Update: The President and CEO of eMusic today disputed the claim made by USA Today as to Amazon's current market position.

It seems that Apple is finally seeing some formidable competition in the form of Amazon’s MP3 download store. Jeffrey Graham of USA Today reports that Amazon MP3, an exclusively DRM-free digital sales outlet whose lifespan goes back only about half a year’s time, “has quietly become No. 2” to Apple’s top placement, far surpassing the industry’s prior second-place institution, eMusic.

At present, Apple claims a music catalogue of some 6 million songs, one-third of which is now delivered DRM-free. Those tracks comprise collections sold by record giant EMI and various independent labels. Amazon’s gross count to date ranks at an impressive 4.5 million, all of which are sold devoid of software-based copyright restrictions.

The ascent of Amazon MP3 can most likely be credited to Amazon’s de facto brand recognition, which derives from its online retail prowess honed over a large span of time, as well as its proven ability to expand its digital offerings tremendously over the course of only several months. When juxtaposed against the history of Apple’s iTunes Store, Amazon MP3 is without a doubt the long-awaited reckoning for Apple CEO Steve Jobs.

The fast pace of Amazon MP3’s growth is of course partly due to the tremendous handicap placed on Apple’s own online music service by three of the four biggest record industry forces. While EMI granted Apple a DRM-free catalogue back in 2007, and to great acclaim, Universal, Sony BMG, and Warner have all chosen to side with Amazon MP3, at least temporarily, in their delivery of DRM-free material. This factor has likely contributed a good deal to the trend shown by Amazon’s service. While such a strategy likely stifles the potential for digital sales overall for the industry, one cannot deny that the move to offer Amazon such rights has granted Apple’s newest competitor the position it now touts, which may well be in the long-term interests of the media companies when sitting across from iTunes representatives at the negotiation table.