It appears that the gravy train known as AllofMP3 has come to an end. Both Visa and Mastercard have blacklisted the service. And from what I can gather, PayPal has refused to honor the service too. If users cannot pay, AllofMP3 will certainly not be able to sell.

The Register – Thursday 19th October 2006:

Mediaservices, the owner of the controversial music download site AllofMP3, will pursue “every avenue” to overturn the decisions of Visa and Mastercard to stop processing payments to the company.

In a statement today, the Russian company said the blacklisting was “arbitrary, capricious and discriminatory”. Visa and Mastercard had no authority to judge the legality of AllofMP3’s services, and their “determination that the company’s activities were illegal is patently erroneous and without legal merit”, it said. “AllofMP3 has not been found by any court in the world to be in violation of any law…To disqualify AllofMP3 based on a payment processing company’s whim is irresponsible and sets a bad precedence.”

Update: As of 5:40 EST this error message appears on AllofMP3’s website:

Unfortunately credit card payment is not available at the moment.

Update: Here’s a pretty good blog entry from USA Today entitled: “Visa, Mastercard now deciding copyright law

Visa and Mastercard say they will no longer process payments to Russian music site AllofMP3.com.

Which seems pretty outrageous. At this point, AllofMP3 is certainly controversial and is making a lot of people in the music world angry — but it has not been found guilty of anything. No court has ordered it shut down for copyright infringement. No one has been arrested or tried.

If Visa and Mastercard refuse payments, they will put the site out of business. How else can it get paid? (The site says it doesn’t accept American Express — maybe there’s a TV commercial in that.)

So this is a terrible precedent for the Internet. The two major credit card companies have decided themselves that a site is illegitimate and are colluding to put it out of business. Who’s next on their list?



  1. Proud Alien says:

    This is exactly why it is so tempting to sabotage all those fat cat Fortune 500. The corporations follow the rules when they want to and ignore them when they need to. Well, I will continue doing my part trying to minimize my contribution to their bottom lines.

  2. Matt says:

    who the heck is visa or mastercard or for that matter paypal to tell me who i can give my money to. I have used all of mp3 in the past and used my visa and there has been no stealing of my credit card.

    If they stoop us from spending our money where we want whats next???

    Will they make us shop at certin stores to use out visa cards (ones they aprove of)

    Thanks Visa but i already have a mommy, daddy, and a wife that tell me what to do i dont need you to do it as well.

    This makes me so mad i may just cancel my visa.

  3. OhForTheLoveOf says:

    The most dangerous part of this, I might think, is that Visa and Mastercard have now set the precedent that they are willing to be corporate vigilante’s for the RIAA and the Justice Department. Before any court has ruled on anything, the credit card companies decided that they don’t like a certain business on political grounds and have shut off access to them.

    Fuck this. Revolution Now!

  4. mxpwr03 says:

    Good luck with that revolution.

  5. Don says:

    While I have never used the service, it sure does sound fishy to me. I simply use Limewire to ste… er download my public domain mp3s that I would like to listen to.

    Visa and Mastercard are private businesses and that I’m sure it states somewhere in their multipaged cardmember agreement that they can refuse to do business with anyone for any reason.

    If you are so gungho to use AllofMP3, slap a couple of 20’s in an envelope and send it off to them. I’m sure they will be happy to do business with you.

    Don

  6. kariato says:

    There is a danger with this move for both Visa and Mastercard especially with the same thing happening gambling. They may open up a business for a micropayment option outside these sellers to act as a third party. Given the money involved with the offsite Gambling I could see a non US based micropayment site being formed that will take business away from the regulated credit cards. I imagine that a Russian bank might well view this as a great money landering scheme.

  7. Olo Baggins of Bywater says:

    The other factor here, from what I’ve read, is that MC and Visa were being ripped off by the Russians. Same way the internet porn industry was ripping off Amex, (how would my card ever get used for THAT? 😉 ) now Amex won’t do business there.

  8. rctaylor says:

    Get a copy of their merchants agreement and read it. I think you’ll find they have the right to suspend service, it probably was justifiable and would hold up in US courts. Why are so many people nuts to have a 100 GB’s of mp3’s they hardly ever listen to, if at all. That’s pack rat behavior. Get an unlimited usenet service and knock yourself out.

  9. malren says:

    Tech journalism at it’s best, folks! Neither the source nor the blogger bothered to check this out.

    Editor’s note: Actually, I did check it out. As of this morning I saw this error message “Unfortunately credit card payment is not available at the moment.”

    AllOfMp3 has already found – within 24 hours of the original ruling by Visa (the Mastercard and PayPal decisions came later) – two ways around the problem. I just added $50 to my account from my Visa card yesterday.

    Editor’s note: That’s great, explain the workaround and I’ll amend the original posting. Thanks!

    The more they tighten their grip, the more star systems will slip through their fingers.

  10. Andy says:

    I agree that visa and mastercard shouldn’t selectively tell you where u can and can’t spend your money. However, I think they have a right to not make payments to illegal business, which Allofmp3 is. Yes yes, i know they say they’re legal, but its not legal in the US thats for sure, they don’t pay crap to the artists and everyone knows it.

  11. SN says:

    “they don’t pay crap to the artists and everyone knows it.”

    Under that definition all of the major music labels are illegal!

  12. WokTiny says:

    that was quick…. “its the end of… oh, wait, they’re back”

  13. Jeff says:

    People up in arms about Visa and MC saying they will not deliver payments to a particular merchant. Hmm, they did the same thing to tobacco merchants that legally sell their products to adults. PayPal did, too. It’s not about law. It’s about credit card companies covering their hind quarters in the event of law suits or a Spitzeresque raid.

  14. malren says:

    Editor’s note: Actually, I did check it out. As of this morning I was unable to add money via my Visa card.

    Oh really?

    Just now, I went to AllOfMp3.com. I logged in. I clicked on the link titled “Balance.” Then I clicked on the link titled ‘Refil balance.” On this page I was given multiple choices on how to refil my balance. For my first experiment, I chose “Alltunes Payment.” I followed the links, filled out the forms and viola! I added ten dollars to my account off my Mastercard. My PAYPAL Mastercard, I might add.

    Amazing.

    Next, I went back and chose “Add money by credit card.” Lo and behold, it brought me to the same e-pay gateway as the last choice. I filled out the forms and used my Visa this time, and successfully added another ten dollars to my account. I did this literally 3 minutes ago.

    It’s like a miracle. A miracle that was exactly the same as it was yesterday when I added the $50.

    Editor’s note: Thanks a lot for letting us know!

  15. Mark Derail says:

    From my Canada location in Quebec, I just renewed 25$ with my Mastercard, no problem.

    FWIW, the online MP3 service Top100.cn is even cheaper, and just like AllOfMP3 they pay the royalties in accordance with their local laws.

    Buying my DRM-free music from AllOfMP3 is similar to me driving to the Indian reserve, buying items in a store, and not paying the two taxes GST and PST, because under law, the Indians don’t collect or pay taxes.

  16. mike says:

    Just added some $$ through my Visa card.

  17. ryan says:

    i just use the xrost prepaid cards. that way i don’t have to give allofmp3 my credit info. if they’re willing to pirate music who knows what they’re willing to do w/ credit card #’s once they go under!

  18. SN says:

    “who knows what they’re willing to do w/ credit card #’s once they go under!”

    You can get a temporary number with a set limit from your credit card company.

  19. Gigwave says:

    In Canada, we pay an added tax on all blank cds for the music we don’t pay royalties for. Artists get paid. It’s legal. I’ve just added $10 to my AllTunes account using my MasterCard. Visa wasn’t an option.

  20. catbeller says:

    And Discover? What about that card?

  21. catbeller says:

    Oh, it has to be said: Big Government is nowhere as nasty as Big Business. How do you vote Visa out of office?

  22. Marz says:

    Yeah, still not able to add via CCs

  23. catbeller says:

    10: Allofmp3 is legal in Russia. Its legality in the US is irrelevant; the goods are not in this country. Also, songs are not goods. Songs are patterns, not property. Also, its nobody’s business. Certainly not Visa’s. To enforce this new “intellectual property” notion, you need a completely locked down police state to make sure people never hear or buy a tune without permission. IP is a meme good for nothing but fascism — goverment + business + total survellance + total control = fascism, kids.

    Remember, these kids of laws were unknown ten years ago. We’ve built the police state around the idea we need to police people listening and watching to media so that they can’t consume without an idea’s “owner” being notified. No gulag was this locked down.

  24. catbeller says:

    10: also, if offshore sculduggery is so wrong, why did they let the Cayman Island offshore money system stay legal in the US? I do believe people are putting ill-gotten gains in there and not paying taxes, yes somehow Visa hasn’t cut off the islands from their financial systems.

    Poor people get law; rich people get “privilege” — a latin term meaning “private law”, aka law for people who are above and beyond law that applies to the vulgar masses. Somehow I assume that RIAA members have Cayman accounts.

  25. Podesta says:

    It is apparently taking a few days of Mastercard and Visa’s new policies to be implemented. But, they will be. Meanwhile, a Danish court is also banning allofmp3 use. The writing is on the wall. . . .

    I really can’t say I have any sympathy for the whiners here. If people were stealing the fruits of their labors, they would be singing quite a different tune.

  26. Luís Camacho says:

    @23:
    goverment + business + total survellance + total control = fascism, kids.

    Wrong!

    goverment + business + total survellance + total control = democracy

    Have phun!

  27. Hanzo says:

    So this is all just another example of how in modern times it is harder to do ‘that which is not acceptable’. I remember movies where there is no more cash, because how would you know if you were using stolen cash? How many times does one slip now cause the downfall of a politician due to the gaff being posted on Youtube? Certianly I can’t say anything too controversial here (like “i want to steal all music cause I am cool”) and not expect that, if I were to run for president later, some net junky would trace that comment back to me. Heck, I would almost wonder if I did (and RIAA did not like me) if that exact quote wouldn’t be dug up and used out of context on this actual post.

    Paying anonymously is a privacy issue as noted by the fact that the law and morality supporting allofmp3 is vague and not mainstreem. That privacy is going. Anything you do on the net should be assumed to have been noticed and noted by another.

  28. Ben Lewitt says:

    Well we let Visa and Mastercard thwart smartcards and other less centralized methods of payment. Now a very few institutions can dictate how and what we do. Throw a switch and law enforcement can cut you off. Portable negotiables are necessary for true freedom. Wonder how long cash will hang in there?

  29. Steve S says:

    #27
    In other news, it was revealed today that presidential candidate Mr. Hanzo once posted in a blog comment that quote “i want to steal all music cause I am cool”. This type of flagrant disregard for the legal rights of others has all but guaranteed that he will not be a viable candidate for president. Mr. Hanzo could not be reached for comment.

    Steve

  30. SN says:

    “Wonder how long cash will hang in there?”

    Apparently, you haven’t seen this!


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