AllofMP3 Down - For Good?

May 15th, 2006 at 5:55 am

“We are sorry but the server is closed for maintainance.”

Looks like it’s still here.

May 15th, 2006 at 6:05 am

I hope it returns soon as well. Allofmp3 is the only site I buy music from. I’d happily buy it from others if they offered the same service and features at similar rates.

May 15th, 2006 at 6:29 am

Eh, they had this problem a couple weeks ago and came right back. FWIW, the AllofMp3 explorer was working over the weekend.

May 15th, 2006 at 6:42 am

Surely they would have seen this coming… the site was making a heck of a lot of money, so they would have had contingency plans… right?

For example, they could have built a new ops centre in a country that does not enforce copyrights at all. They could have moved their hosting to yet another country that takes a hands-off approach to data. They were almost certainly bribing the “right” people so that their chief execs were kept out of jail.

May 15th, 2006 at 7:17 am

so is this mp3sugar site legit (i.e. is it safe to give them your $??)

May 15th, 2006 at 7:32 am

The second IFPI lawsuit might have hit the nail
http://www.moskalyuk.com/blog/.....again/1066

May 15th, 2006 at 7:35 am

The thing is, allofmp3.cz, which I think is their Czech site, is currently up. So what I’m thinking is that lots of people heard about this site closing down, and wanted to get their money in to make some ‘last minute’ purchases. A lot of traffic all at once was a strain on allofmp3’s servers and therefore they needed to close down for maintinence.

Also, I think if the site were down permanently, it would be one of those advertising sites when you went to allofmp3.com then the site would look like one of these: http://playtunes.com/ (I just chose a random url not in use). It brings you to a site where you can purchase the url. But that’s not the case, as there is a sign that says the server is closed for maintinence.

Just my 2 cents.

May 15th, 2006 at 8:03 am

Sorry, it’s India. And I’m not talking about the legality of it, rather the morality. Americans (since we’re probably talking about the Birttanys) are buying music from American artists through Russia and the artists from their own country are getting nothing. How is that legal, or rather, moral?

May 15th, 2006 at 8:15 am

AllofMP3 down? Ouch!

May 15th, 2006 at 8:49 am

Tanaeem: The reason that it’s legal is because the company is operating in Russia. They have different copyright laws that us here in the states. So we’re legally buying music, but by a different country’s laws.

May 15th, 2006 at 8:52 am

Its legal. RIAA approved to let Russia digital music online.

The problem of course is people in foreign countries buying things at prices targetted for the local population.

But thats no different than living in Europe and buying stuff on Amazon.com, we all try and take advantage of local pricing when it suits us….

May 15th, 2006 at 9:08 am

The big record labels are big marketing machines that can no longer effectively market to the youth market. Just give it a few years and they will follow the same path the newspaper industry is currently on… the slow spiral into a smaller, more niche industry.

Smart artists will give their music away for free, and make big dough on the concert circuit or through their merchandise.

This makes sense, since record companies were valuable years ago when artists needed a partner to help distribute their music- now that distribution online is easy and effectively costs nothing, their services are no longer required.

And oddly, I do not feel much sorrow - the industry has profited long enough on the backs of many artists who never really got much out of the deal.

It’s evolution, baby…

May 15th, 2006 at 9:19 am

Great comment, Calvin. I completely agree with you. I wish more people would think like us.

Ryan, you’re mostly right. But the artists do get a fraction of the ammount, don’t they? I mean, it’s something. I like eMusic a lot, but I wish there was more mainstream music there.

May 15th, 2006 at 9:25 am

the czech site is also down. yes, the czech home page is up, but no links, search, or sign-in functions operate.

May 15th, 2006 at 10:55 am

That’s looks more like the kind of generic message an ISP will put up when it has shut a site down…

May 15th, 2006 at 12:16 pm

Robert, artists do not own their own music. The record labels do, so they will not be able to set their own prices.

May 15th, 2006 at 12:56 pm

Eric,

I am aware of this. My previous post stated that “it wouldn’t surprise me if alot of new bands stayed away from record labels in the future“. There are a TON of popular MySpace bands that could use such a service becayse they are unsigned to a label… If “independent” bands are a thing of the future (which they appear to be), then most of the music will be unsigned anyway. The record label industry is slowly getting cut out, now that artists know how greedy they are.

I didn’t mean the John Lennon could upload his old songs from back in the day, I meant that new garage bands that have millions of fans on MySpace could bypass the record label

May 15th, 2006 at 2:21 pm

I think that the point that everyone is overlooking is that allofmp3.com is the perfect model for what a legitimate music store SHOULD be. I think that their pricing is spot-on. Here’s an example based on a 500MB CD at $0.02/MB for various compression rates:

Uncompressed WAV files would cost about $10 for the whole CD;
Compressed but lossless FLAC files would cost about $7;
Very high quality (320kbps) OGG files would be about $3.50;
Decent quality (160kbps) MP3 files would cost about $2;
Marginal quality (64kbps) MP3 files would cost less than $1.

The per-bit pricing makes it easy for the distributor and the user gets to choose whichever quality fits their needs and budget. I’d happily pay $3.50 for an entire CD’s worth of 320k OGG files. What the record labels (and movie studios) need to remember is that MOST PEOPLE ARE HONEST and would gladly pay a reasonable price for music. Their basic problem is that they have been gouging both their customers and their artists for so long, that nobody believes that their current pricing model is fair.

If there were a legitimate music store in the US that was based on allofmp3’s model, music piracy would practically disappear overnight.

May 15th, 2006 at 4:04 pm

Anyone stop to wonder how much money AllofMP3.com has “on deposit” from customers? I’ve got $15 on account there myself. Could be quite a winfall to the operators to “take the money and run” if and when they see the writing on the wall for the continuity of their organization.

It makes you wonder how wise it is to pony up cash in advance for a service an ocean away where you have zero recourse should they pull the plug…

May 15th, 2006 at 6:08 pm

Gabriel - There are a number of these sites that I use regularly, all cheap, all based in Russia, and as of this weekend all gone. This is not a technical glitch, this is the aftermath of a wide reaching crack down by a government that has been pus$y whipped by another government that has been pus$y whipped by our friends in the RIAA.

bbum - The artists are less screwed by these operations because these operations are actually getting the content to the listener. I am a musician and I can tell you I would easily choose to make less money if I knew my music was getting out to more ears because a) that’s why I do it and b) in a pragmatic sense it translates directly into ticket and merchandizing $s.

The RIAA is just like a number other old media that are in various states of their own death throughs. Unfortunately, they’re hurting a lot of people in their bid to make one last buck and perhaps stay around for another few years. “Steeling” music, buying it from companies who somehow get around supporting it.. anything that speeds their demise is a good thing. You can either choose to starve a couple artists for a short time, or keep propping up a structure that will not be satisfied until you pay them X dollars every time you want to listen to a song you already own…and the artists still starve.

May 15th, 2006 at 7:29 pm

Stephen (#39) - Do you think suspected organized piracy sites (e.g. allmp3) are genuinely concerned about what’s in the best interest of musicians? Maybe there are some benefits like you’ve suggested as a side of their activities but it’s still unclear to me what their underlying agenda really is. Scott (#35) makes an interesting point about allmp3 being a prototype for a potentially more sensible, viable longer-term business model even if that’s not their intention. Is that any riskier than the alternatives?

Sometimes it’s hard to avoid premature “radical” judgments about the RIAA, MPAA, allmp3, et.al. based on personal biases from incomplete information and hearsay evidence of their motives, instead remaining as open and questioning about them as possible.

May 15th, 2006 at 9:34 pm

andy - Specifically, I was talking about one (completely unrelated to allofmp3 or alltunes as far as I know) that actually seems to be back up now after being “gone” all weekend. Interesting coincidence? I hope this ends up proving me wrong.

sjk - Honestly, I don’t care what their intentions are. The enemy of my enemy is, for now, my friend. And I agree 100% that these sites could absolutely be a model for a “legit” service. Add onto it the ability to “donate” to the artist in the same way that we do for a lot of open source software and you have a winner. The challenge is that those kind of services wont be allowed to exists until the RIAA does not.

May 16th, 2006 at 12:38 am

I guess people say this a lot (maybe it’s true then). I have several times bought CD’s and gone to concerts after buying tracks from allofmp3 with bands I never heard of before.

So how the hell can that be immoral? I would never have learned of them if I had to pay 25$ for a CD (Yes it’s even more expensive in Denmark), that is if I knew there was a CD to buy. I’m not that into the whole but shaking mainstream stuff they pump into your head on most TV and radio shows. I learned about these bands from allofmp3.

As many here have mentioned it’s the big labels business model that is out of date. Not a bunch of evil people trying to deprive the musicians from their living.

May 16th, 2006 at 4:24 am

…and it’s back!

May 16th, 2006 at 5:24 am

It’s back, but when I try to order a track I get the following message:
“Ordering is temporarily not available.”

May 16th, 2006 at 10:28 am

THE SITE IS BACK UP. It is not down. Works fine for me. Looks like they are back in business.

May 16th, 2006 at 10:31 am

Chad - the site may be back online, but not back in business, because ordering is still not working!

@ michael - Could you ask your friend how long all that will take?

May 16th, 2006 at 8:51 pm

Its up again

May 16th, 2006 at 11:54 pm

@ Aswin Anand
Allof isn’t back in businees. The website is online but the content isn’t. I doubt if this is still a technical problem because it is the one thing that I would do to keep my customers waiting and, at the same time, prevent further prosecution.

May 17th, 2006 at 4:28 am

Current message:

Ordering is temporarily not available.
The site is undergoing some technical restructuring.
We work hard to resume the service. We expect to put back all the functions shortly.
Please, accept our appologies for this ongoing disruption.

May 17th, 2006 at 12:24 pm

This is crap.

Allofmp3 is NOT comming back. They’re simply stalling for time until they figure out how the hell they’re going to return funds to their millions of users. The russian prez has basically stated that this 2 cents a mb s**t is no longer going to fly, and the entire country’s government isn’t about to exclude themselves from wto just so american’s can get cheap music. They can keep posting whatever the hell they want on their pages, but everyone knows the truth. Allofmp3 has been slowly dying since the beginning of 2006, and last friday s**t finally hit the fan.

R.I.P Allofmp3

(and those who don’t believe are setting themselves up for disappointment)

May 17th, 2006 at 2:21 pm

Every day in the past they have managed to send out e-mails on the latest albums now in the library.How come they have not sent out an e-mail to let users know what is going on? I notice other Russian sites are still going Ok

May 17th, 2006 at 3:40 pm

Been doing some research since my last post, and I’ve found more than one credible rumor that Allofmp3 has sold-out to a major online music distribution company under pressure from the us/russian government. Rumor has it that Allofmp3 will convert to a one pricing structure, upwards of about 89 cents per song, or 9 bucks an album. And yes, all music will be bundled with DRM to ensure that no copyright infringement takes place. My only question would be; will they use WMA or AAC? I know mp3 has never been bundled with DRM in the past, but who knows, this may be a turning point. Anyone else hear of this buy out rumor?

May 17th, 2006 at 6:26 pm

The reason why Allofmp3 was doing so well was because it gave people what they wanted and people bought the music. They sold the music in multiple formats at a cheap price and people were willing to spend the money for it. The RIAA should take lessons from Allofmp3. The RIAA wants to charge 99 cents for a substandard format and people buy it. On top of that have limitations and DRM to boot. The RIAA could sell garbage and they know people would buy it. It’s sad to see Allofmp3 go offline cause of a ripoff organization like the RIAA.

May 18th, 2006 at 4:07 am

All people here acting like AllOfMP3 won’t come back.
But why would then the site still be accessable?

That wouldn’t make any sense.
I’m still one of the few how are fermly convinced that AOMP3 will come back!

May 18th, 2006 at 6:09 am

But it always say to me “Unfortunately, the remainder at your balance doesn’t allow you to perform the order!”, though I got loads of money on my account!

Can other peepz order?

May 18th, 2006 at 6:17 am

Well, works now again for me too.
Waiting since 10 minutes now for 2 songs to be encoded.
I guess there’s a huge load at the moment on their servers.

May 18th, 2006 at 6:51 am

Yes, I’ve downloaded 4 tracks w/ 192kbps Lame mp3

May 18th, 2006 at 8:25 am

Is able to download songs that were left in my basket. Though some songs are encoding even though they already have been encoded. Hopefully I can get them before there servers crap out again. It seems to downloading slower than usual. Probably due to people overloading there servers, getting all the songs they can before the inevitable happens.

May 18th, 2006 at 9:34 am

Alltunes is working perfectly for me! And the one album I just downloaded, took pretty much the same time to encode and download as it always has. Seems that everything is working fine for me anyway. Only thing is that the catalogue hasn`t been updated for a few weeks, but hopefully that will happen in the next few days…

we should al be celebrating. at least for now, its all good…

May 18th, 2006 at 9:54 am

Greg, I AM using AllTunes!

May 18th, 2006 at 9:03 pm

Still not encoded.
Tried with another account with 20$-Bonus - also still not encoded…
When I tried yesterday to encode a very short track @ CBR it worked fine.
But when I try MP3 with preset it just won’t work.

May 18th, 2006 at 9:53 pm

If you encode at 192 mp3 cbr or lower, you’ll get your songs encoded quickly. However, using anything above 192, or any other codec besides LAME MP3 will result in either no songs encoded, or one or two stubborn songs per record that simply won’t encode, no matter what. From a 15 song record, I’ve gotten 14 downloaded, but the 15 won’t encode, and I’ve been trying all day. Hopefully this problem will be fixed within the next 24 hours, cuz’ if not, im going to tunster.com…for good!

May 19th, 2006 at 2:46 am

Looks like AllOfMP3.com is back in operations.

May 19th, 2006 at 3:23 am

I found out now, that the mistake is hidden in my settings:
If I chose MP3 + alt preset standard it doesn’t work.
But if I take MP3 + abr 192 it works (absolutely same price to alt preset standard).
But I hope they’re gonna fix it soon, because I want all songs in my collection to have the same quality.

May 19th, 2006 at 3:33 am

O HAPPY HAPPY DAY!

Shes’s back again :-), although not quite herself

Advice given on site is to order high bitrate tracks unless you are prepared to wait, and I also found the some tracks were not what the were labelled as (possibly as a result of the ongoing transfer?), so be a little careful if you need to dive in straight away. Some tracks failed to download (still queued?) I would also expect if they get a massive surge in users that this might stuff the system - so a little patience here may go a long way to avoiding problems.

I’ve downloaded some tracks this morning and although they transferred fine, they seem a tad “flat”, although the file size appeared to be correct. I may try another artist and/or another player, just to check that the encoding is as expected.

Anyway, KUDOS to the techs and I’m so pleased they made it back.

May 19th, 2006 at 6:37 am

A few songs of an ordered album (256 abr mp3) did not encode for more than 24h too:

But the Tech suppport wrote back after I asked:

There’s some maintanance work going on at the moment. It will be complete in a few days. We’re sorry for the inconvenience.

May 19th, 2006 at 12:49 pm

I’ve only gotten 2 full LP’s downloaded since AOmp3 came back, but the quality seems to be just as good as before at 320kbps. I doubt there would be any problems with, considering that the encoder (LAME) is the same. My main concern is the stubborn encoding. I’ve been trying for close to 3 days to get one stupid song to encode to complete an LP. I’ve done everything!…and gotten nothing. This is really pissing me off…

May 19th, 2006 at 2:32 pm

Doesn’t support OE and thus not interesting for me.

May 20th, 2006 at 5:24 pm

It IS still working, I’ve been getting tons of music for the last two days with no problems.

May 21st, 2006 at 12:48 am

Hi all, there’s been a load of discussion re the “legality” of someone outside Russia using the allofmp3 site which seems to have died down now the site is back up yippee!

Here’s my question, I’m in the UK and love this site, I’ve spent more money on music on this site than I’ve done in music stores in years!

At the weekend there was a TV prog on “illegal” downloading looking at the £2500 fines handed out to those who used Napster in the early days.

“When” probably rather than “if” Russia closes this site down to get into WTO and it is deemed “illegal” for those outside Russia to have used the site (Beatles music etc..) what’s to stop USA E-mailing fines to everyone, allofmp3 have exact “track… sic” records of our activity, gulp!

May 21st, 2006 at 10:53 am

Hmm, am I the only one with log-in problems in allTunes?

“Error at update user basket. Wrong response format!”

When I’m buying an album, it doesn’t start the downloading!! …

May 21st, 2006 at 11:15 pm

The people who got sued for using Napster and more recent peer to peer networks were those that made the music available for download. People actually doing the downloading have nothing to worry about, as long as you don’t also share out a large (100 tracks +?) amount of music. By the way, I downloaded 6 albums on Friday 19th in Mp3 192 format and they encoded quickly and downloaded without any problems. I don’t think it’s going to last too much longer so best make the most of it while it lasts…..

May 23rd, 2006 at 7:20 pm

Henrik,

i’m getting the same message.

“Error at update user basket. Wrong response format!”

please tell me someone has figured out what the problem is? Help!

May 24th, 2006 at 2:45 am

If you check out the xrost website they state:

Currently, our service is being relocated to a new payment provider in order to improve security and performance. During the relocation you will be unable to order new PIN codes; you will still be able to see your previous orders.

Maybe xrost/cmpass has got caught up in the same server relocation issue as allof??

May 28th, 2006 at 8:51 am

This “Error at update user basket. Wrong response format!” is really starting to piss me off - it makes no sense!

Anyone with a golden solution? …

June 4th, 2006 at 7:49 am

they’re down again!

June 4th, 2006 at 8:04 pm

Hmmmm…. I just tried to purchase a pin code, but couldn’t get it. I don’t know, but I have the feelling that this time is for real. Thanks a lot, RIAA. >-(

June 5th, 2006 at 11:01 pm

This is crazy! I keep waiting for allofmp3 to close down for good, but it seems like with each new day, they’re only growing stronger. It’s been 18 days since the site came back up after a week of shut down, and since then; new albums have been added each day, downloads are quicker and my own personal request has even been added! (something yet to happen in recent memory). This leads me to wonder if all the hype is just that; hype. As of yesterday (june 4th), there were still news articles and blogs across the internet citing everything from Putin to WTO regulations to the RIAA as being “an immediate threat to aomp3″. This continues (and probably will) with nothing coming from the AOmp3 camp about a threat. In other words, AOmp3 either knows it’s in it’s last days and is trying to make a last minute cash in, or someone out there is lying. After almost 3 weeks with no problems and no word from the AOmp3 camp, the latter seems most likely. Here’s to hoping AOmp3 lives forever!

June 7th, 2006 at 3:25 pm

That’s right, ordering is not working. I’ve sent them a message and they told me that “work of the site will be restored in the near future”. What is “the near future” is something that is still unclear…

June 22nd, 2006 at 12:36 pm

No albums in the just added bin for june 23rd. Look out guys, I think aomp3 is going back down again. Cash out today…just in case.

September 28th, 2006 at 5:25 am

Their servers seem to be working just fine these days and ALLTUNES rocks.

October 13th, 2006 at 9:19 pm

Here it is October 14, 2006 and allofmp3 is better than ever! Faster downloads, an awesome new preview feature that blows their old way of doing it out of the water. Previews launch instantly within their own embedded flash player. I’ve been using them now for a year and a half with only minor problems (around the time many of the posts above were made). I certainly hope Putin doesn’t allow the WTO to blackmail them over one company (which according to news reports is exactly what they’re doing). Allofmp3 is giving a course on how an online music store should operate - and I don’t just mean the prices. They just do it RIGHT.

October 17th, 2006 at 6:29 pm

After all the praise in my comment above (just four days ago), I now have to agree with Scott above. I just checked my email account which was for allofmp3 only and sure enough, spam free until October 4th - and then a swarm of porn spam. Also, in the news tonight, it looks like they’ll be leaving the scene after the Russian Parliament has adopted a preliminary law that would ban the operation of allofmp3 and pave the way for Russian entrance into the WTO. All I can say is ———– DAMN!

October 26th, 2006 at 3:31 pm

I use allofmp3.com all the time and, in all honesty, I think it’s an awesome site! So far, the best part about AllOfMP3 is that, due to the fact it contains far more artists and albums than most other music sites, it has introduced me to some of the most interesting artists and music (from around the world) I’ve ever heard of–much of which I’ve NEVER heard of before!

Although I do feel sorry for the artists losing some money due to the cheap downloads, I think it’s time for all of today’s musicians to realize that music is ripped and shared for free several billion times per month worldwide. I think it’s also time that, with all-due respect to the musicians, if musicians care about making lots of money–especially those who are greedy, they should consider at least finding other jobs as well in addition to their music career. Look at some of the acting careers many musicians have, for example.

After all, this IS a changing world and, as for most other non-musicians these days, people are changing careers more and more often these days. Considering that, if I was a musician and/or someone that produced material that can easily be freely distributed and copied all over the world, I would consider holding at least one second profession in addition to music.

Bottom line is this–is it better to have a site like allofmp3.com continue running so that there is *some* money coming in, OR take the site down and risk all of it’s former users getting into the habit of file sharing–thus increasing the amount of file sharing substantially?

Lee

November 5th, 2006 at 12:22 pm

I found out about allofmp3 about two months ago. Since then, I have downloaded about $200.00 worth of misic. What a ride. It was only last week that I learned that the site simply copies cds to their server, without the artists permision. They then legitimize their sales policy by saying that it is consistent with Russian law. from what i have heard, no artist has ever received a nickle from allofmp3.

Even if it comes back online I shall stop using it. It seems at least highly unethical and at most theft that artists get no compensatioon for their work.

The allofmp3 deal did seam a little too good to be true. I have nothing against chaper music but I do think that we should be receiving it with the consent of the artist - no matter how wealthy the artist. Let’s face it, ethics are ethics, should we steal from the wealthy artist and the poor one alike because their intermediaties in the recording industry are giving the consumer a raw deal.

Looks like I will return to iTunes.

January 5th, 2007 at 8:35 am

I have read loads of stuff about this site being illegal and not paying royalties. But I have read on the BBC website that allofmp3 pays royalty monies to Roms the Russian Multimedia and Internet Society, Roms has tried to pays the western authorities but they refuse to recognise Roms and reject any offers of payment.
Who is in the wrong here? I don’t think it is Roms do you!