When pressure from the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and the United States government caused the Kremlin to take down AllofMP3 in mid 2007, the RIAA must’ve been jumping for joy.

Before the shutdown, AllOfMP3 had around 6 million users who were able to download songs and albums for a tiny fraction of the price of authorized alternatives such as iTunes.

The RIAA said it could not live with this situation.

In December 2006, the RIAA filed a...