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Alltunes.com Lets Users Download AllofMP3 Songs
Stony Stevenson writes with word that, although AllofMP3.com was shut down by the Russian Government this week, customers from the site who have existing credit can still purchase songs through its downloadable windows desktop and smartphone client, allTunes.com. From the article: "A former AllofMP3.com user, who spoke to Computerworld on the condition of anonymity, purchased songs with his existing credit from the allTunes software client today and experienced no trouble doing so... AllofMP3's six million users will no doubt be delighted they can use their leftover credit to purchase songs, but the site's longevity hangs in the balance. Just days after the Russian Government shut down AllofMP3.com, its sister site, MP3Sparks.com, suffered the same fate."
Slashdot posters are traditionally link-happy. Where is the link to the article about AllofMP3.com's takedown? I didn't know about this.
Whether or not you believe what AllOfMp3.com was doing was illegal or unethical, it has got to be at least a little worrisome that a group of American corporations can effectively control the legal system of another major nation.
In my more paranoid moments, I might consider this evidence for an upcoming shift from nation-state to corporation-state as the global political unit. Then again, I'm also prepared for the inevitable zombie outbreak, so perhaps you oughtn't listen to me.
Reality has a conservative bias: it conserves mass, energy, momentum...
Don't worry; they'll be resurrected in Antigua, now that the US has lost in the WTO dispute and Antigua declared it was free to retaliate by ignoring US copyrights.
Many Russian expats relied on allofmp3.com as the only real way to access a lot of the music they know and love from back home. You just can't buy CDs of Hi-Fi or even Russian folk bands in the US. The RIAA has now essentially stolen representation of russian artists whether the russian artists cared about allofmp3.com or not. I'm not saying that allofmp3.com supported Russian artists at all, nor am I saying that allofmp3.com wasn't pirating russian music (it appears not, due to russian copyright law). But rather that the RIAA has unilaterally declared themselves the owner of all copyrighted music material in the Russia as well as the US, whether or not they really do. That is the despicable part of their actions.
The difference between theft and infringement is irrelevant to the discussion, because the infringement is just as harmful to the rightful owners of the intellectual property, as the theft is to those of the tangible property.
They are equally harmful to the rest of the society too. Because of thieves we must burden ourselves daily with locks, keys, alarms, chains. Similarly, the infringers force us to deal with DRM and other fair-use preventing implementations.
Thus the terms can be used interchangibly without too much of a stretch.
I don't even see RIAA "shills" as "despicable". They are doing their work, fighting for their employer's rights...
He was protesting against slavery and the Mexican war. To use the same term to describe a "battle" against a non-governmental organization in a fight for entertainment of all things, is, on one hand, a sign of a very substantial quality of life improvement, and, on the other, that of how silly your complaints and cheek-puffing really is...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
You left off the best one -
They do it because I it is a natural right. Listening to a song and then humming the melody yourself differs only in degree, not kind, with downloading and keeping the complete song. Either you believe in freedom of expression, or you don't. Because where you may choose to draw the line isn't necessarily where anyone else may choose to draw the line. After all, copyright law as defined by USC Title 17 is just arbitrary line as drawn up by a select few vested interests, no more meaningful than anyone else's opinion.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
At a music store I can listen to any track on an album and I rarely like more than one. So why should I buy a whole bag of assorted jelly beans if I already tried them all and only like the red ones? Recording labels put artists under a great deal of pressure to produce albums. The result is a couple of good tracks and a dozen space fillers.
I want the opportunity to buy what I want and not to buy what I don't want. I don't think I am being unreasonable.
If an album has 20 tracks and costs $20, I want to be able to buy one track for $1. And it has to be the same quality as on CD - lossless format and DRM-free. Until the music industry shows such flexibility, labels will continue losing sales, music piracy will thrive, and musicians will remain under pressure to produce mediocre art.
Remember, allofmp3.com was legal under Russian law. Your scheme also sounds legal, but they will find a way of defining this as "piracy on the high seas" one way or another.
Off topic, that's what really annoys me about the new FBI "Anti-Piracy"warning on DVDs. I can understand the MPAA and similar organizations misusing words like "stealing" and "piracy" because they're more interested in polemical wattage than legal accuracy, but the FBI is a law enforcement agency for crying out loud; they have no excuse for misapplying legal terms to the wrong crimes. Illegal copying is copyright infringement, it is neither piracy nor simple theft.
That is a statement of fact, not wishful thinking.
Copyright holders appeal to sentimental, loaded language because deep inside them they know their business model is broken.
Saying this as somebody that has never pirated a single song, mind you.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.