Python – Multiple consumers & producers connected to a message queue, Is that possible in AMQP

Can I have each consumer receive the same messages? Ie, both consumers get message 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6? What is this called in AMQP/RabbitMQ speak? How is it normally configured?

No, not if the consumers are on the same queue. From RabbitMQ's AMQP Concepts guide:

it is important to understand that, in AMQP 0-9-1, messages are load balanced between consumers.

This seems to imply that round-robin behavior within a queue is a given, and not configurable. Ie, separate queues are required in order to have the same message ID be handled by multiple consumers.

Is this commonly done? Should I just have the exchange route the message into two separate queues, with a single consumer, instead?

No it's not, single queue/multiple consumers with each each consumer handling the same message ID isn't possible. Having the exchange route the message onto into two separate queues is indeed better.

As I don't require too complex routing, a fanout exchange will handle this nicely. I didn't focus too much on Exchanges earlier as node-amqp has the concept of a 'default exchange' allowing you to publish messages to a connection directly, however most AMQP messages are published to a specific exchange.

Here's my fanout exchange, both sending and receiving:

var amqp = require('amqp');
var connection = amqp.createConnection({ host: "localhost", port: 5672 });
var count = 1;

connection.on('ready', function () {
  connection.exchange("my_exchange", options={type:'fanout'}, function(exchange) {   

    var sendMessage = function(exchange, payload) {
      console.log('about to publish')
      var encoded_payload = JSON.stringify(payload);
      exchange.publish('', encoded_payload, {})
    }

    // Recieve messages
    connection.queue("my_queue_name", function(queue){
      console.log('Created queue')
      queue.bind(exchange, ''); 
      queue.subscribe(function (message) {
        console.log('subscribed to queue')
        var encoded_payload = unescape(message.data)
        var payload = JSON.parse(encoded_payload)
        console.log('Recieved a message:')
        console.log(payload)
      })
    })

    setInterval( function() {    
      var test_message = 'TEST '+count
      sendMessage(exchange, test_message)  
      count += 1;
    }, 2000) 
 })
})

No, the other consumers don't get blocked. Other messages will get delivered even if they have unacknowledged but delivered predecessors. If a channel closes while holding unacknowledged messages, those messages get returned to the queue.

See RabbitMQ Broker Semantics

Messages can be returned to the queue using AMQP methods that feature a requeue parameter (basic.recover, basic.reject and basic.nack), or due to a channel closing while holding unacknowledged messages.

EDIT In response to your comment:

Time to dive a little deeper into the AMQP specification then perhaps:

3.1.4 Message Queues

A message queue is a named FIFO buffer that holds message on behalf of a set of consumer applications. Applications can freely create, share, use, and destroy message queues, within the limits of their authority. Note that in the presence of multiple readers from a queue, or client transactions, or use of priority fields, or use of message selectors, or implementation-specific delivery optimisations the queue MAY NOT exhibit true FIFO characteristics. The only way to guarantee FIFO is to have just one consumer connected to a queue. The queue may be described as “weak-FIFO” in these cases. [...]

3.1.8 Acknowledgements

An acknowledgement is a formal signal from the client application to a message queue that it has successfully processed a message.[...]

So acknowledgement confirms processing, not receipt. The broker will hold on to the message until it's gotten acknowleged, so that it can redeliver them. But it is free to deliver more messages to consumers even if the prededing messages have not yet been acknowledged. The consumers will not be blocked.