD-R versions.

Take that Big John Patton album as an example. It has two format categories listed:
MP3 download
Audio CD, 2011

They need a third format category for "Audio CD-R, 2011"

If it gets to the point that I can't determine whether I'm buying a CD or CD-R from Amazon I will have to stop purchasing CDs there.

 

The seller has agreed to send me a pre-paid UPS return label.

 

Based on Ivan's point above, I think you have to assume that if Amazon is selling the CD-R, that all Marketplace sellers are as well. Obviously you can write a Marketplace seller to see what they're selling, but they few of them respond to queries in my experience.

What really annoys me is that I ordered the Patton disc from a Marketplace seller and the CD-R came from Amazon. Nowhere did it say "Fulfilled by Amazon".

 

I wonder if some fan generated petitions could get label to properly issue cd titleson factory pressed discs. Not sure what the minimum cd count needs to be: 2,000?, 1,000?

 

It's hit or miss from what I have seen. Some sellers do list regular CD copies under the CD-R listing, some only list actual CD-Rs. It's particularly hard to decipher when Amazon is selling a CD-R of an album that had an earlier, identical CD release.

 

The question remains if amazon.com sources their mp3s and their CD-Rs from the same lossless (master a/k/a original CD) source or if they source their CD-Rs from mp3.

To those of you who have written to the site and asked ... what answers have you gotten?

Thanks for information.

 

For those on this Forum who believe CDR copies sound better than the original this should be a godsend.