Challenge for a legal type with spare time

[directhex]

Can anyone find out, without relying on the FUD thrown up by google, whether the Russian online music stores are a) legal and b) legal in the UK? e.g. allofmp3

The service offered beggars belief, and reliance on old USSR copyright law certainly sounds plausible...

I'd just like to know, once and for all, are these places in any way legal? screw the pricing, an online store where i can get audio in the format of my choice, free of DRM, is great

Edit: I've got no more reason to believe what the IFPI says than the Russian Mafia, so nothing they're saying on the matter really has any merit. I want to know based entirely on the copyright law basis...

[Swafe]

it might be legal - but only in russia

i heard they were selling copies of HL 2 in shops over there??

[Knoxville]

Its legal there but not here i think, iits like buying a load of weed over in amsterdam and bringing it here, totally legal there but as soon as it crosses our borders it becomes contrband, don't quote me on that though

[directhex]

http://3cx.org/item/21

has the most detailed analysis i can find - sounds like they follow a broadcast license model not a sales model - much how a radio station pays its royalties.

if that info is accurate, then it does appear (more or less) legit.

[Howard]

Well I honestly don't care if they're legal or not. The quality of Allofmp3's MP3s are great, and $0.01 per megabyte is rather entycing. The quality of some of Mp3search.ru's tracks are lesser, but usually pretty good.

[directhex]

i'd say philosophically it's pretty important - what they're offering is EXACTLY what the consumer wants, with newly added titles in ANY format you could possibly ask for. no DRM at all. it's really everything anyone could want from an online music store. If it's actually LEGAL, and can be proven to be legal, then int impact would be staggeing.

and i'd rather be paying for a legal service than the Mafia, tho it's kina impossible to avoid the Mafia in Russia, especially if you plan to take a taxi

[Atomic]

http://smh.com.au/articles/2004/04/2...831475556.html

We sought some advice from a Melbourne barrister and contributor to these pages, Simon Minahan, who practises in the area of intellectual property.

His opinion: "There's probably nothing to stop the individual from downloading this material for private use. For end users, the issue is a basic question relevant to acquiring a reproduction of any copyright work: has the rights owner consented?"

Even if allofmp3.com's asserted licence is bogus, says Minahan, "the end user would seem to have a good basis to argue that he is an innocent infringer, which would mean he isn't liable to damages, although he would still be liable to an order requiring him to destroy or deliver up any copies and an order requiring him to refrain from doing it again."

[Blub2k]

Its legal there but not here i think, iits like buying a load of weed over in amsterdam and bringing it here, totally legal there but as soon as it crosses our borders it becomes contrband, don't quote me on that though

Bad example Knoxie, it is not legal there either, it is tolerated, but that is another thread altogether.

[Blub2k]

On another point would you like to give the Russian Mafia your credit card number?

[MD]

are you telling me its 10 cents for a mb, cos thats like, one gig of files for $10. By the text above because I am being told its legal and they have the support of legal representation I can get these files and the worst they can do is tell me to destroy what I downloaded?

Hmm strikes me as a great deal, worth doing, for the sake of 6 quid gig I cannot believe the prices others are charging......

anyone here actully using the service? I can see PayPal is accepted, thts just nuts!

m@

[Atomic]

I've been using it since before xmas and its been fine. I didnt like the idea of giving the russians my creditcard number either so have been paying through Paypal as it doesn't give the site my CC number.

If you use the 'allofmp3 explorer' program to do the downloading its even better

I get about 300-400KB/Sec on the work connection so its not slow either.

Im happy to pay for the service as it's just so much easier than trawling through search results on P2P programs.

[Raz316]

bit of topic theft, right here.

But oh my god AllofMp3 is fantastic! 120kb/s the whole time : o

[Atomic]

only 120kb/s ?

I was getting between 300-400KB/Sec this morning

[Raz316]

seeing as my connection can only do 120kb/s it isnt bad Soon that will go up to...
180kb/s (according to NTL anyway...)

[Atomic]

Ah if thats the max your connection does thats all good

Im glad they take paypal, finally a use for the spare cash id forgot was there...

[directhex]

it recently emerged that the broadcast license group they pay money to, ROMS, severed ties to the IDSA following disagreements over pay. ROMS can still apporve redistribution of other media for broadcast (spoken word, plays, etc).

so nope, it might've been almost legal at some point, but not anymore