allofmp3.com

A quick update on my experiences with allofmp3.com.

Initially when I started out using them they were being terribly slow - the 'current users' counter constantly sat around 2000 users so I imagine they had a bit of unexpected traffic. By the weekend of the 1st of May they were actually refusing connections and eventually on the 2nd they were up again after posting a note about maintenance.

Since then the service levels have been acceptable. The 1 Gig of mp3's I downloaded from them were all perfect quality and their online encoding system is really nice and definitely a reason to return to them in the future. I was surprised with their music selection covering some bands that I had trouble sourcing in London. My bank statement shows a perfect deduction from them with no funny business.

A big thumbs up to them then. The question about the legality of their service still remains, The Register has some interesting things to say about it but still no-one is being clear on what this means for the consumer and if music purchased from them will be considered illegal copies of copyrighted material.

The answer is far from clear. The site is not licensed by any labels. However, currently there is an exemption under existing Russian copyright legislation (Article 39 for the aficionados) allowing phonograms to be performed publicly without the authorisation of the copyright owner for broadcasting and cable transmission. The Internet could be deemed to fall under this exemption. A similar argument can be applied to copies in the cache memory of computers.

So as IFPI Russia's legal adviser, Vladimir Dragunov, concedes: "Because of these loopholes we don't have much chance of succeeding if we attack these companies who are using music files on the Internet under current Russian laws."