Grammy's Enter The Internet Age

I missed the Grammy's last night and now I'm kicking myself.
I meant to watch the show, and was really happy that Norah Jones took home at least one statue. I discovered Norah Jones last year when I got her first DVD as a gift and I've been a fan ever since.
What really caught my eye though was the Grammy won by Jazz singer Maria Schneider which was done so even though she did not sell a single copy of her "Concert In The Garden" CD through record stores. All sales of Schneider's album came via the internet.
"It's a new way for fans to be closer to artists and artists to be closer to fans," said Schneider of her web sales. "For me it's been very gratifying".
The web-only Grammy win provides further proof to the music industry that the internet may indeed be the future music store for fans.
In 2004 legitimate online music sales were in the area of 143 million songs, up from only 19 million in 2003.
"This record cost $87,000 to make, I already made my money back," continued Scheinder. "(And) I'm not splitting the profits with the distributor, the record store or the record company, so it's working so well for me."
Schneider was the first participant in a new online program called ArtistShare where all album financing is done through donations from the artists fans. Initially 10,000 copies of the CD were pressed, with 9,000 being sold to those who donated money for the project through ArtistShare.
The remaining 1,000 copies are then sold through an online auction.
"They (fans) came into the project long before I completed my CD," concluded Schneider.