Allofmp3.com and Piracy

I'm probably breaking some obscure copyright law by simply mentioning this website. For those who don't know, allofmp3.com features ridiculously cheap mp3 files: a song usually costs a dime, not a dollar. The catch? They are a shady Russian company that uses a loophole in Russian law to not pay royalties. Whether or not to buy music from them is a continual test of my conscience, a daily moral dilemma. (Needless to say, my selfish impulses usually win. Sorry, iTunes.) But now the U.S. government is making Russia's admittance to the WTO dependent on allofmp3.com going out of business. If I was gambling man, I'd wager that allofmp3.com isn't long for this world. So get your cheap music fast, before the pseudo-legal loophole disappears.

PS. It suddenly occured to me that if allofmp3.com is put of business by the U.S. government, the company will still have the credit card information of hundreds of thousands of U.S. consumers. So maybe this visit-allofmp3.com-before-they-die idea isn't such a good idea after all...

More like this

I've been doing a bit of research, spurred by this article by Allyn Jaffrey Shulman, on the legal status of online poker. And I've found that most of what Shulman says is spot on. She points to a Federal court ruling in the case of In re Mastercard International, the full text of which can be found…
The BBC's global tech news show Digital Planet reports from Belém in Brazil on a rootsy version of the new business model that's likely to supersede the traditional music industry. It's musical sneakernet. Since the invention of sound recording, musicians (and to an even greater extent, record…
Things have been crazy the last couple days in the online gaming world. The response from various companies ranges from "maybe we can survive this" to "man the lifeboats". Party Poker has announced that if the president signs the bill (which is inevitable, and will likely happen in the next day or…
Watch for more of this kind of stuff as green prducts and technologies grow! And along the same vein, did anyone else note that Saudia Arabia brought up the idea of their being entitled to compensation for lost revenue in any kind of a global oil consumption control agreement? I think this came up…

I think music sharing is the market at work, although not many creative types like that concept. However, I also think that if you're going to take music and avoid paying royalties, you should do it honestly, in your own country.

The idea that you can "avoid paying royalties" "honestly, in your own country" is a wonderful mangling of logic.

You cannot avoid paying royalties honestly. That's the whole point.

Anyone using allofmp3.com does so knowing that there is something slightly smelly in the air. At least admitting to "selfish impulses" is honest. But why stop there? Why not help yourself to anything you like in the local supermarket? Why not steal books from the library? Or, nearer to home, why not pinch a copy of Seed from the newsstand on the way home?

The Open Source movement is at least based on the notion that we have already paid for the research, so why should publishers reap more returns.

There are many internationally based web sites like Allofmp3 which offers music download service, and are continually coming under pressure from other countries to shut down. i know more 19 store or service that provides the best digital music experience at lens http://www.squidoo.com/review_russianmp3site .

By Andrew Janefd (not verified) on 07 Aug 2007 #permalink