Monday, March 07, 2005
Everybody dance to the music!
I blogged before about Allofmp3.com and the stealing of Christmas and so on. Since I happen to like the site, I'm very happy to forward on the news that they seem to be off the hook for now.
Awwww, yeeeeeah. Excuse me will I go do a little victory dance. Alas, the dance shall be short-lived, since I'm very much aware that this is not the end of the story. First, this is only significant from a criminal law point of view. From what I've read, they are still liable for civil lawsuits. (RIAA file civil lawsuits? Such a thing could never be! Insert your sarcasm-marker of choice here, since that last bit was just gushing with it like a severed artery gushes blood.) In the second, RIAA has never let little things like this stop their efforts, so I'm sure that they will simply try another avenue to get their way. Aside from the civil lawsuits I just mentioned, they'll probably also try to influence Russian lawmakers to seal up the loophole in their copyright law. I hope that cooler heads prevail; this could be a big opportunity to set a world precedent in the way that digital music is legally handled, in the same way that the Netherlands and Portugal have been doing for drug law, provided that this is done right. (Unfortunately, these leads have yet to be followed, but I'm still hoping on that front too.) ¶ 1:43 p.m.
I blogged before about Allofmp3.com and the stealing of Christmas and so on. Since I happen to like the site, I'm very happy to forward on the news that they seem to be off the hook for now.
Russian online music site Allofmp3.com will continue to operate, after Russian prosecutors concluded they cannot take legal action against the music store. Finally prodded into motion by continuous lobbying by the RIAA, International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, and other copyright holders, Russian law enforcement officials began an investigtation of the service two weeks ago. Allofmp3.com argued that it had the right to sell the tracks through an agreement with the Russian Multimedia and Internet Society. That claim looks very questionable at face value, especially since the Russian site offers selections from groups which have not released their catalogs online yet, such as The Beatles. However, the Moscow Southwest regional prosecutor's office has apparently decided that a loophole in Russian copyright law (it only covers infringement via physical media, e.g., CDs and DVDs) allows Allofmp3.com to continue operations. In addition, Russia employs the concept of compulsory copyrights, where the copyrights belong to the artist or music label, but copyright owners are required to license it to anyone who making a request.
Awwww, yeeeeeah. Excuse me will I go do a little victory dance. Alas, the dance shall be short-lived, since I'm very much aware that this is not the end of the story. First, this is only significant from a criminal law point of view. From what I've read, they are still liable for civil lawsuits. (RIAA file civil lawsuits? Such a thing could never be! Insert your sarcasm-marker of choice here, since that last bit was just gushing with it like a severed artery gushes blood.) In the second, RIAA has never let little things like this stop their efforts, so I'm sure that they will simply try another avenue to get their way. Aside from the civil lawsuits I just mentioned, they'll probably also try to influence Russian lawmakers to seal up the loophole in their copyright law. I hope that cooler heads prevail; this could be a big opportunity to set a world precedent in the way that digital music is legally handled, in the same way that the Netherlands and Portugal have been doing for drug law, provided that this is done right. (Unfortunately, these leads have yet to be followed, but I'm still hoping on that front too.) ¶ 1:43 p.m.
