New Music Industry Briefing For Wednesday June 7, 2006
The British recording industry is taking legal action against rogue Russian download site AllofMP3. More on the story from UK’s Guardian here. Read AllofMp3’s official rebuttal below after the jump.
– The battle over a new copyright bill now in front of Congress in heating up over a line that reads, “incidental reproductions made in the course of non-interactive streaming provided by the licensee, including cached, network and RAM buffer reproductions." So is making a copy to your hard drive illegal? (EFF)
– Beck has finished recording his next studio album and will release it this fall. (Billboard)
– 48 million Americans now share media on the net, according to the "Home Broadband Adoption 2006" report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project. (ClickZ)
– Warner Classics is being folded into other Warner labels including Rhino. Some see it as a major label getting out of the Classical music business. (Gramophone)
R.I.P – Billy Preston, keyboardist for the Beatles and The Rolling Stones.
THE ALLOFMP3.COM STATEMENT
The US government officials and politicians have been demanding lately that the Russian authorities shut down allofmp3.com, alleging the site is pirate. Otherwise, they threaten Russia with sanctions, including blocking its entry to WTO.
In this regard we would like to make a statement:
1. The site AllOfMP3.com belongs to a Russian company and for 6 years it has operated within the country, in full compliance with all Russian laws. Throughout this period the various government offices have scrutinized site’s legality and have not found any breach of the law. So far there has been no decision by any Russian court contesting the site’s legality.
2. The Russian site AllOfMP3.com is not operating or advertising its business on the territory of other countries.
3. The site AllOfMP3.com does regularly transfer substantial amounts of royalties to the Russian organizations for collective management of rights such as ROMS and FAIR, which have granted the site licenses to legally deliver music through the Internet.
4. The site AllofMP3.com reserves the right to take all steps necessary to protect its business reputation. We call upon everyone to take a thorough and unbiased view of the site’s legality.
5. On September 1, 2006 the changes to the Russian copyright legislation will come into force. Since January 2006 the site has been making direct agreements with rightholders and authors at the same time increasing the price of the music compositions and transferring the royalties directly to the artists and record companies. The aim of AllofMP3.com is to agree with all rightholders on the prices and royalties amounts by September 1, 2006.
6. We believe in the long term and civilized business based on respecting the law, considering the customers’ demands as well as the interests of both national and international rightholders.
The AllofMP3.com Administration
June 6, 2006 Moscow
