| reply to BF69
Re: Hardly surprising - allofmp3 was a pirate outfit said by BF69:Yes they are pirates. Did the artists get thier money? No. who cares about Russian laws. Russians? Seriously, though, do you think that a site run and hosted in Russia should be bound by US laws? How about a site in the US being bound by Russian laws? Or is it ok to export US rules upon the world and not ok to have other countries' rules forced on us.
Here's the answer: Neither should be permitted. Sites should be expected to live up to the laws in the countries where they are hosted. To expect otherwise is to open a HUGE can of worms that could shut down virtually every website. (Imagine if China could dictate what sites shouldn't be allowed to operate because their content was illegal in China.) The only wrinkle to this would be if someone lives in one country and hosts a site in another country. Then they open themselves up for prosecution in either country.
As for the particular case of AllOfMP3.com, Russian law specified a compulsory license fee that had to be paid to an organization called ROMS. This means that AllOfMP3.com didn't need contracts with each record label. They could just take the songs and sell them and pay the compulsory fee to stay legal. ROMS didn't pay that money back to the rights holders, but that wasn't AllOfMP3's issue. (Of course, this is all supposing that Russians were the ones paying for the songs. When an American bought a song, the legality got a whole lot grayer.)
said by BF69:If some country says that child porn is ok does that make it ok for Americans to view it then if the website is base in that country? No of course not. Nice Straw Man you have there. We're not talking about Child Porn. We're talking about copyrighted music. Bringing up Child Porn is just an attempt to sway an opinion based on "child porn is bad, therefore the other guy must be wrong since this argument is associating his position with child porn."
However, to turn your question back to copyrighted music: "If some country says that it is legal to buy copyrighted music in a fashion that is illegal in the US, does that make it ok for Americans to buy that music if the website is based in that country?"
Framed like this, I would say: Maybe. It actually all depends on import/export rules. For example, let's say you were to travel to Russia and buy a CD there. Now (from what I've heard), CDs there typically cost about $3 each. But CDs here cost about $15 (or more). Would it be legal for you, on a trip to Russia, to buy that $3 CD and take it home? Or should you be forced to pay an additional $12 for it when you cross customs?
Of course, downloading an item and buying a physical copy are two different actions. Right now there are no clear rules about this. It is one huge gray area (but one that I suspect will get less gray as time goes on).
said by BF69:Why anyone would give money and personal info to a RUSSIAN website is beyond me. .ru is synomomous with SCAMS. I have any e-mail I get that has .ru in it to automatically be discarded before it even reaches my inbox. So .ru is synonymous with scams? Luckily AllOfMP3.com was a DOT COM and not a DOT RU. 
I don't judge a site solely based on where it is hosted. You could just as easily get scammed by a .com, .uk, .eu, etc site. If you are getting any unsolicited e-mail from a company, you should junk it no matter what country code is in the URL.
I might be more careful with a site hosted in Russia, Turkey, etc, but I would also rely on other users who have used the site to form an opinion of it. I haven't heard of anyone being scammed from using AllOfMP3.com. Whatever the failings it might have in regard to US copyright law, it isn't an out and out scam.
said by BF69:Sometimes people are idiots. Anyone that bought from them deserves to have their bank accounts and credit cards drianed dry. Of course, you could use a one-time use number with them and they wouldn't be able to drain anything dry. Customers using credit cards wouldn't be liable for any fraudulent charges over $50 (and even that amount is usually waived). Debit cards should never be used for online purchases even if the site is trustworthy. (After all, you never know when it will be hacked and have a spending spree put on the card.)
I just went to their registration page and it looks like they ask for a name (first and last), e-mail address, country, and language. I'm guessing that later on you would need to enter some credit card details (possibly including home address) to use your credit card on the site. However, I don't see anything severe that would invite identity theft. I don't see any requests for SSN, DOB, or Mother's maiden name, for example. |
