allofmp3.com - too good to be true?
What would you be willing to pay for a music album in mp3 format if that same album would be available for free, if illigally pirated, from for example The Pirate Bay? Not much, I guess? I think this is the fact what makes allofmp3.com so successful. The site offers music albums in mp3 and ogg vorbis formats, among others, for a price of about $2. And this site is legal! At least under Russian law.
Now the US government has demanded that the site must be shut down. Why? When does the US government realize the small fact that the so called "world outside US borders" is not one of US states! The same thing happened with The Pirate Bay. The rumor has it that the US government forces Swedish authorities to seize the servers despite the fact the the Swedish police knew the server didn't contain anythin illegal!
From the site http://www.museekster.com/allofmp3faq.htm:
“MP3's, OGG's, etc are not illegal in the USA and therefore can be imported. There is also no law against importing music from other countries (including Russia). Because you are buying this legally in Russia and then importing to the USA, this should be 100% legit. For example, assuming that Russian Vodka is illegal to buy in the USA on Sunday, but you buy the Russian Vodka in Moscow on Sunday, then you import it into the USA, you have done nothing wrong. Again, this assumes that 1) it is illegal to buy Russian Vodka on Sunday in the USA 2) it is legal in Moscow and 3) it is legal to import Russian Vodka.�
The license agreement on allofmp3.com states that you may not use the service if it is in conflict with the legislation of your country. How should I know if this kind of international business between for example myself and a Russian company is legal or not if the product(s) itself is legal!?
I think the music industry, and the US government for that matter, has failed to realize that people will find music illegally and are not willing to pay if they can find the same content for free. They should realize that if they can get any money for downloaded mp3s they should be happy! I am willing to pay for the kind of service allofmp3.com provides, that is, provides fast download rates and latest albums even if I could the same for free and the artists wouldn't get anything at all. Now they get at least something...
Last but not least; I am not supporting piracy in general! I do buy CD albums from all the bands I really like (I have about 150 CD albums)! These CDs I would anyway rip to mp3s and put them into my MP3 jukebox.
But then there is music I might be interested in, but I wouldn't want to pay the full price for it - then the options are to pirate the content, or buy it cheap from allofmp3.com.
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