It looks like the RIAA and big music labels have won a battle, if not the war, against massively popular AllOfMP3, a Russian music download site that sells MP3s for as little as two cents per megabyte. The site has been shut down, again, reportedly at the hands of the Russian government.
Russia agreed to force the site to shut down last year, in response to pressure by the U.S. government and the RIAA.
The site has been under constant fire over the last two years. For a brief history of its travails, see our coverage (in chronological order, skip to the end of the list for the most recent stories):
AllofMP3 Down – For Good?
AllofMP3 Outsources Marketing to U.S. Government
Russia Agrees To US Request To Shut Down AllofMP3.com
I Wish Google Could Buy AllofMP3
AllOfMP3 Responds To RIAA’s $1.65 Trillion Lawsuit
AllOfMp3 Down For 8 Hours And Counting
AllOfMP3’s parent company, Media Services, has taken a firm position that the RIAA should go to hell. In a now famous response to a RIAA $1.65 trillion (yes, trillion) lawsuit for copyright infringement, the company said:
“AllofMP3 understands that several U.S. record label companies filed a lawsuit against Media Services in New York,” an unnamed “senior company official” stated. “This suit is unjustified as AllofMP3 does not operate in New York. Certainly the labels are free to file any suit they wish, despite knowing full well that AllofMP3 operates legally in Russia. In the mean time, AllofMP3 plans to continue to operate legally and comply with all Russian laws.”
A new site, very similar to AllOfMP3 and also owned by Media Services, launched simultaneous with the shutdown. MP3Sparks looks to be a clone of AllOfMP3 in all but name.