Allofmp3.com Owner "Not Guilty"

This precedent will be encouraging to other Russian Music Sites:

A Russian court found the former boss of music download Web site www.allofmp3.com not guilty of breaching copyright on Wednesday in a case considered a crucial test of Russia's commitment to fighting piracy.

The allofmp3.com Web site angered Western music companies by undercutting the price of downloads in deals they said breached copyright law.

Denis Kvasov, head of MediaServices which owned the site, was put on trial after entertainment companies EMI Group Plc, NBC Universal and Time Warner Inc. pressed for a prosecution.

"The prosecution did not succeed in presenting persuasive evidence of his involvement in infringing copyright law," said judge Yekaterina Sharapova.

A local official with the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), which is representing copyright holders in the case, said it would appeal the decision.

"We are disappointed with the verdict and will appeal," IFPI regional director Igor Pozhitkov told reporters.

The site has been a thorny issue in negotiations between Russia and the United States over Russia's accession to the World Trade Organisation, a key aim of President Vladimir Putin.

At the beginning of the year global credit card companies stopped allowing customers to pay allofmp3.com for music downloads and by July the Web site had quietly closed down.

Kvasov always said he was within the law because the site paid part of its income to ROMS, a Russian organisation which collects and distributes fees for copyright holders.

The judge agreed with his defence.

"Everybody who uses soundtracks has to pay a certain amount of their income to the rights holders and this company has done that," she said. "MediaServices has paid a certain amount of money to ROMS."

At the height of its popularity allofmp3.com attracted millions of bargain-hunting music lovers across the world. It would typically sell the world's most popular tracks at a huge discount to U.S. competitors.

Russian marketplaces and underground passes are full of cheap copies of music and film on DVDs and Russia's government has been accused of being too lax on protecting intellectual property rights, a basic principle of WTO membership.

But in July Russia's top negotiator on WTO entry said he thought a deal would be ready by the end of the year.

Although allofmp3.com has disappeared, another Russia-based discount music Web site has since emerged -- www.mp3sparks.com, also owned by MediaServices.

Allofmp3.com shutdown, Mp3sparks still up

It looks like allofmp3.com has finally been closed down. Almost.

The embattled online music store appears to have quietly lost its battle for survival just in time for Putin's two-day visit to Kennebunkport, Maine.

The web site has long been a thorn in relations, and U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab sharply warned last fall that it had to be closed before Russia could join the World Trade Organization.

Early last month, most online music stores registered by MediaServices, the owner of AllofMP3.com, became inaccessible to their millions of clients. AllofMP3.com itself would not load Sunday, while visitors to AllofMP3.ru, a mirror site, were greeted with a no-entry sign and a note saying, "We are sorry but the server is closed for maintenance."

Not that this will change much as allofmp3 has prepared for the closure of its domain, creating a rather familiar sister site called Mp3sparks (mp3sparks.com.) Wikipedia has all the details:

In late April 2007, two apparent sister sites of AllOfMP3 emerged. MP3Sparks, and MemphisMembers. Both sites use a layout and feel that is similar to the original AllOfMP3 website, and both are owned and operated by the same company that runs AllofMP3.com^{[citation needed]}.

MP3Sparks is a virtual clone of AllofMP3 with a few options changed and different colors. The site is licensed by the Rightholders Federation for Collective Copyright Management of Works Used Interactively(NP-FAIR), instead of by the Russian Organization for Multimedia and Digital Systems (ROMS). This is a key difference as it gives them legitimacy in the eyes of their payment processors Chronopay and E-Centru.

MP3Sparks users are theoretically able to fund their account via VISA, MasterCard and other credit cards without restriction{{Fact|date=June 2007}). This is quite true for some, while others still get the familiar message that credit card transactions are not available at the moment. This differing behavior has now been determined to be based on the IP that the user contacting MP3Sparks is coming from. Some IPs are blocked, for whatever reason. This has been shown to be the case because users who find that they cannot pay on MP3Sparks from their own IP addresses, often CAN pay when they use some form of proxy server which changes their IP to one from somewhere else.

Some AllOfMP3 users have reported receiving an invitation to MP3Sparks seemingly at random when viewing their balance screen. If the invitation is accepted, that member's history, balance and status is deleted immediately from the AllofMP3 website and is transferred over to MP3Sparks website.

Unlike MP3Sparks, Memphis Members is reserved for those individuals that have been high money spenders on either AllofMP3. Using a look that's similar to the classic AllofMP3 layout, it allows members to have more options than the standard invited member as well as being able to fund more money to their accounts in $25, $50, and $100 increments (in comparison to the default $10, $15, $25 and $50 increments on AllofMP3, and $10, $15, $25 increments available on MP3Sparks.) Memphis Members are given their own link to the semi-stealth website (hxxp://username.memphismembers.com) which they can use to access the site whenever they choose. When a person who is not a member of the Memphis Members website tries to access this page, they are greeted with a blank page that contains the words "nothing here." While there has been rumors of the Memphis Members website being linked to credit card information being resold (unbeknownst to the owner) on the black market for use in credit card fraud overseas, none of those claims have been substantiated as being true. It is suspected that these are actually rumors being floated by the IFPI and the RIAA to scare off potential members.

It has been reported in previous versions of this article that MP3Sparks is an entryway for users to become Memphis Members and that they will be sent invitations when they have spent $300. This is incorrect. In fact the administrators of Media Services have told people inquiring that they will not consider MP3Sparks users for MemphisMembers because they "already can pay." MemphisMembers seems to be reserved for current long time AllofMP3 users who have spent in excess of $300 on the site.

With the potential (not at all impending) closure of the AllofMP3 website during the summer of 2007, many people feel that these are shrewd business moves by MediaServices, Inc. (the parent company of AllofMP3) to stay in business and run under the radar of the Recording Industry Association of America, one of the major driving forces responsible for the crippling and destruction of AllofMP3.com. Whether or not the RIAA will take further action against MediaServices for their actions is unknown at this time.

For those counting, I believe this is at least the 11th time "Allofmp3 has been gone for good." While their name may be permanently gone, their services are up and running.

Chrono Wants Russian Music Sites To Obtain License

Chronopay, the payments services provider of 95% of the Russian Music Sites, wants the sites to get a license from Russia's copyright authorities.

"Industry experts, however, sound skeptical of this initiative. “The Federation is no different from the Multimedia and Digital Networks Society – it also has nothing to do with rightholders,” Igor Pozhitkov, head of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry’s Russian office

Russia's music copyright laws are puzzling...

Free Russian Music Sites

I have just added a ton of free Russian Music Sites to my Squidoo Lens. In addition to the slightly more legitimate Russian sites that charge, there are a lot of these free mp3 download sites that, I guess, sell advertising to stay in business. I'm not sure how much longer they'll last...

I added them without investigating each and every site, so some of them might not work and might not even be free. I found about most of them from a post on a Russian blog. If you use them, please comment on the lens or forum. And if you find any good sites, then please add them (if they aren't already there) to my plexo (digg-like-thing) on my lens. Most of the sites are only in Russian and are hard to navigate. I'm not sure if they're in fact better options to torrents, file-sharing, etc. Help me find the useful ones.

Allofmp3 "Shutdown" Dates

An incomplete history of times when Allofmp3 was thought be doomed.

Feb 22, 2005: "Russian music site targeted by law enforcement"
May 15, 2006: "Allofmp3 Down - For Good?"
May 30, 2006: "Allofmp3.com running out of time?"
Jul 3, 2006: "BPI gets go-ahead to sue MP3 Site"
Aug 18, 2006: "AllofMp3 suffers mysterious downtime"
Oct 19, 2006: "Credit card firms cut off Allofmp3"
Sept 15, 2006: "Anti-piracy law could shut down Russian music download site"
Nov 28, 2006: "Russia Agrees To US Request To Shut Down AllofMP3"
Dec 21, 2006: "Allofmp3 sued for 1.65 Trillion"
Feb 2, 2007: "Russia to legalize digital content market"

Pretty resilient. But how long will it last? The Nov 28 and Feb 2 articles may actually signal the end.

No One Steals 45s

In my post, titled 'How to stop music "stealing" ?', I received two comments:

1) "I don't consider paying for music as stealing"
2) "its legal according to Berne convention administered by the WIPO and WTO requirements."

These responses miss the point of my post. There are moral and legal reasons that obtaining music from Russian entrepreneurs shouldn't be considered stealing. I wasn't arguing whether downloading music from the Russian sites or file-sharing networks is good or bad or even against the law. (I had the word stealing in quotes.)

I was arguing that the music industry could compete more effectively with the Russian Music Sites and file sharing by improving their service. Instead of focusing on threatening the file-sharers with legal trouble, they should give the file-sharers a reason not to use other people’s services.

I wrote:
“1) Online music stores can attach almost everything they want to downloads. Album or song purchases should be attached to tour schedules, artist stories and biographies, videos, games, screensavers, drawings, desktop backgrounds, coupons, anything of interest.

2) Songs files can be made for more than listening. Fans like to interact with their music. What if you could download a song file, and then sing karaoke with it, play the guitar solo from it in Guitar Hero, dance to it in DDR, create your own music video for it, remix it and resell your reproductions. All of these abilities in a single interface.”

The record industry targets file-sharers and the Russian sites because they view them as a threat to their business. But I believe they are making a mistake in allowing their legal team to be their main tool against people swapping tunes. They can and should redefine what selling music means, and produce something that cannot be found elsewhere.

Currently, the record industry offers a worse experience than their Russians competitors. They continue to act as if the Internet is a threat, when it’s really an opportunity.

June 1, 2007 Deadline for Allofmp3 Shutdown

Update: I replaced inaccurate info about March 15 deadline with accurate info about June 1 deadline.

"The agreement is dated November 19 and posted to the Web site for the Office of the United States Trade Representative. It summarizes the joint efforts of the two countries to fight content piracy, an issue known to be centered in Russia and Eastern Europe.

“This agreement sets the stage for further progress on IPR issues in Russia through the next phase of multilateral negotiations, during which the United States and other WTO members will examine Russia’s IPR regime,” states the document.

The document specifically names AllofMP3.com as an example of the types of Web sites that they will shut down. We contacted AllofMP3.com and the company sent us an official statement stating their legality. It says that the company has offered to remove illegal music at the copyright holders’ requests." TechCrunch

The U.S. pressure on Russian authorities to target Allofmp3.com appears to be working. I'm no Russian legal expert, and I have absolutely no clue how this will proceed, but it really doesn't matter. At this point, it's almost impossible to load money onto Allofmp3. The question is, if the Russians shutdown Allofmp3, what will happen to the other Russian music sites?

No matter, there are still the Ukranian Sites:
http://www.mp3city.com.ua/
http://mclub.te.net.ua/
http://www.mp3.ua/
Allofmp3 may even join them.