Nothing prevent us form going into a store and jacking whatever we want.

Any statment to the contrary is propaganda. Still people go to the store and pay for stuff.

But for me as far as the RIAA/MPAA members are concerned I want them DEAD! PEROIOD!
Particularly Vivendi/Universal. And I believe that I am getting what I want as we speak, so none
of us will have to fetch our guns.

Cool!

I am demanding for the compensation of the victims though.

The “closing” of AllOfMP3.com was a subterfuge. The site was simply re-badged as MP3sparks.com. Same product line, same prices.

If that were not enough, there now exist many copycat sites that sprang up like mushrooms after a heavy rain, selling music tracks for 10¢ to 15¢ each.

Allofmp3 was rebranded to MP3Sparks.com and is alive and kicking!

It’s even possible to buy download credit again! Check http://www.museekster.com/allofmp3payments.htm

Now that’s funny.
Everything allofMp3 had could and can be found for free
on p2p , you know that .. everyone knows that.
Yet, people still paid .. they will pay if …

.. the price is right ( it was )
.. no DRM ( not there )

Allofmp3 competed with free and made money.
Proof of concept.

This was certainly no victory. It was grand bribery from an unscrupulous criminal organization, RIAA.

Precisely, and why ??

The russian model did not use the dollar per track model that
the US industry likes. You know .. the one that still treats a download
like a physical item .. 1 dollar per track with DRM.

The russian model was SMART.
Cheap, by bytes downloaded and no DRM.
EVERYTHING that the customer wants.
It was the ideal industry model.
The american assholes wanted more though, pure greed.

They want to know how to make downloading work, well, they DO know,
and the concept is proven.

P.S. how many Artist had SuX found on their own since Fred updated us on the topic of stealing money from the artists by label/copyrightowners sockpuppets like SuX?

Small ?
AllofMp3 did incredibly well.
It proved that people will pay when it is drm and bullshit free.

Russia has it’s own version of the same collective agencies we do, that pay the artists.
AllofMp3 paid the russian collective societies, the sam as we pay the american collective
societies, which then pay the artists. They were legally licensed in russia to do the
same things that Itunes does in the us. Itunes sells what they do not ‘own’ .. they are
licensed and pay US authorized collectice societies. AllofMP3 did EXACLTY the same
thing … the difference is .. they dared to use a pricing model that the labels do not
comprehend, and sold tracks for a reasonable price, AND they were making a buttload
of cash.
They were proof that using a sensible pricing model, people will pay for it instead
of using the ‘free’ route. The RIAA cannot allow proof such as that to survive.

” Did any of the revenue, small as it was, filter through to the artists? ”

I’m sure the russian collective paid at least as much to the artist that their
american counterparts pay to the artist … take that for what it’s worth, when you
consider how many artists collective agencies in the US can’t ‘find’ to pay
What make you think the US entities responsible for paying the artists are any more
or less honest that their Russian couterparts ?

We can never know for sure because the american versions hide their accounting
and payment practices from any responsible party.

Do you really believe that the american versions of collective societies are honest ?

However, the labels aren’t at all interested in solutions or compromise. They want want to control how, and by whom, music is distributed online. Period. Full stop.

And as Kommersant suggests, “Winding up the site was called one of the key provisions for Russia’s admission to the WTO.”

On the links, I had to moderate Andy’s post.

I try to check the comments often precisely to keep an eye open for those with two or more links and I don’t think I’ll have missed very many. However, I’m not online twenty four hours a day, and when I am around, I’m doing stories so inevitably, there’ll be delays.

Cheers!
Jon

On posting troubles: I feel for Mr “Reader’s Write”, it’s tough when you’ve collected some references, to have it bounced (apparently!). I’m curious to see if logging in bypasses the filters. I’m going to post three links; if this makes it to the board, assume that it does. And Jon, if you have to moderate this… delete this part!!!

http://www.michaelgeist.ca/
http://www.neutrality.ca/
http://www.savetheinternet.com/

Sorry for that.

I tried it with three URLs and the number of incoming junk posts appearing jumped dramatically.

The alternative is to allow a shit-load of spam comments crawling with links to Chinese and US kiddie-and other-porn sites, guaranteed downloads, and so on.

I’ve been there and I don’t want to go there again.

Cheers!

Court confirms legality
http://blogs.allofmp3.ru/music_news/2007/11/05/court-confirms-legality-of-allofmp3com/

Court rules allofmp3 operated within the law ..
http://blogs.allofmp3.ru/music_news/2007/08/27/court-rules-that-allofmp3com-operated-within-the-law/

So they are gone, yet are winning every one of their court cases, and have
been declared fully legal by their court system.

Gone for now, but back with a vengeance ?