Comments on “A Kid in the Musical Candy Shop”
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30 Responses to “A Kid in the Musical Candy Shop”
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Tomas Martin30
until the music industry comes up with a similar system, sites like allofmp3 will exist. It would be far fairer for itunes to price downloads per megabyte, for instance - it always galls me to pay 99c for an introduction track of 30s, that without which the album wouldn’t be complete. the industry is being simply immoral to charge the same price for downloads as cds - there are so many more costs involved with a cd, in distribution to shops as well as manufacturing - all those store clerks have to be paid.
I think the music industry will be caught out by this. Everyone hates the RIAA (voted most evil corporation in the world) and musicians are starting to realise that the old system of many middle managers is not working and not giving them nearly enough share of the profit.
within five years, i expect we’ll see a site much like allofmp3, maybe slightly more expensive but not much, run by independent musicians. as soon as a couple of big artists go that way, to selling their own music online and getting much larger percentages of the profits, it’s all over for the music execs.
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Dan29
I’m a huge fan of Allofmp3.com and like others here have spent a lot on it in recent times, and I’ve been happy to use Xrost to fund my purchases securely. However I’ve recently discovered that I can’t use the Xrost site to top up my balance: there’s a message there saying that the server is being worked on and normal service will resume in 48 hours. It’s now been a lot longer than that. Anyone else had the same problem?
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Gadianton28
IMHO, as far as the ethics are concerned, the question really is who gets the money. From what I gather from the Wikipedia article on allofmp3, neither the record companies nor the artists get any money. Instead, the money goes to the Russian government and allofmp3 itself. Now, I’m not exactly the largest fan of the Russian government and I am not too eager to support them with my cash. Moreover, if the site is selling music that is not their property and not giving any money to those people whose property it is, it really looks like selling stolen goods, no matter whether it is legal (because of some loopholes) or not. So — and please correct me if I’m wrong — it looks like that your money is going to (a) a repressive regime and (b) people who sell stolen goods and not to (c) the artists who actually make all the music. Not the kind of people I would like to support, if you ask me. I mean, if North Korea launched its own online music store, it probably would be legal as well, but I definitely would not want to support them with my money (BTW, this is something Kim Jong Il should think about. At least that would be cheesy, and odds are he’d also get some hard currency.)
BTW, I don’t quite understand the bad words about the P2P networks. I’ve never had any issues with quality, you don’t have to hunt down individual songs — the album or even the entire discography is nicely archived in a single file, many albums are available in lossless encoding, and you don’t give any money to people who do not deserve it.
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max27
Just my two cents worth on legality issue: there was a long-standing legal battle between Apple Recording Studios (founded by Beatles and still managing the Beatles’ music) and Apple computers about the name. In the 1990, it was settled that Apple Comps can use the name as long as they don’t sell music. No wonder, they were sued again as soon as they started selling songs in iTunes. I don’t know all the details of the case, but I know they used the argument that they sell data, not music. An argument that, strangely, doesn’t work for AllOfMp3.
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Bulent Boytorun26
I have been using allofmp3.com since March 2005 and purchased numerous songs. There is another similar service in Russia called mp3spy.ru, which is just as good as allomp3.com.
I have also provided my cc details to both of them as well as Xrost, and not one problem so far.
As for the ethics side, as long as the record industry keeps overcharging the public, I see no problem with the opportunities a different country’s laws provide me with.
But, there is another matter that keeps sticking to my mind.
Why bother with downloading? So much HD space going to waste. One can not listen to more than 300 song a day anyway. And that is, if we were to listen to music 24 hours every day!
I think I would rather like to have a service where I have access to ALL the music in the world, ever produced, and I don’t have to download anything. Pay a monthly fee and have access to all archive. Create your own podcasts to get the music into ipod, and you’re done.
A bit like pandora with added flexibility (i.e. you make your own playlists).
Does anyone know a site that provides this kind of a service?
BB
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Graham25
For me the legal and ethical issues are very clear: The Russian authorities have investigated allofmp3.com and determined that they are not breaking any Russian laws. Case closed. The RIAA is lying when they call this an illegal site. It is false to even describe the legality as “murky” or questionable.” One of the fundamental cornerstones of democracy is that individuals (and corporations and websites, etc) are innocent until proven guilty. In fact, in other statements, the RIAA has admitted that allofmp3.com operates within “a loophole” in Russian law! A loophole is the result of an error by lawmakers that left some action legal that someone thinks should be illegal. The Russian government has faced enormous diplomatic pressure to shut this site down, and has even promised to change their laws to make the site illegal. If their actions were already illegal, the Russian government would not need to promise new laws in order to shut them down
The fact is, there is a loophole and it is not illegal (for either allofmp3.com or me) to take advantage of a loophole. It is also not immoral on my part to pay a reasonable price for a superior product rather than an exorbitant price for an inferior product. The recording industry could negotiate a better price from the Russian copyright licensing agency, but they don’t want to price themselves out of the Russian market. Instead, they want to sell their product at a reasonable price in Russia and then sell the same product at an exorbitant price in the North American and Western European markets because the consumers there can afford to pay more. I feel no moral obligation to cooperate with their attempts to gouge me.
We live in a global economy. Every product has a “world price,” the cheapest unsubsidized price it sells for legally, anywhere in the world. In order for a product to sell in any local market for less than the world price, somebody - either government or the owner - has to subsidize that product. In order for a product to sell in any local market for more than the world price, somebody - either government or the owner - has to restrict the consumer’s right to purchase the product at the world price. The more internationally mobile a product is, the harder it is to maintain a higher, discriminatory price in any local market. That’s isn’t immoral; it’s just economics. Music is an extremely mobile product. The world price for music has been established by allofmp3.com to be under 10 cents per song. The music industry has not objected to allofmp3.com selling to Russians at that price. They’ve only objected to allofmp3.com selling to foreigners at that price. They are simply trying to sell their music at the world price in some markets and at a higher, discriminatory price in other local markets where they believe the public is able and willing to pay more then the product is worth. I’m able to pay more than the world price for music, but I am not willing. If diplomatic pressure shuts down allofmp3.com, I will find a new source for un-DRMed music. If I can pay someone a reasonable price for the rights in order to get a high quality recording from a reliable source, I will. If necessary, I will download it for free. There are very few songs that I am willing to pay 99 cents for in a restricted format. (I live in Canada, where it is also not illegal for me to download music for personal use because we pay a levy on all blank recordable media. The levy goes to recording artists to compensate them for unpaid downloads.)
The only reason the Russian government has faced such enormous diplomatic pressure to shut this site down is due to the cowardice of other national governments. Any country that wants to prevent their citizens from purchasing music from allofmp3.com could pass their own law forbidding it, but then they would face the anger of their own voting citizens. Instead, they pressure the Russian government to control the behaviour of people outside of Russia!
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Kevin24
I’ve been using allofmp3 for 9 months now, and have also found that I’ve spent more money here than on any other music service.
The only time I use iTunes is to buy the rare album that’s not on allofmp3. Needless to say, I’ve spent upwards of $300 on allofmp3. Conversly, I spent less than $20 on iTunes in that same time period.
When VISA pulled out of allofmp3, I was skeptical of Xrost/Click & Buy. But I couldn’t resist the call of affordable music, and eventually bit the bullet. I gave click & buy my info, got the pin number for Xrost, and have been downloading away with NO problems whatsoever. I’ve re-upped my account three times now. The fact of the matter is clear - if anyone in the world could offer good quality files at these prices, they would make a fortune. I cringe when I hear someone buying tracks for .99 each. WHY?? If iTunes lowered their prices, I’d spend more of my money there too.
I saw today that a new lawsuit has been brought against allofmp3, and this time it looks serious. That said, I’ll continue to use allofmp3 until the day it gets shut down. I’ll just add money in smaller increments… :)
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hobie23
Yep - just downloaded my collection - all bought from allofmp3.com and they worked fine - you can also get the artwork from itunes for free if youre cheeky!
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Erika22
Can you transfer allofmp3 files to your itunes library so they can be downloaded on to your ipod?
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21
Hi Gezza,
Good point about the availability of some music on allofmp3.com but almost nowhere else — if people want to buy it, why not provide it?
Personally, I’ve had no problems with Xrost payments; also, there’s now the Ukash option as a way of paying money into Xrost (and from there into allofmp3.com). To my mind, one major advantage of using Ukash and Xrost as an intermediary is that it is not necessary to provide any personal details to a third party organisation operating from within Russia. In the UK, anyway, Ukash — which is designed to enable people to make purchases on the web without a credit card — can be bought over the counter at many small shops. Providing a Ukash number (bought with cash) to Xrost then yields a second number, which in turn is provided to allofmp3.com to receive the credit. Although it’s all a bit more complicated than just using a credit card, it also enables customers to keep their personal details to themselves.
All the best,
Greg
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