Good news everybody. The rogue Russian download site allofmp3.com has seemingly gone out of business. Bad news everybody. The people behind the service have reportedly launched a new, similar service. Well, I use the 'good news' / 'bad news' tags that way round assuming that you're in some way sympathetic to the record labels whose content was illegally sold at cut price rates by the Russian download platform. If you care more about getting cheap MP3 downloads of major label music from a simple to use one stop shop, then feel free to swap the 'good news' / 'bad news' bits around.
Anyway, as much previously reported, Allofmp3.com was enemy number one for the record industry last year. Based in Russia, it sold major label music in DRM-free MP3 formats at very low prices. It claimed to be working within Russian copyright laws, but the record companies disagreed, and through politicians in the US and EC began to put pressure on Russian authorities to take action against the cut price service. In the end, however, it was the decision by the major credit card firms to stop accepted payments for the service that really reduced AllofMP3.com's customer base, whilst legal moves by the UK record industry against agents selling pre-pay AllofMP3.com vouchers brought to an end the company's remaining route to market.
It is not entirely clear when AllofMP3.com ceased trading, but the URL is currently not active and the Moscow Times reported yesterday that the download service had "quietly lost its battle for survival". However, a new site offering similarly cheap downloads called MP3sparks.com has launched and it is reportedly owned by the same company as AllofMP3.com - MediaServices.
Like AllofMP3.com, the new site claims to be a legitimate concern, telling users: "The availability over the Internet of the MP3Sparks.com materials is authorised by the license 31/ZM-07 of the noncommercial partnership Rightholders Federation for Collective Copyright Management of Works Used Interactively (NP FAIR). In accordance to the licenses' terms MediaServices pays license fees for all materials downloaded from the site subject to the Law of the Russian Federation 'On Copyright and Related Rights'. All these materials are solely for personal use. Any further distribution, resale or broadcasting are prohibited".
The new service also claims to accept credit card payments, though I have to say that when I tried to charge up an account with a credit card I got to a screen telling me that "this service is currently unavailable". So, it is kind of unclear whether there is any difference between AllofMP3.com and MP3Sparks.com in terms of the service's legality, or not, or whether the credit card companies are expected to play ball with the new service. I suspect 'not' in both cases, but time will tell I guess.
Though it would be good if they did get the credit card bit working. I never did get a copy of Calvin Harris' 'The Girls', and they are selling it for 15p.