AllofMP3: Your money's no good here

AllofMp3 - propelled by music industry attention further into public consciousness - continues to adapt to whatever attempts to close it down are batted in its direction.

Visa - citing worries over copyright - had announced it would stop processing payments for the site, which seems to have inspired AllofMp3 to take a lesson from Napster. A new, free business model - supported by advertising - was at the heart of an announcement from the site:

The company, which previously charged about $1 an album, plans to offer consumers a new software program that allows them to download any song from the site for free. AllofMP3 claims to have a catalogue of hundreds of thousands of albums, increasing at a rate of 1,000 per month.

Users of the new service will only be able to listen to songs by using the AllofMP3 software, and the songs will be usable on just one computer at a time. The interface, called Music for the Masses, will initially be available for Microsoft Windows, with an Apple version arriving in several weeks, Mamotin said.

Consumers who wish to transfer their songs between computers or to a music device like an iPod or another MP3 player, will have to pay for the music.

The viability of the service will, of course, depend on being able to find people who are willing to advertise on a site which is something of a grey area; if customers are willing to download a piece of software which does something other than play MP3 files; and, of course, on the IFPI continuing to offer free promotion of that allofmp3.com web address.

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