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Russian mp3 sites

mike65

Anyone here use those ruskie sites which offer legal (under Russian law) downloads for literaly a few cents a track? I'm seriously tempted to sign up but fear for my credit card for some reason. So if you have an account can you reassure me?!

http://www.mp3search.ru/

http://www.allofmp3.com/

Mike.

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muletide

I have been using Allofmp3 for about three months now and have put about $50 through them with my credit card and have had no problems, same with friends of mine so they seem fairly legit

Mossy Monk

i use Allofmp3 every now and again

never had a problem with it

John R

I've been using allofmp3 for a good while now with credit card, no problems.

If you are still unsure there is a 3rd party payment option or you could use one of the secure credit card systems.
AIB have one where you get a unique number for each transaction and can set the limit to the exact amount so no extra can be taken.

Drag00n79

Mike65, been getting stuff from allofmp3 for about 18 months now. No problems at all. Great service.

mike65

Cheers for the replies, chaps.

Mike.

John

They are vaguely illegal though. No one actually gets any royalties from them but they keep operating because of a loophole in Russian law.

Royale with Cheese

Yeah I've used allofmp3 for about a year. Great to use when you download allofmp3explorer. Only problem I have with them is that it takes them a fair while to upload new music if it's not a really major release. Stuff like Coldplay or Foo Fighters will get put up a day or two after it's release. For other bands like The Bravery or Kaiser Chiefs I had to wait about 5 or 6 weeks. Can get very annoying. I think they are only legal in Russia and in their legal disclaimer it states they are not responsible for making sure that their customers are Russian citizens. So I reckon it is illegal to use outside of Russia but cannot be shut down.

Devon

This is true. The money you're paying goes straight into their pockets. The original artists don't see a penny. IMHO it's just kazaa or bittorrent only someone, who has no legal right, is charging you for the music. Why bother lining their pockets? You might as well give the money to SVDP and just P2P. At least it would be a more worthy cause...

Royale with Cheese

jerryadams wrote:

This is true. The money you're paying goes straight into their pockets. The original artists don't see a penny. IMHO it's just kazaa or bittorrent only someone, who has no legal right, is charging you for the music. Why bother lining their pockets? You might as well give the money to SVDP and just P2P. At least it would be a more worthy cause...

I pay for the practicality, I absolutely hate using P2P programs. With this you can just click and get what you want straight away at very fast speeds. No waiting in queues, no downloading at 6k/s. You can pick exactly what format and bitrate you want for nearly everything.

John

jerryadams wrote:

This is true. The money you're paying goes straight into their pockets. The original artists don't see a penny. IMHO it's just kazaa or bittorrent only someone, who has no legal right, is charging you for the music. Why bother lining their pockets? You might as well give the money to SVDP and just P2P. At least it would be a more worthy cause...

Well said. I know a few publishing companies are working on a way to either:

a) Get royalties

or

b) shutting their pirating asses down

meldrew

They're both good sites maybe alllofmp3 is a bit better no probs with credit cards . and anyway we're getting screwed by publishing companies so dont feel guilty

sobberandclean

how much would it cost for a full album to download from these sites lads?

muletide

depends on what quality you want, and the size obviously, but usually in around $2

John

meldrew wrote:

They're both good sites maybe alllofmp3 is a bit better no probs with credit cards . and anyway we're getting screwed by publishing companies so dont feel guilty

How are we getting screwed by publishing companies? The artists mainly damaged by these sites are not the big label bands like Coldplay but the independent labels who struggle to keep afloat as it is. One hundred people downloading Coldplay's album which is selling by the hundreds of thousands is not the same as 100 people downloading someone who is only selling a fraction of the amount.

Royale with Cheese

muletide wrote:

depends on what quality you want, and the size obviously, but usually in around $2

Never $2, at 192kbps the average cost is $1.20, at 128kbps it's about $0.80.

rogue-entity

The irony is that the smaller lads in the market that are not as well known are usualy the songs that I download from various sites. The reason that I download from these sites is because I cannot get the songs anywhere else, this is either because the song is not released here or not being released anymore.
I feel that If I am paying to download music 90% of the money less taxes should go to the artist. Record companies are only bitching about piracy because they are not getting the same multimillions that they once were, artists have even more to complain about as the record companies will take there share regardless of sales so unfortunatly the artist suffers not the record companies. I suppose I should feel guilty but I dont, most of these artists are set for life and I dont feel guilty denying them a few extra euro. Russia seems to turn a blind eye towards copyright when it suits them, as do some asian countries. The reason for all this is that they, like us hate being ripped off by americian companies that make millions, they like us use the internet to distribute pirated copies, they unlike us can get away with it because the US can do sweet FA about what the ruskies do, they are outside US legal juristiction.
I say screw the publishing companies, copyright belongs to the artist not the publishers, there is no law that says it is illegal to use copyrighted music WITH the copyright owners permission, it does not mention publishers rights.

Spacedog

LOL, Copyright is a made up concept to line the pockets of the wealthy middlemen. Since phisical distribution of music became obsolite, the recording industry's role had been reduced to marketing and publicity, considered by many to be one of the biggest problems with the music business today, music media attention loaded on supergroups and high profile artists leave the small musician high and dry, if the music industry didn't exist, truely talented artists would be more likely to emerge instead of mimeing sluts and prancing boybands.

Devon

Spacedog wrote:

...if the music industry didn't exist, truely talented artists would be more likely to emerge instead of mimeing sluts and prancing boybands.

I'm guessing you're either a struggling artist or very close to someone who is. Thing about this comment is - I agree!

Andy-Pandy

Iuse allof mps and have done for months. Ive never listned to more music in my life and for that im gratefull. It gives me the opertunity to experiment with my music tastes. Chances are i wouldnt have bought most of the albums ive really digged, and ive discovered music i love that i wouldnt have gotten into with out the site. Ill go see these bands in concert now, so in my opinion it helps them reach an audiance that they wouldnt have gotten to any way.

dalk

meldrew wrote:

and anyway we're getting screwed by publishing companies so dont feel guilty

Spacedog wrote:

Copyright is a made up concept to line the pockets of the wealthy middlemen.

Copyright is basically the claim of ownership of an original work. I agree that the Recording Industries business model is a sh1t way to reimburse an artist for their work, and the contracts they tie artists into are a scandal. But i don't see how you can use this as an excuse to lining a Russian websites pockets... How are they somehow more deserving of your money? They are 'middlemen' after all. I would be surprised if they pay any royalties to the artist. At least with a CD/legal download some of the money trickles down to the artist...

Presumably we can all agree that the artist deserves some money?

Spacedog wrote:

if the music industry didn't exist, truely talented artists would be more likely to emerge instead of mimeing sluts and prancing boybands.

Like it or not, there is a market for this music. People love crap music. Just look at the charts from any year since they began... You'll find that it is 80% pop filler. People like to think of certain times as being golden era's, but the popular music was still mostly sh1t. A good example of this is Strawberry Fields was kept off the top spot by an Engelbert Humperdick tune...

MorningStar

jerryadams wrote:

This is true. The money you're paying goes straight into their pockets. The original artists don't see a penny. IMHO it's just kazaa or bittorrent only someone, who has no legal right, is charging you for the music. Why bother lining their pockets? You might as well give the money to SVDP and just P2P. At least it would be a more worthy cause...

Actually I don't think that is true. My understanding of it was that the artist is entiled to the royalties but the various other middle men aren't entiled to anything. This is the reason you have record companies lying in national radio and papers. The head of IMRO said all free downloads were illegal and said downloaders were found guilty when it is only uploaders have been done.
I can't believe the way they actually have tried to scare people.

Legal CDs in Russia but not outside the same logic but done with agrement with the labels

http://www.cd-maximum.ru/index.php?lang=en

They used to actually do major artists but they were making it out of the country so the rights were removed. Some of the releases were never made on CD anywhere else e.g. "Other Voices" The Doors. Not illegal bootlegs but the real thing at a cheaper price with normally two albums per CD.

dalk

MorningStar wrote:

jerryadams wrote:

This is true. The money you're paying goes straight into their pockets. The original artists don't see a penny. IMHO it's just kazaa or bittorrent only someone, who has no legal right, is charging you for the music. Why bother lining their pockets? You might as well give the money to SVDP and just P2P. At least it would be a more worthy cause...

Actually I don't think that is true. My understanding of it was that the artist is entiled to the royalties but the various other middle men aren't entiled to anything.

jerryadams was referring to Russian mp3 sites. These sites exploit a hole in Russian copyright law which they claim makes them exempt from paying royalties to the copyright holder (which is usually the record company, sometimes the artist). They do pay some Russian songwriters Organisation, but like jerryadams was pointing out, i doubt if any of the money they make 'selling' music actually makes it to the copyright holder/artist.

MorningStar wrote:

The head of IMRO said all free downloads were illegal and said downloaders were found guilty when it is only uploaders have been done.

This is true, the distinction being that it is the person(s) offering the downloads who are breaking the law, but actually downloading the music for personal non-commercial domestic use is not illegal. (Technically, it is my understanding that a civil action could possibly be taken against a downloader, but it is extremely unlikely). So downloading music from these sites shouldnt land you in court. Allowing uploads of the same mp3's from your PC is a different matterm and is illegal.

MorningStar wrote:

They used to actually do major artists but they were making it out of the country so the rights were removed.

I believe this is to do with publishing rights, and as such is out of the record companies hands.

MorningStar

dalk wrote:

jerryadams was referring to Russian mp3 sites. These sites exploit a hole in Russian copyright law which they claim makes them exempt from paying royalties to the copyright holder (which is usually the record company, sometimes the artist). They do pay some Russian songwriters Organisation, but like jerryadams was pointing out, i doubt if any of the money they make 'selling' music actually makes it to the copyright holder/artist.

I know what he was saying I am saying I think he is wrong! He may doubt the money gets to the people but I think it does but the other distributors and record companies don't. It was done with CDs before the MP3 sites

dalk wrote:

This is true, the distinction being that it is the person(s) offering the downloads who are breaking the law, but actually downloading the music for personal non-commercial domestic use is not illegal. (Technically, it is my understanding that a civil action could possibly be taken against a downloader, but it is extremely unlikely). So downloading music from these sites shouldnt land you in court. Allowing uploads of the same mp3's from your PC is a different matterm and is illegal.

I know this my point is the head of IMRO said it otherwise. He lied is the point. One of the reasons people don't know what to do is becasue they are being lied to on both sides.

dalk wrote:

I believe this is to do with publishing rights, and as such is out of the record companies hands.

Who ever could give permission did and they used the original masters too and still do. This is all legal and was fine with the record companies untill the realised the CDs were getting out of the market. The MP3 sites are basically using the same laws so I think they are paying royalties through the ministry in Russia

dalk

MorningStar wrote:

He may doubt the money gets to the people but I think it does, but the other distributors and record companies don't.

Neither of us can say for sure whether money does or does not make it to the Russian songwriters agency (whatever its called). Your viewpoint is more optimistic than myself and jerryadams.

That Russian songwriters agency sounds something similar to IMRO here. If that is the case then the Russian mp3 sites money (if they pay any) will make it to the publisher. The publisher pay royalties to the songwriter (not necessarily the recording artist). In a lot of band scenarios this may only be one person in the band or in the case of a band covering a song they will get nothing (but the songwriter will).* So in that scenario, eg downloading Sinead O'Connor singing Nothing Compares 2 U, she wouldnt receive a penny (but prince would)...

So, I think the record companies should be getting their cut for the recording artists sake. Then Sinead would get something at least...

Maybe bands should have Paypal accounts so you can donate money directly if you like them?

MorningStar wrote:

I know this my point is the head of IMRO said it otherwise. He lied is the point. One of the reasons people don't know what to do is because they are being lied to on both sides.

I was agreeing with you. Yes you may know it, I was just clarifying for anyone reading who didn't.

*For anyone interested in a basic rundown of how the (major label) record industry works.

Record industry triumvirate: songwriter, publisher, record company.

And basic (typical) scenario: Songwriter(s) writes song, gets automatic copyright. Publisher pays for partial or total transfer of copyright for set period, and pays royalties to artist. Record company pays for recording of songs, holds copyright of recording (but not songs) and pays publisher fee for each CD/LP/whatever etc pressed (whether it is sold or not). TV/radio/ads/other artists covering the song etc pay publisher when songs are broadcast or recorded/covered (artist receives royalty cut). Record company gets revenue from recordings sold (recording artist receives royalty cut).

I'm not going to go into the v sh1tty recording contracts artists get lumped with, and the record companies/managers cut, which i think is what most people object about.

MorningStar

The russian system was desgined so that the song performer and writer got the music and that is really it. So if the publishing company and record company get nothing I am not bothered. The record companies aware of the sytem in place came to agreements with some record companies to get their money (the CD site I posted). This was working but sales on ebay and the like made the record companies remove their deals on major artists.
With MP3 sites the record compnay is getting nothing so they are lying about certain things about the russian sites by saying things like they are illegal. They aren't illegal at the moment. The russian ministry of arts and culture (I think that is responsible for the royalty thing) are not like IMRo becasue they are a state body and collect the money like taxes. Whether that means people get there money can be questioned but there is no way to know the record companies do this either. There have been many cases showing how the record companies avoided paying people so there is at least proof of that.
Plausable deniabilty means you can buy from these websites:D
The big problem is that both sides could be lying on the subject but I know that IMRO are and have been helping record companies fleece the public and try to prevent customers getting cheaper good (CDwow).

John

MorningStar wrote:

The MP3 sites are basically using the same laws so I think they are paying royalties through the ministry in Russia

I don't think they are. I know a band personally who are being sold through one of these sites and they have not received a penny. They own their own publishing rights and some of the mp3s available on the Russian sites are from releases that were only sent out on a subscrition basis to 2000 people with no permission given to sell copies of them online as mp3s. The band own these recordings and all the rights for them, no companies were involved so they know exactly who should and shouldn't be selling them. They have contacted the Russian government and these sites and have received nothing. These sites are just pirates and the worst thing about it is, unlike soulseek and kazaa, people are paying these gangters for the privilege.

MorningStar

John2 wrote:

They have contacted the Russian government and these sites and have received nothing. These sites are just pirates and the worst thing about it is, unlike soulseek and kazaa, people are paying these gangters for the privilege.

What did the government and website say? Like many royalties they don't have to pay them instantly.

The general public probably don't care which gangsters are ripping them off. The record companies are just as guilty. Bad actions of the record companies and those acting on their behalf are really to blame . They have to change their approach and think of their customers.

I would prefer to see the artists get the money but if they aren't I am not overly concerened as they signed up for a deal whereby they knew customers would be charged a lot more than seems reasonable. The market price is dropping and the record companies are not adding a great value so they will go like the studio system over time. I don't use the websites but have no problem with them and I really don't care too much if Madonna doesn't get paid but if it is a small band I personally buy .

John

MorningStar wrote:

What did the government and website say? Like many royalties they don't have to pay them instantly.

Essentially they were told to **** off.

The general public probably don't care which gangsters are ripping them off. The record companies are just as guilty. Bad actions of the record companies and those acting on their behalf are really to blame . They have to change their approach and think of their customers.

That may be true of the major labels but what about the hundreds of small, honest labels that are losing out to these people? What about bands that have to pay for everything themselves only to find that no one's buying their CD because they can get it cheap from sites like these?

MorningStar

John2 wrote:

Essentially they were told to **** off.

Well now that we have a clear story of what happened I will have to agree with you:rolleyes:

Did they actually sell any of the artists material? Is it distributed in shops?

John2 wrote:

That may be true of the major labels but what about the hundreds of small, honest labels that are losing out to these people? What about bands that have to pay for everything themselves only to find that no one's buying their CD because they can get it cheap from sites like these?

Actually it is also true in part to smaller labels. There are very small quantities of artists on small lables on such sites either way and few people download such tracks as it is common knowledge it is major artists on such sites that really get downloaded.

John

MorningStar wrote:

Well now that we have a clear story of what happened I will have to agree with you:rolleyes:

Did they actually sell any of the artists material? Is it distributed in shops?

They have a number of albums available in the shops but these were a couple of albums that were never intended to have a wide distribution, they were meant to be mail order to the fan club only. I've just checked allofmp3.com and they're gone now so maybe their lawyers made some progress.

But as for a clear story, they contacted allofmp3.com and allofmp3.com politely told them to go away, they didn't care. The Russian government said it wasn't their problem. Last I heard the band contacted their lawyers and that was a year ago.