AllOfMP3.com
Author
http://music.allofmp3.com/ offers music downloads for $0.10 a track or less than $2 for an album.
Seems too good to be true.
Is this a legitimate business? I'm wary of giving them my credit card info.
They're real, but I wouldn't buy from them. The business is located in Russia, and it's always been a center of controversy.. for a few more dollars, iTMS, Yahoo! and Napster don't seem so bad.
They are real, they are a legitimate business in Russia, following all of Russia's laws.
However, it's unclear whether you in the good old USA are paying for music or simply paying for the privilege of pirating music from their servers.
It's still an untested in a court of law, in regards to international commerce, artist's rights, etc.
However, it's unclear whether you in the good old USA are paying for music or simply paying for the privilege of pirating music from their servers.
It's still an untested in a court of law, in regards to international commerce, artist's rights, etc.
Let's see... company located in Russia... no licensing agreements.... artists don't see a penny of your subscription money. Ethically, how is this any better than pirating the music yourself?
I did some background checks on this service myself. The most I could come up with is that it's legality is questionable but untested either. That stems from the fact that this company is legally licensing music according to Russian law. But that isn't saying much, because Russian law doesn't really care so much about copyrights as it does the pure right to distribute particular media. So legally this business is operating within perfectly legal bounds.. but as to whether importing music from a foreign country where the business has legitimate distribution rights is what is the issue.
It may be the case that if you are not physically in Russia, that what you are doing does not constitute importing of music and may be illegal according to U.S. law because it is no different than downloading from a P2P service. However, how exactly does one know if the company they are buying from does in fact have the legal right to distribute the media they are selling? Problems like this have been brought up and the conclusion was that if one were to be caught using this service, had it been deemed illegal, you would be guilty as an innocent infringer and fined $200 for each violation under section 504(c)(2) of the Copyright Act.
Probably better to avoid it.
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Michael Tanczos
It may be the case that if you are not physically in Russia, that what you are doing does not constitute importing of music and may be illegal according to U.S. law because it is no different than downloading from a P2P service. However, how exactly does one know if the company they are buying from does in fact have the legal right to distribute the media they are selling? Problems like this have been brought up and the conclusion was that if one were to be caught using this service, had it been deemed illegal, you would be guilty as an innocent infringer and fined $200 for each violation under section 504(c)(2) of the Copyright Act.
Probably better to avoid it.
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Michael Tanczos
AllOfMp3 is definitely an interesting case, both technically and legally. They're a perfectly legal business in Russia, there is no doubt about that. There have been a lot of pushing from the side of the RIAA to close this site, but the response from the Russian copyright control agency (ROMS) has been clear: this business aquired a legal right to 'broadcast' music. Just as any radiostation in the US or EU. The difference being some details in Russian copyright law, which basically equals commercial internet distribution to a radio broadcast.
Actually, AoM is not that cheap - for Russians. Taken into account the difference in purchasing power, it's quite on par with iTunes and co for a typical Russian household.
But it's clear that AoM is not only targeting the Russian market, but deliberately the Western markets as well. This is again perfectly legal to Russian law, but whether or not you are allowed to import this music into your country is debatable (and depends a lot on local jurisdiction). AoM is definitely pushing the (huge) greyzone of international copyright laws. But it would be incorrect to say that AoM is an illegal site, because it definitely is not.
Of course, tons of people use it. It's extremely popular over here, especially due to its large collection of Western European music. Compare:
iTunes & friends: low quality highly compressed music, the DRM dictates how you can and cannot use the music you purchased (mostly cannot in pratice), Windows only, high price (basically the same as if you bought a CD).
AoM: high quality music in any format you like, even uncompressed, no DRM, any OS, very competitive prices.
No wonder everybody uses it. Legal questions aside, the music industry could learn a lot from them. Make online music easy to buy, download and use. Give the customer a choice in quality, format and platform. Make the music affordable, and not a luxury good.
Here is an interesting article about its legal implications in different countries. IANAL though, so I don't know how genuine this information is.
Actually, AoM is not that cheap - for Russians. Taken into account the difference in purchasing power, it's quite on par with iTunes and co for a typical Russian household.
But it's clear that AoM is not only targeting the Russian market, but deliberately the Western markets as well. This is again perfectly legal to Russian law, but whether or not you are allowed to import this music into your country is debatable (and depends a lot on local jurisdiction). AoM is definitely pushing the (huge) greyzone of international copyright laws. But it would be incorrect to say that AoM is an illegal site, because it definitely is not.
Of course, tons of people use it. It's extremely popular over here, especially due to its large collection of Western European music. Compare:
iTunes & friends: low quality highly compressed music, the DRM dictates how you can and cannot use the music you purchased (mostly cannot in pratice), Windows only, high price (basically the same as if you bought a CD).
AoM: high quality music in any format you like, even uncompressed, no DRM, any OS, very competitive prices.
No wonder everybody uses it. Legal questions aside, the music industry could learn a lot from them. Make online music easy to buy, download and use. Give the customer a choice in quality, format and platform. Make the music affordable, and not a luxury good.
Here is an interesting article about its legal implications in different countries. IANAL though, so I don't know how genuine this information is.
Quote:Original post by Sneftel
Ethically, how is this any better than pirating the music yourself?
Exactly. Why is it even an issue if it's legal or not? I remember that survay about piracy in the lounge, and, excluding those that said "I pirate things!!1!@" (and, incidentally, were banned moments later), I think just about everyone said that the moral aspect, rather than the law, was what stopped people from pirating music. If that's true, then, even if it were legal, this service shouldn't be any more appealing (less, in fact, because you're actually paying someone for the opportunity to be unethical) than simply pirating the music.
Point of information:
Uh, tell that to my Mac [smile]
Quote:Original post by Yann L
iTunes & friends: low quality highly compressed music, the DRM dictates how you can and cannot use the music you purchased (mostly cannot in pratice), Windows only, high price (basically the same as if you bought a CD).
Uh, tell that to my Mac [smile]
Quote:Original post by superpig
Uh, tell that to my Mac [smile]
Heh, of course someone had to mention this, I should've used another example than iTunes [wink]
But my point still stands for the "& friends" part: when you take 'services' like Napster (Windows IE only), Yahoo (Windows IE only), Virgin online (which won't even let you visit the site with anything else than Windows + IE), Fnac Music (french service over here, Windows + IE only), etc. The list is endless.
Quote:Original post by superpig
Point of information:Quote:Original post by Yann L
iTunes & friends: low quality highly compressed music, the DRM dictates how you can and cannot use the music you purchased (mostly cannot in pratice), Windows only, high price (basically the same as if you bought a CD).
Uh, tell that to my Mac [smile]
Tell that to my Slackware Linux system. Or FreeBSD. Or any other OS in the world besides Windows and Mac OS(X).
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