It's been that way for a while. I've been buying and ripping myself since back when the last independent record store around me closed, and online music was on

It's been that way for a while. I've been buying and ripping myself since back when the last independent record store around me closed, and online music was only selling DRM'd 128kbps tracks. It was really about the DRM and the quality (I'm no golden ear, but even on my dicey consumer equipment I can hear the artifacts at 128). The price difference was just icing on the cake. It's not like it took a lot of effort or time to put the CD in the tray, hit "go" and get 320 kbps and a FLAC track (for kicks).