[solaris]

Look at former voucher selling site SongBoom's new review section:

http://www.songboom.com/reviews.html or http://www.songboom.com/comparison_matrix.html

I think that the hunt down made by the MAFIAA might have blown up in their own faces.

Very few AllOfMP3 customers knew of the other quality Russian/Ukrainian sites before the music industry tried to block people from using their credit cards on AllOfMP3.

Now this forum (and for instance SongBoom) have made thousands of users (who will tell their friends, who will tell their friends...) aware of these sites that seem like popping out of nowhere all the time.

Not only that but more and more of them seem to start sister/partner sites, so if the RIAA blocks one, the other will still work, and if that one gets blocked too, they just make yet another clone.

Maybe it's about time the music industry took a long good look at their current business model and 1. ditched DRM 2. offered online encoding themselves. Then maybe they would get some of their customers back.

solaris

[solaris]

Originally Posted by solaris

Look at former voucher selling site SongBoom's new review section:

http://www.songboom.com/reviews.html or http://www.songboom.com/comparison_matrix.html

I think that the hunt down made by the MAFIAA might have blown up in their own faces.

Very few AllOfMP3 customers knew of the other quality Russian/Ukrainian sites before the music industry tried to block people from using their credit cards on AllOfMP3.

Now this forum (and for instance SongBoom) have made thousands of users (who will tell their friends, who will tell their friends...) aware of these sites that seem like popping out of nowhere all the time.

Not only that but more and more of them seem to start sister/partner sites, so if the RIAA blocks one, the other will still work, and if that one gets blocked too, they just make yet another clone.

Maybe it's about time the music industry took a long good look at their current business model and 1. ditched DRM 2. offered online encoding themselves. Then maybe they would get some of their customers back.

solaris

The flooding of Russian/Ukrainian sites since the MAFIAA started muscling AllofMP3 is also documented in this article: http://techdigest.tv/2007/05/paul_mccartneys.html

They compare it to when Napster was taken down and floods of new P2P networks just followed automatically.

solaris

[seantg]

**first Posting **

I think you have hit the nail on the head there Solaris, previously any downloads that I made were taken from allofmp3 but now that I can't build my balance up again with them I have been seeking alternative methods to enable me to keep adding to my collection and now have added no less than 7 possible alternative download sites to my bookmarks.

Like everyone else here I am dismayed by the efforts to get allofmp3 closed down but trust me there will always be a demand for a reasonably priced download facility and not one (eg itunes) which costs almost as much as going out to buy a cd.

My only sadness is that I still cant add money to allofmp3, I have never been a big downloader but having used the site for almost 3 years now I am saddened by the fact that any invitation to the memphis members site looks unlikely to be forthcoming in the immediate future which is dissapointing given my length of service and constant recommendations to others for allofmp3.

Still I live in hope, keep up the good work !

[chris7]

Originally Posted by solaris

Look at former voucher selling site SongBoom's new review section:

http://www.songboom.com/reviews.html or http://www.songboom.com/comparison_matrix.html

I think that the hunt down made by the MAFIAA might have blown up in their own faces.

Very few AllOfMP3 customers knew of the other quality Russian/Ukrainian sites before the music industry tried to block people from using their credit cards on AllOfMP3.

Now this forum (and for instance SongBoom) have made thousands of users (who will tell their friends, who will tell their friends...) aware of these sites that seem like popping out of nowhere all the time.

Not only that but more and more of them seem to start sister/partner sites, so if the RIAA blocks one, the other will still work, and if that one gets blocked too, they just make yet another clone.

Maybe it's about time the music industry took a long good look at their current business model and 1. ditched DRM 2. offered online encoding themselves. Then maybe they would get some of their customers back.

solaris

As usual you are spot on.

I for one would not have found all these new sites had I not stumbled on to THIS site. I am now downloading from mp3fiesta and mp3sale and to be honest, I have never been happier with the quality and vast choice of music I now have.

[HaMuse]

I like this one better

http://www.museekster.com/legalmusic.htm

[solaris]

Originally Posted by HaMuse

I like this one better

http://www.museekster.com/legalmusic.htm

I like Museekster too, HaMuse

solaris

[film_girl]

Originally Posted by solaris

Look at former voucher selling site SongBoom's new review section:

http://www.songboom.com/reviews.html or http://www.songboom.com/comparison_matrix.html

I think that the hunt down made by the MAFIAA might have blown up in their own faces.

Very few AllOfMP3 customers knew of the other quality Russian/Ukrainian sites before the music industry tried to block people from using their credit cards on AllOfMP3.

Now this forum (and for instance SongBoom) have made thousands of users (who will tell their friends, who will tell their friends...) aware of these sites that seem like popping out of nowhere all the time.

Not only that but more and more of them seem to start sister/partner sites, so if the RIAA blocks one, the other will still work, and if that one gets blocked too, they just make yet another clone.

Maybe it's about time the music industry took a long good look at their current business model and 1. ditched DRM 2. offered online encoding themselves. Then maybe they would get some of their customers back.

solaris

EXACTLY!

And really, these Russian services are a much, much bigger threat to the MAFIAA because customers are actually PAYING to download music. A large part of the RIAA's position/argument against file sharing since the Napster era (and it continues erroneously now, despite the vast evolutions made to the technology, the customers and the industry since 2000) has revolved around the whole notion that customers are "stealing" intellectual property, when they should be paying for it. So the RIAA spent millions of dollars "educating" (I say, indoctrinating - but it's all semantics) customers about the evils of file sharing, the evils of downloading something that isn't paid for - blah blah blah. Well, these service negate and spit in the face of those arguments, because it proves that once again, it has never really been about price -- it has been about ACCESS.

These services are making thousands and thousands of dollars a day (it could be hundreds of thousands, I don't know - I guess it depends on their size) from customers who are WILLINGLY paying money for digitally encoded music. Customer's aren't against paying for music - but they don't want to buy music that restricts where it can be played or that is priced at a level that is incongruous with its perceived value. And as I've stated elsewhere, it is the RIAA's own fault that customer's now put a lower value on the cost of digital music -- if they had offered digital downloads six years ago (or had actually had the foresight to start looking at new technologies in the late 90s and staved off the Napsters and Kazaas of the world), they could still expect customers to pay $1 or $2 a track without complaint. However, because they buried their heads in the sand and responded with litigation rather than innovation (a tactic that has only made customers regard the industry, and by extension, the artists, with even less respect and made them that much less likely to legally purchase a CD or download something from a RIAA approved service), customers got used to getting music for free - or for a fraction of the price that the RIAA wants to charge. 50 + years of consumer buying trends/attitudes towards music has been reversed in less than a decade, and the RIAA has no one to blame but themselves.

And just like all the publicity about shutting down Napster just served to inform that many more people about the program's existence (and by extension, the program's that popped up to fill Napster's void), all the publicity in the press (which, smartly, to the RIAA's credit has been pretty well contained to online media or print media that is dedicated to technology) will do nothing more than point customer's to other alternatives, and if they aren't careful, inform uninitiated consumers about the existence of these services in the first place.

[solaris]

Originally Posted by film_girl

EXACTLY!

And really, these Russian services are a much, much bigger threat to the MAFIAA because customers are actually PAYING to download music. A large part of the RIAA's position/argument against file sharing since the Napster era (and it continues erroneously now, despite the vast evolutions made to the technology, the customers and the industry since 2000) has revolved around the whole notion that customers are "stealing" intellectual property, when they should be paying for it. So the RIAA spent millions of dollars "educating" (I say, indoctrinating - but it's all semantics) customers about the evils of file sharing, the evils of downloading something that isn't paid for - blah blah blah. Well, these service negate and spit in the face of those arguments, because it proves that once again, it has never really been about price -- it has been about ACCESS.

These services are making thousands and thousands of dollars a day (it could be hundreds of thousands, I don't know - I guess it depends on their size) from customers who are WILLINGLY paying money for digitally encoded music. Customer's aren't against paying for music - but they don't want to buy music that restricts where it can be played or that is priced at a level that is incongruous with its perceived value. And as I've stated elsewhere, it is the RIAA's own fault that customer's now put a lower value on the cost of digital music -- if they had offered digital downloads six years ago (or had actually had the foresight to start looking at new technologies in the late 90s and staved off the Napsters and Kazaas of the world), they could still expect customers to pay $1 or $2 a track without complaint. However, because they buried their heads in the sand and responded with litigation rather than innovation (a tactic that has only made customers regard the industry, and by extension, the artists, with even less respect and made them that much less likely to legally purchase a CD or download something from a RIAA approved service), customers got used to getting music for free - or for a fraction of the price that the RIAA wants to charge. 50 + years of consumer buying trends/attitudes towards music has been reversed in less than a decade, and the RIAA has no one to blame but themselves.

And just like all the publicity about shutting down Napster just served to inform that many more people about the program's existence (and by extension, the program's that popped up to fill Napster's void), all the publicity in the press (which, smartly, to the RIAA's credit has been pretty well contained to online media or print media that is dedicated to technology) will do nothing more than point customer's to other alternatives, and if they aren't careful, inform uninitiated consumers about the existence of these services in the first place.

film_girl.

Your posts express exactly my thoughts on these issues. Even if tried (HARD) I couldn't write it better. Thumbs up!!!

As I said before: I compile your posts and maybe we should send them to the music industry and let them think about what could have been

solaris