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$.04 for music downloads - legally?, Looks legit...

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Audiyoda

Jun 7 2004, 03:37 AM

Post #1

Houston, we have a problem...

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Posts: 340
Joined: 23-March 04
From: S of Superior-E of Michigan-W of Huron-N of HERE.
Member No.: 64

Interesting read:
http://www.g4techtv.com/feature.aspx?article_key=779
http://www.museekster.com/allofmp3info.htm

At $.01 per Meg, that's about $.04 per song at 128kbps. They need a larger catalog, but it's growing every day.

Because this service originates in Russia, it is bound by Russian copyright law - which is a little different than the copyright laws here in the United States (or Canada, Australia and/or Europe).

QUOTE

Russian copyright legislation allows phonograms to be performed publicly without the authorization of the copyright owner for broadcasting and cable transmission. (Article 39) The Internet could be deemed to fall under this exemption. The copyright involved have to be paid to a collecting society.
Allofmp3 has signed agreements for this with Russian Organization for Multimedia & Digital Systems (ROMS). According to license № ЛС-ЗМ-02-36 the Internet-project www.allofmp3.com, has the right to use musical compositions by providing downloads. Under the license agreement Allofmp3 pays out fees to ROMS for downloaded materials that are subject to the Russian Federation Copyright And Related Rights Law.

ROMS is a member of CISAC (www.cisac.org) - the International confederation of authors and composers societies. ROMS manages intellectual rights in the Russian Federation. All third party distributors licensed by ROMS are required to pay a portion of the revenue to the ROMS. ROMS in turn, is obligated to pay most of that money (aside from small portion it needs for operating expenses) to artists. Both Russian and foreign.

United States copyright law does not really apply since you are buying the music for personal use from a licensed (and legitimate) content provider. So we really need to look at intellectual property law to determine if this is legal or not - and then we need to consider who's intellecual property laws apply. United States law? Russian law? Currently, the neither the WTO or the World Court has established any minimum standards for international intellectual property standards. So until they do, it can be argued that you downloaded the files from a Russian site, then you will be covered under Russian copyright laws.