Newspeak

AllofMP3 is down at the moment. Their website says for maintenance. Slyck says it’s just while they recover from having servers siezed by the russian authorities. Even if it will be back, how long can AllofMp3 really survive with so much pressure on it? Putin’s recent assertion that Russia “must defend copyright inside the country. That is our obligation to our foreign partners” makes me think not long. Why is AllofMp3 so popular and what will happen if and when AllofMp3 disappears?

AllofMp3 is very well known, despite not having been hyped up like its competitors iTunes and Napster. In the UK it is thought AllofMp3 has (had?) a 14% market share second only to the television advertised favourite of iPod owners iTunes. I have never seen an advert for AllofMp3 but I’ve heard a lot more about it than either iTunes or napster (at least since Fanning sold Napster to BMG). AllofMp3 became as popular as it is by word of mouth alone.

The record industry is probably scratching its head trying to think how AllofMp3 got so big without spending anywhere near as much as they do advertising. The answer is that it is good and cheap. AllofMp3’s “online encoding” lets users pick the quality and format of their audio. This gave you choice unrivalled by both P2P and other online music retailers. Furthermore AllofMp3s files are not crippled by DRM like Napsters. Potential users of napster tend not to like the idea of paying out for music which they will no longer have access to if they stop paying. iTunes similarly has it’s problems.

So what are people going to turn to if they can’t get DRM free music in the format of their choice for $20/gigabyte? Well, I suppose a lot will go back to using P2P networks such as BitTorrent, LimeWire or EMule. Those who want to carry on using websites might look at websites that are similar to AllofMp3 running in Russia such as:

• mp3spy (minimum payment: $10)
• mp3search.ru (minimum payment: $20)
• mp3sugar (minimum payment: $19.95)
• musicmp3.ru (minimum payment: $19.90)
• delit.net (minimum payment: $10)

however if AllofMp3 is to disappear due to a change in Russian law then these sites will surely also be forced to close.

If AllofMp3 does disappear now, it may be that users lose their remaining balance, my remaining balance is around $2 so I’m not especially concerned about that, however, it does make me reluctant to invest in another Russian mp3 retailer as I could lose a larger amount. To use up the minimum payment of around $20 users would have to download about 20 albums or 200 tracks. It’s hard to know if these services will be around long enough to use that much.