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Russian Music Site Offering Legal Songs By The MB
An anonymous reader writes "The Sydney Morning Herald is reporting on a Russian Music site that is offering legal digital music by the MB. The site apparently has a license from the Russian Music authorities to legally distribute songs for a fraction of the price of what is being offered by iTunes and others. The report from SMH is here. Amazingly, the site offers files in any format and encoding you choose and rips it on the fly. Notifications by email follow when the songs are ready for download. Sounds a little to good to be true :)"
click me
http://www.allofmp3.com/
Been using their services for half a year now without any problems. They're licenced with the Russian equivalent of the RIAA, so I don't see where the problem is.
This is a great example of the free market combined with the internet. I'm able to buy goods and services from wherever it suits me.
"Democracy is three wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner."
Considering that the RIAA sued weblisten for RE-distributing allofmp3.com's content, but didnt sue them, this is probably legal..
Official GOD FAQ.
Dear users!
We proud to announce a new encoding function called Online Encoding Exclusive, which is a part of the "Online Encoding" service and became available at AllOFMP3.com in the test mode. Online Encoding Exclusive enables you to:
1. Encode music with LossLess encoding algorithms (Monkey's Audio, FLAC and OptimFrog) using the data of original audio CD as a source.
2. Encode music with our usual encoders (MP3, Ogg, etc.) using the data of original audio CD as a source.
Albums, that available for ordering through Online Encoding Exclusive service are marked with a special label . The amount of such albums will grow from day to day. We hope that you'll enjoy our new service.
More details about Online Encoding Exclusive service.
AllOFMP3.com team.
YAFIRL (Yet another Free iPods referral link)
The website is in English.
I've been using another service from Russia, MP3 Search Club with great success for some time now. Frankly, I'm surprised this qualifies as news. This service, too, is liscenced by the "Russian RIAA". As a Canadian, I find this site an invaluable compliment to my right to make personal copies of music to share with others. ;-P Given, though, that this other site lets you encode in your favorite format, I'll probably soon switch over to them.
A lot of people, apparently. Including me. I've been very happy with it.
I don't think they even accept credit cards directly; at least, I don't recall seeing that option when I signed up.
I signed up using PayPal. That's one reason I took the plunge: a (more or less) reputable American intermediary for the financial end. I have a balance, that's deducted from for each download. When it's near empty, I go to PayPal and fill 'er up again. It's pretty painless.
Learn from the mistakes of others. You won't live long enough to make them all yourself.
If you live in Australia, where the article is written, then it is legal The parallel importing of music is legal in Australia. The parallel importing of music helps keep the price down and is evidence of a free market economy working well, unlike the USA with the BSA and MPAA and RIAA and other IP outfits where these gestapo like organisations control the free flow of information.
Does it go on forever?
And from this Guardian article:
The problem is that, according to the recording industry, these sites are breaking the law. As Alan Dixon, general counsel of the London-based International Federation of the Phonograph Industry, says of Weblisten: "They have not less than six lawsuits pending against them, and two criminal proceedings. They are taking advantage of the way the Spanish legal system moves incredibly slowly: they have never been declared as legitimately distributing the plaintiff's recording."
The issue is that recorded music has three sets of rights to be argued over. The songwriter has the copyright to the song, the artist his own rights in it, and the record label and producers a third set. While these Russian and Spanish sites may be paying the songwriters, via a collection agency, they are acting without the permission of the other copyright holders.
The Russian sites claim that, under Russian law, foreign record labels releasing music in Russia give up their rights to prevent this. Not so, says Dixon. Such Soviet-era rules were rescinded under "article 47 paragraph 2 of the Russian Copyright Code" years ago. Downloading from such sites would be infringing both British and Russian copyright law, he says.