Details are starting to surface about that AllofMp3 press event I theorized about earlier today. The company is remaining defiant, but its sudden rush to speak with some press seems to indicate that the pressure is being ratcheted up on the pirate operation.
"The US government is conveniently using allofmp3 as an issue to gain further concessions from Russia," said company boss Vadim Mamotin and other executives. "We operate under Russian law, we pay taxes in Russia and we pay royalties,"
Earlier we heard rumblings that the issues with AllofMp3 were all but taken care of, when the Moscow Times reported that German Economic Development Office Gref stated publicly that piracy worries were no longer holding up U.S. talks on Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization. Which led to renewed speculation that AllofMp3 was headed for the exit door.Today's rather terse and confrontational statements from AllofMp3's top bosses paint a completely different picture. In what could only be described as an effort to reframe the debate, AllofMp3's management claims they are working towards a new model for the music industry, "They are concerned with making money for themselves not the artists. In our opinion, we and the artists are better off dealing directly with each other. In fact we believe it is the future of the music industry,"
I'm guessing that the artists -- who as yet haven't seen a dime from AllofMp3's pennies on the dollar, per-megabyte sales mechanism -- aren't in total agreement with AllofMp3's claims. AllofMp3's revenues are estimated at $30 million per year.
1. You're guessing that the artists... what? (see the last paragraph of your article -- something's missing). Thx
Posted at 6:10PM on Oct 17th 2006 by dicombobulated