[snowman12]

I just noticed that they've already got the new Portishead album Third which is due to be released mid April.

I read somewhere that someone within the industry has leaked the album onto P2P. I notice that the file sizes on P2P are identical to the file sizes shown on GoMusic (there the album is listed at VBR, ie a different bit rate for each track), ie they got the album from P2P.

It is obviously naive to think that these (Eastern European) music sites buy all the CDs and then rip them onto their servers, but why should I pay for quality I can get for free somewhere else?

On a more general note, would it be possible for these sites to get their catalogues from P2P, often at a low bit rate but then re-encode these files at higher rates (obviously without any quality improvement) and sell them at a premium to their unsuspecting customers?

I would greatly appreciate if someone could enlighten me on the logistics aspect of their operations.

[solaris]

Originally Posted by snowman12

I just noticed that they've already got the new Portishead album Third which is due to be released mid April.

I read somewhere that someone within the industry has leaked the album onto P2P. I notice that the file sizes on P2P are identical to the file sizes shown on GoMusic (there the album is listed at VBR, ie a different bit rate for each track), ie they got the album from P2P.

It is obviously naive to think that these (Eastern European) music sites buy all the CDs and then rip them onto their servers, but why should I pay for quality I can get for free somewhere else?

On a more general note, would it be possible for these sites to get their catalogues from P2P, often at a low bit rate but then re-encode these files at higher rates (obviously without any quality improvement) and sell them at a premium to their unsuspecting customers?

I would greatly appreciate if someone could enlighten me on the logistics aspect of their operations.

Take a look at each tagging of each file you have downloaded from these Russian online stores and those taggings will eventually provide you with the answer to at least one of your questions

[snowman12]

Sorry I can't quite follow you....my tags seem perfectly ok to me??

[solaris]

Originally Posted by snowman12

Sorry I can't quite follow you....my tags seem perfectly ok to me??

Yeah, YOUR tags - but did you take a look at the ones that came with the files?