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Allofmp3 Shut Down, Again

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Mon Jul 02, 2007 05:27 PM
from the e-roller-coaster dept.
The Internet
studguy1 writes to tell us TorrentFreak is reporting that the Russian government has shut down Allofmp3, the popular online music site. "AllOfMP3 has been a thorn in the side of the RIAA and the US government for years. Last year, U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab said that if Russia wants to join the WTO, they should shut down the pirate music website that is robbing US recording companies of sales."
+ -
story

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reporter writes "According to a disturbing report just published by Bloomberg, 'As the Kremlin gears up for the election of Putin's successor next March, Soviet-style controls are being extended to online news after a presidential decree last month set up a new agency to supervise both mass media and the Web.' However, unless the Kremlin pursues Chinese-style/Turkish-style blocking of the Internet-Protocol addresses of web sites like 'The Economist', even the Kremlin cannot control the online media. If Putin pulled the plug on an anti-Putin web site inside Russia, the anti-Putin web site could simply be migrated offshore to a server in, say, the United States."
[+] Entertainment: AllofMP3 Voucher Resellers Quit After Police Raid 137 comments
Broohaha writes "Europeans who resell AllofMP3.com vouchers are quitting the business after a UK raid against one prominent reseller there. An Ars Technica article talks to several of them about their situations. 'Until a few days ago, I had never heard of the IFPI [the international music trade group],' said one reseller. 'But yes, I am concerned about them now. Although my attorney assures me that reselling gift certificates bought from AllOfMP3.com isn't breaking any laws, it isn't worth the possibility of engagement with their legal machine.' The music industry seems determined to choke off AllofMP3's funding, no matter how small the source."
[+] News: Allofmp3 Restarts Business 226 comments
An anonymous reader writes "With a pretty short message on their blog, Allofmp3 announced that they will resume their music store soon. According to a Russian court, their music store did not violate any copyright law in Russia, so there was no reason for them to keep it closed."
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  • Heh (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Kingrames (858416)
    "...they should shut down the pirate music website that is robbing US recording companies of sales."

    So then, they shut down the wrong website.
    Exposure leads to increased sales, period.

  • No Big Deal (Score:5, Interesting)

    by sam_paris (919837) on Monday July 02 2007, @05:30PM (#19722949)
    In actuality, most people stopped using Allofmp3 when it became virtually impossible to pay, some months ago. (when Visa pulled the plug)

    The rather more substantial thorn in the record industrys side is now iTunes and Apple.

    • Re:No Big Deal (Score:5, Funny)

      by UPZ (947916) on Monday July 02 2007, @05:35PM (#19723001)

      In actuality, most people stopped using Allofmp3 when it became virtually impossible to pay, some months ago. (when Visa pulled the plug)
      Thats why I couldnt pay them. I thought they became communist or something.

    • Re:No Big Deal (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 02 2007, @05:42PM (#19723071)
      That's probably why allofmp3.com is now mp3Sparks.com [slashdot.org], including the same logins/passwords and the same typos in the track names and album titles.

      • Re:No Big Deal (Score:5, Funny)

        by fohat (168135) on Monday July 02 2007, @05:51PM (#19723151) Homepage
        Shhhhh.... Ixnay on the parkSay

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Harik (4023)
        except despite having spent hundreds of dollars at allofmp3, they never did transfer my account (or balance) to the new site. And they don't take any form of payment, either. They should get into linden dollars or e-gold or something goofy and obviously money-laundering like that.

        I mean, hell, how the fuck do offshore casinos move cash around?

         

  • Hmmmmm! (Score:5, Funny)

    by supe (163410) * on Monday July 02 2007, @05:32PM (#19722971) Journal
    Bush - Putin visit?

  • Soo... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Kamots (321174) on Monday July 02 2007, @05:33PM (#19722977)
    Soo...

    When US record companies see no positive impact in sales, will Russia be allowed to let allofmp3 reopen?

    Because, for some reason I find myself really doubting that people that were paying pennies for songs are going to suddenly turn around and start paying an order of magnitude more.

    But hey, what do I know? I'm just a lowly consumer...
    • don't you mean 2 orders of magnitude?

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Skreems (598317)

      When US record companies see no positive impact in sales, will Russia be allowed to let allofmp3 reopen?

      Because, for some reason I find myself really doubting that people that were paying pennies for songs are going to suddenly turn around and start paying an order of magnitude more.

      Actually, I bought at least 10 albums in the last year that I wouldn't have if I hadn't downloaded the whole thing on allofmp3 first. As well as several shows that I've gone to, enjoyed, bought a t-shirt at, etc...

      • Re:Soo... (Score:4, Informative)

        by Harik (4023) <Harik@chaos.ao.net> on Monday July 02 2007, @06:57PM (#19723725)
        Don't post on copyright subjects until you can grasp the basic concept that Copyright is NOT Trademark, and doesn't have to be enforced to maintain it.

        Copyright is for a period of time, period.
        Trademark is forever until failed to be maintained.

        And you're an idiot for telling people they HAVE to file copyright infringement suits - even worse, this isn't even copyright infringement, it's a civil issue over which of the (many) royalty schemes allofmp3.com should be paying.

        But hey, feel free to think you knew something.

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by Pofy (471469)
            If you use a trademark to actually sell what it applies to you don't need a permision. That is, if you sell your used car you can of course use the trademarked name of the car when selling it without needing any permission. Trademarks prevents you from using it to sell OTHER products. One of the main points of trademark is to avoid confusion for consumers and other buyers so that they know what they get. You can thus use it without permision (although there is probably countries were it can work differently

  • Bribery? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Aranykai (1053846) <{moc.liamg} {ta} {resnogls}> on Monday July 02 2007, @05:34PM (#19722997)

    AllOfMP3 has been a thorn in the side of the RIAA and the US government for years. Last year, U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab said that if Russia wants to join the WTO, they should shut down the pirate music website [AllOfMP3] that is robbing U.S. recording companies of sales.
    Isn't that bribery?

    bribe (plural bribes)

          1. Something (usually money) given in exchange for influence or as an inducement to dishonesty.
    http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/bribe [wiktionary.org]
    • Isn't that bribery?

      More like extortion.

    • Re:Bribery? (Score:5, Funny)

      by jez9999 (618189) on Monday July 02 2007, @05:40PM (#19723055) Homepage Journal
      It's legal in the US political system, why would international relations be any different?

    • Re:Bribery? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Caetel (1057316) * on Monday July 02 2007, @05:50PM (#19723137)
      Perhaps, but it is probably better described as coercion or extortion.

      coerce [wiktionary.org]: to use force, threat, fraud, or intimidation in attempt to compel one to act against his will.

      extort [wiktionary.org]: To wrest from an unwilling person by physical force, menace, duress, torture, or any undue or illegal exercise of power or ingenuity; to wrench away (from); to tear away; to wring (from); to exact; as, to extort contributions from the vanquished; to extort confessions of guilt; to extort a promise; to extort payment of a debt.

  • This would matter except . . . (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Cyberllama (113628) on Monday July 02 2007, @05:37PM (#19723017)
    There's already a good 100 clones of allofmp3 with similar music catalogs and pricing schemes all operating out of Russia. Shutting down one website is really a non-issue at this point, anyone can go to google and find dozens of alternatives all operating out of Russia.

  • And once they stop "robbing" RIAA, sales go up? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by GodWasAnAlien (206300) on Monday July 02 2007, @05:43PM (#19723075)
    So once allofmp3 is shut down, do they really expect sales to go up?

    If there was a similar legitimate, and DRM-free service, and prices were low enough, perhaps sales would go up.

    It seems that RIAA still does not get it, things like Napster, mp3.com, and allofmp3 will keep coming until the RIAA, or the artist themselves decide to stop fighting the Internet model, and instead profit from it.

      • The thing about AllOfMP3 was that it showed the marginal cost of running an online store. Even if we assume that AllOfMP3 was not paying anything to the recording industry, and not making any profit, they must still have been covering their bandwidth costs. Now, add on to that roughly what the RIAA pays artists, and you get something like 10-20/track as the minimum cost of running a fair music store. Then they can look at iTunes selling tracks for $1.29 (without DRM), and suddenly realise that $1 of every track they buy is going to middle men who aren't providing any service of value to them.

        There isn't much a customer can do about this, but there is a lot an artist can do when they do the same sums. This is why the RIAA members want AllOfMP3 shut down. It shows exactly how much profit they are raking in from online sales to exactly the people they don't want to know; the ones they claim to represent.

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by NormalVisual (565491)
            The thing is, you don't need the biggest and best studio to record a decent-sounding album. Yeah, it's nice to have a humongous SSL board with a full ProTools suite and lots of other high-end gear to add lots of sparkle, but it's far more important to have a decent engineer that understands how to work with what he's got. Contrary to popular belief, there are lots of good engineers out there that actually enjoy what they do, and don't charge ridiculous prices for their services. I personally can't see th

        • Re:And once they stop "robbing" RIAA, sales go up? (Score:5, Interesting)

          by shark72 (702619) on Monday July 02 2007, @08:48PM (#19725065)

          "allofmp3 WAS legitimate in Russia. It paid royalties to ROMS, the Russian organization responsible for collecting copyright fees. The RIAA simply didn't like ROMS' rates and structures (even though Russia, as a sovereign nation, has every right to set its own royalties), and declared allofmp3 illegal."

          Well, for what it's worth, ROMS isn't recognized by any of the world's performance licensing groups. Whether that's a badge of honor or a shame is, as the math texts state, an exercise left to the reader.

          Contrary to popular belief, the cost of sale of a music download usually isn't zero. There are mechanical royalties to the composer and lyricist to deal with (the mechanical rate is set by law), and there are usually contractual royalties as well, paid to the performer. Record companies have tricks for minimizing these royalties, but it's a safe assumption that for a typical track sold on iTunes, mechanical and contractual royalties are being accrued.

          Now, let's say you're a record company. For the sake of simplicity let's say you're one of the cool indie labels, and you pay your artists fairly. One track you sell has a mechanical of $0.08 each to the composer and lyricist, and you're throwing the rest of the band an additional $0.04, for a total of $0.20 that you owe to the artists for each track sold.

          So this ROMS outfit tells you that you can have a portion of the licensing fee that they've collected, if you really want it. The web site sold your track for $0.20, for which they paid ROMS $0.02. ROMS takes their cut, so that penny is ready for you to take whenever you want it.

          Trouble is, if you take that penny, you still owe the band $0.20. If you take it and don't pay them their $0.20 (for a net loss of $0.19 to you), the best case is that they'll be mightily (and rightfully) pissed. The worst case is that they'll find themselves a lawyer.

          So, you eat the difference. ROMS says that they've collected royalties for 10,000 downloads and they owe you $100. You take the $100 and pay your band the $2,000 they're owed. You're out $1,900.

          And then ROMS tells you that they have another $100 for you. And another. And another.

          My story is hypothetical; mainly for the very big reason that artist who've tried to get sales info from allofmp3.com have failed in their quest. Yes, I am aware that AllofMP3 stated that they supported artists' rights, but they could have at least shared this basic sales data, just as iTunes and legitimate stores do. And, if you try surfing the ROMS site for information on how to collect royalties, it quickly becomes frustrating, even if you speak Russian. Compare this with the two US performance right societies, ASCAP and BMI -- they go out of their way to make it easy for artists to find out how much they are owed. I know that lots of people reading this see ROMS and allofmp3 as the good guys in this situation, but it's just not showing from their actions.

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by adona1 (1078711)

            They were exploiting a loophole in Russian law and they knew it.


            Upstart Russian website exploiting a loophole in law = filthy communist thieves.

            Established tax-paying middleman business exploiting a loophole in law = good business practices [wikipedia.org]?

  • Thorn in the Side? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by fm6 (162816) on Monday July 02 2007, @06:01PM (#19723227) Homepage Journal
    "Thorn in the side" means "constant source of irritation". An MP3 bootlegger is certainly a "thorn in the side" of the RIAA. But of the U.S. government? Somehow, in this era of major terrorism, genocide, nuclear proliferation, insurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan, and other thorny issues, I don't think anybody in the government loses sleep over allofmp3.

  • And the site that replaces it is - (Score:4, Funny)

    by Archon-X (264195) on Monday July 02 2007, @06:13PM (#19723291)
    www.mp3sugar.com [mp3sugar.com]

  • Balance carried over to Mp3Sparks.com (Score:5, Informative)

    by justinjas (1123183) on Monday July 02 2007, @06:59PM (#19723751)
    I noticed the comments about Mp3Sparks.com. I'd never heard of them but saw that they we're run by the same guys. I was bummed to hear allofmp3 was shutdown since I still had $30 balance on it. What do you know though, I tried to login with my allofmp3 username/login on Mp3Sparks and my account and balance was carried over. And I just assumed they'd steal my money.

  • slyck.com (Score:4, Informative)

    by SilverwoodUG (853342) on Monday July 02 2007, @07:41PM (#19724281) Homepage
    slyck [slyck.com] has a better article

    • Re:robbing == theft (Score:4, Informative)

      by superwiz (655733) on Monday July 02 2007, @05:43PM (#19723081) Journal
      nope. theft is only taking something in a way such that the original owner no longer has it. copyright infringement is not theft. it is what it is.

      • More accurately, the RIAA can't prove that it's theft.

        The RIAA argues that if the person hadn't received the song illegally, that they would have purchased it. By providing an alternative means to get that song, allofmp3 are taking $X from the RIAA, which is ethically (if not semantically) the same as theft. Unfortunately, the RIAA can't prove when they actually lost sales, but I'm sure they are in some percentage of cases. Maybe that percentage is around what you'd argue (perhaps 0.0001%?) or maybe it's

            • I think you go a bit too far. There are many people who say things like "I'm sick of buying a whole album for one song" or who disparage popular music who then go buy single tracks and indie music at iTunes and eMusic. And there really are people who think that copyright violation (which, and I'm not saying this to condone it, isn't 'theft') is a way to hurt "the man". They're mistaken about that, and there may be many people who are being totally hypocritical when they say things like that, but I think you

      • Re:robbing == theft (Score:5, Funny)

        by wall0159 (881759) on Monday July 02 2007, @06:19PM (#19723353)
        "..robbing US recording companies of sales"

        -Stick 'em up!
        -Yeah - git your hands in the air!
        -We heard you got some "sales"
        -No funny business - hand em over - slowly!
        -That's right - nice and slow, and noone will get hurt...

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by westlake (615356)
        copyright infringement is not theft. it is what it is.

        The notion that copyright infringement was a form of theft became current in English language and in English thought while the Black Flag still flew over the Caribbean.

        It made perfect sense to Dickens, who had some choice things to say about the American character in this context. Copy Wrong: Internet Piracy and Dickens and Melville [americanheritage.com]

        The geek wastes time and pursuing the linguistic argument, the philosophical argument, which were lost long ago.

        The

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by rockhome (97505)
        That is a poor rhetorical trick to justify theft.

        Copyright infringement limits the ability of the content owner to receive compensation for his
        work. Even though nothing physical is taken in the act, the result is the same and, in such instances,
        can be considered a proper analog for theft.

        It is all well and good to deny that copyright infringement is not theft and hide behind a naive technicality
        in order to continue to be in the wrong.

        By your logic, were I to acquire your credit card and purchase items, I a

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by gsslay (807818)
          I don't like the idea of buying music online that can't be burned onto a CD as a back-up due to DRM controls

          Well I don't know of a online site that doesn't allow burning onto a CD. Got any examples?

          When I was younger, I almost always bought the newest albums, because the music was good, or at least I thought so .... I don't want to pay $15 for an album that is crap (which describes most, but not all, of new music today).

          Congratulations, you have reached middle age. Next step - complaining that you can't

            • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

              by Tink2000 (524407)
              Either your sister is lying to you, or doesn't know how to properly operate the easiest-to-use music software (imo, ymmv) ever, or she doesn't have a cd burner. You choose.

              Tracks bought from ITMS can be burned to CD a limited number (7) of times.

              • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

                by davester666 (731373)
                > Tracks bought from ITMS can be burned to CD a limited number (7) of times.

                Close. It's not an individual song, but a playlist [group of songs] that has a limit. By including a given song in different playlists, it can be burned an unlimited number of times, even without ripping a 'burnt' copy of the song, thus removing the copy protection completely.

        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Pofy (471469)
          >That's why they said that allofmp3.com was robbing them of sales.

          Which in many cases can be completely legal despite you and them using the world "robbing", I believe it is common to call it competition in the market. Just because someone manage to use thw world "theft", "steal" or "robbery" to describe something doesn't turn it illegal (not commenting on allofmp3 here, just the use of the worlds). From what I see, people tend to use theft for all sort of things related (and not so related) to copyrigh

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by superwiz (655733)
          I have not. They can still sell it to me. It is an oft repeated story that people have bought music after downloading it. So the ability is still there. But that's moot, anyway. Because "ability" to engage some free person in commerce is not a property. It is a stroke of luck. So all I did was reduce your chances of getting lucky. That's not the same as taking from you the proverbial bird in the hand. All I did was make it less likely that you'll get that bird in the tree. But as the saying goes t

      • Re: robbing == theft (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Belacgod (1103921) on Monday July 02 2007, @07:06PM (#19723839)
        Precisely. The demand curve for music is very elastic. People will get free stuff that they wouldn't pay $1 for, people will pay $1 for stuff they wouldn't pay $16.99 for, and so on. The RIAA's claim that music demand is totally inelastic is, IMO, more laughable than any of their legal claims.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Rashkae (59673)
      Guaranteed quality (you chose the encoding bitrate yourself on most of their albums).. Great search engine/catalogue navigation without having to worry about download speeds or what downloads finished..Basically, it was just a really convenient service. And since time *is* money, well worth the small charges they applied.

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