Russians going after allofmp3.com?

February 23, 2005 6:52 AM

After much discussion about legality, within thirty days we will know if Russian authorities are going to bring criminal charges against Allofmp3.com for large-scale copyright infringement.
posted by anathema (19 comments total)

I, for one, am glad that I didn't buy many many many albums there for pennies on the dollar.
posted by ColdChef at 6:54 AM on February 23, 2005

Hurry and don't download while you can!
posted by Dukebloo at 7:04 AM on February 23, 2005

ColdChef, like they're going to track down customers and prosecute them? Please.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 7:15 AM on February 23, 2005

Luckily, the files had no DRM so they will still work even after allofmp3 is shut down.
posted by smackfu at 7:19 AM on February 23, 2005

Hmm... apperantly the licenses they bought were (possibly) fakes to begin with.

Selling likely records in russia is a huge deal (that's what TATU did before they went global), so I can see why record companies would license the tracks cheaply.
posted by delmoi at 7:23 AM on February 23, 2005

Flanders, read Chef's comment again while picturing him chuckling to himself as he browses his 120 gigs of mp3s.
posted by anathema at 7:33 AM on February 23, 2005

Ok. I obviously need to read your comment a little differently too. Oops!
posted by anathema at 7:34 AM on February 23, 2005

Even if AllOfMp3 is legal, by buying our albums offshore, we take away the jobs of hard-working americans in the recording industry, little people who toil for as little as 70 or 100 thousand dollars a year.

It's willful moral blindness to rationalize this kind of assault on the American worker as "watching the bottom line" or "getting lean and mean" or as "fiduciary responsibility" to your shareholders -- especially when almost all of the your savings on albums (as much as $15 per CD) goes into your own pocket and the pockets of your close cronies in the form of "executive benefits", "bonuses" and "golden parachutes".

Can you imagine the hue and cry if an American company did the sort of thing you're doing by buying from AllOfMp3.com? If an American company did business overseas just because that was cheaper, and put most of the savings into top executives' salaries and benefits, while at the same time causing American jobs to be lost?

Why that sort of thing wouldn't be tolerated for an instant, not by anyone who truly loves America! Congress would pass all sorts of new "Intellectual Property" laws to put an end to it, and the FCC would mandate that all TVs sold to the American public be modified to include hardware to prevent such theft. Because our leaders truly care about the little guy!

So for shame! Stop your overseas out sourcing of your entertainment budget, and remember we don't do that sort of things to our fellow Americans!

So STFU album parasites!
posted by orthogonality at 7:40 AM on February 23, 2005

Usher needs his bling.
posted by ColdChef at 7:45 AM on February 23, 2005

I wonder if the "legality" of their licenses will boil down to whether RIAA can slip the Russian authorities more baksheesh than the proprietors of AllOfMp3 can?
posted by gregor-e at 8:01 AM on February 23, 2005

Supporting the russian mp3 is the best possible thing an antiliberulz can do !

Them liberulz always supported russia and communist, didn't they ? Well it's time for revenge ! Let's see how sweet russia is to communist supporters, let russian sell the mp3s..after all the money that is lost doesn't go in hollywood pockets. Why shoud we ruin relationship with russia by "politely asking" (read command them) to stop selling the mp3s ?

Plus, it's free market at work !
posted by elpapacito at 8:22 AM on February 23, 2005

Coldchef, don't you think Usher has a ton of bling already? Please.

I feel like an SNL sketch: Sarcasm-Deaf Man
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 8:24 AM on February 23, 2005

hmm. i always meant to sign up just to see what they had and see if i could find anything new to listen to. probably mostly top-40 junk anyway?
posted by weretable and the undead chairs at 9:15 AM on February 23, 2005

When they raised their prices, I bought less. How ridiculous is that?
posted by smackfu at 9:18 AM on February 23, 2005

weretable, you can browse their entire collection without having an account.
posted by zsazsa at 11:34 AM on February 23, 2005

If you'd like to try them and are concerned about giving them your CC#, use a Visa gift card. You can get them at any Simon mall in the U.S. for $1.50 + whatever you want to put in it.
posted by exhilaration at 1:36 PM on February 23, 2005

As someone who purchased from them browsed their inventory pretty frequently, I can tell you their catalogue was indeed heavy on top 40 pap and a lot of Russian/Euro artists I'd never heard of - but they also had a good selection of classic rock stuff, and I guess I justified my purchases (oops!) based on the fact that I'd already bought the material legitimately on vinyl (!), cassette (!!), or even CDs that I had lost over the years. (Oh, and PS - they also take PayPal.)
posted by contraposto at 1:45 PM on February 23, 2005

They only take Paypal on alternate Tuesdays, in my experience.
posted by smackfu at 7:33 PM on February 23, 2005

They've got a nice selection of metal and other music I've not seen on other commercial sites. And their rates were completely reasonable (at least until they jacked them up to 2 cents a mb) you could get a lossless encoding of a standard length album for about $10, what you'd expect to pay for an album without cover art, liner notes or a physical presence. Or you could get it compressed in any flavor for about a buck an album, a reasonable rate for compressed tunes.

I will certainly miss them if they get shut down.
posted by Jawn at 12:36 AM on February 24, 2005