Magnitizdat is a term used to describe the process of re-copying and self distributing live audio tape recordings in the Soviet Union

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 that were not available commercially. It is similar to bootleg recording

Bootleg recording

A bootleg recording is an audio or video recording of a performance that was not officially released by the artist or under other legal authority. The process of making and distributing such recordings is known as bootlegging...

s, except it is usually sanctioned by the performers (who do not expect to make money from these recordings) for the purpose of circumventing political censorship and making their work as well known as possible.

The process of magnitizdat was less risky than publishing literature via samizdat

Samizdat

Samizdat was a key form of dissident activity across the Soviet bloc in which individuals reproduced censored publications by hand and passed the documents from reader to reader...

, since any person in the USSR was permitted to own a private reel-to-reel tape recorder, while paper duplication equipment was under control of the state.

Magnitizdat was the main method by which the songs of Russian bards

Bard (Soviet Union)

The term bard came to be used in the Soviet Union in the early 1960s, and continues to be used in Russia today, to refer to singer-songwriters who wrote songs outside the Soviet establishment, similarly to beatnik folk singers of the United States...

 such as Bulat Okudzhava

Bulat Okudzhava

Bulat Shalvovich Okudzhava was a Soviet and Russian poet, writer, musician, novelist, and singer-songwriter. He was one of the founders of the Russian genre called "author song"...

, Vladimir Vysotsky

Vladimir Vysotsky

Vladimir Semyonovich Vysotsky was a Soviet singer, songwriter, poet, and actor whose career had an immense and enduring effect on Russian culture. He became widely known for his unique singing style and for his lyrics, which featured social and political commentary in often humorous street...

, and Alexander Galich

Alexander Galich

Alexander Galich , was a Russian poet, screenwriter, playwright, and singer-songwriter. Galich is a pen name, a sort of acronym of his last name, first name, and patronymic: Ginzburg Alexander Arkadievich. He adopted this name to conceal his Jewish ancestry in the face of antisemitism in the Soviet...

made their way around the Soviet Union and abroad. Magnitizdat was also used to distribute lectures with anti-Soviet content.

The word magnitizdat comes from "magnit" (magnet), which comes from the word "magnitnaya plyenka" (magnetic tape), and "izdat" (to publish).