Music industry calls for filesharing tax

considering the average music artist gets about 5%, this ruling is in favour of the fatcats and their love of money

what gets me is that governments support it

its criminal - especially when they make out that the artist is the biggest lose

the music industry is just as 'streamlined' as any other - the littel guy gets shafted and the corporate scum light cigars with £50 notes

either Tax and free downloads or pay per download and no Tax.

You can't have both, although i am sure the RIAA & co. will disagree.

the Dutch pay already for many years a piracy tax on all forms of recording materials, tapes, cassettes, cd's, dvd's.

Where this money goes is a mystery, there's no public account.

Any "tax" should not be considered collective "punishment" for illegal activities, but rather sanctions the unlimited downloading and trading of the music that is being *paid for* by public funds.

However, I don't want to be taxed for something I am not responsible for. Downloading music should not be on the socialist agenda.

So, we're initially expected to believe that what we pay for isn't vinyl, ferromagnetic tape or polycarbonate Frisbees, but a licence to reproduce the artists' works. In the next breath, they say that every copy, even though it is simply reproducing that work for private use, be it on a media player, computer or CD-R for the car (which the Police have been advocating as a way to prevent smashed side windows in cars as CD-Rs are seen as less valuable by scrotes) requires another licence to reproduce the same damned thing.

These people must think we're soft.

Please note that I do NOT condone filesharing of copyrighted works, making copies to give to other people or downloading said works from t'Internet. In fact, those things p1ss me off because it has come to the point that any heavy Internet user has been spattered with the label "pirate" and we're all suffering because of the lazy few. Yes, that's what you are, lazy, cheap and arrogant. What I am arguing for is that when you have a licence to reproduce a work, you should have the right to do so in any way you wish as long as you do not *distribute* that work. That word distribute is key to this issue and copyright law in general.

Also exists in Portugal. Its a shame on us for allowing such a thing.

In France we have had a blank media tax for ages, we even have a hard disk tax to go with it, yet we never know how much is collected nor where it goes, and the media moguls in France are not publicly pretending to be any better off than anywhere else.
Conclusion ? This tax is useless, period.
But hey, that doesn't have anything to do with whether or not it will happen, right ?

when the UK government adopts a tax, the revenue does not go to the originating industry.

it is used to line MP's pockets in some way just like every financial transaction in parliament

The same "fee" is also being paid in the United States, which is where the whole thing started. Of course, it's not widely advertised that it exists in the US, because then people might realize they aren't getting what they paid for.

And AFAIK, the fee that's collected in Canada is paid to the RIAA and MPAA in the U.S. Talk about screwed up.

I always get confused about that tax,
If we have to pay tax for it doesn't that mean we are allowed to do it?

Sound to me as a new way to raise taxes, they taxed everything that was legal now let start everything that isn't legal and assume everyone is equally guilty.

They should do that for speeding tickets, everyone should pays equally as much every year.

"No one seriously expects the government to go ahead with such batty oppressive schemes"

jesus christ nick, the uk government would totally go for this,
5p tax, gov gets half, music execs get half (singers get fucked off anyway).

But,they alresdy tax the poor taxpayers & give £millions, nay..£Billions, ...nay £ TRILLIONS of taxpayers money to business.
They just haven't got round to pluck up the courage to tax us more to pay for the £Trillions they gave,that was borrowed & printed.
twenty years ago,they gave £4.5 BILLION to the farmers,with NO accountability for it(mad cow disease)... now,we have the government giving £100's Billions to the banks,again, with NO accountability,for what you may call..MAD BANKS DISEASE.

We have paid that silly tax on blank media and whatnot for a while now.

The RCMP has stated they will not go after people who download music because they realize they have to go arrest themselves for the exact same "copyright infringement". Every time the guv tries to implement some kind of bill C-61 (DMCA) our wonderful opposition parties come along and make another non-confidence vote and here we go to the polls again.

Yeah, sure it's a pissoff cuz it's a waste of taxpayers money (200mil+ a crack), but it's better than paying 75$ extra for every mp3 player or hard drive.

I download music, but I also pay my "tax" on it and hopefully it gets to the musicians somehow. If musicians want my money, come to where I live and I'll pay to see them. Otherwise...no one gives a crap, and we keep on going, business as usual.

Michael Geist (sp?) will keep them in check.

I would definitely say that if the tax is levied then the activity itself has to be legal. You cannot tax crime. In Finland we also pay for empty CD:s and DVD:s at least. Many people go around this by ordering from Germany via the net. Also copying for your own use at least used to be legal, although I am not sure whether it is still true. I don't necessarily think of the tax in negative terms. But it has to be absolutely clear in that case that downloading and sharing becomes a legal activity. As someone said said - you can't have your cake and eat it too.

If you make it a volutary, Gov't thing, where you will be covered from any attacks from RIAA, MPAA et all the rest of the fat b'stards, IFPI, etc....

Pay X per month a download as much as you want.
If you can't stop it getting on the web, allow people to Download it.
Just allow.

If they give you a free reign to Download, for a fee, and the feeling that if anyone gives you sh*t about copyright, you ARE COVERED, and SAFE.
This would then work.

Making everyone pay is wrong.

... to simply stop buying the product. Oh wait, the last music I bought was on a vinyl platter and played at 33 1/3 RPM. Oh well, radio I listen to is still free. So far anyway.

One of my main complaints about the present system is this whole artificial scarcity thing. I absolutely LOATHE the fact that a show will show up on tv, and then I have to jump through hoops(DRM, waiting for the show to come on a second time) to be able to see it again. And if you want to rent Season 1 on dvd, by the time they decide to put it out, they're well into Season 3 or 4 by then. That sucks ass.

Tell you what RIAA, put everything on a Hulu-type model and quit fucking around. I'm not an intentional thief, I'm a time-shifter. You want to make money, that's fabulous, but artificial scarcity is totally uncool.

"No one seriously expects the government to go ahead with such batty oppressive schemes."

Yeah, that would be silly. Like requiring internet radio stations to pay "broadcasting fees" to the FCC. Oh wait... that passed.

how can it work. I mean if there's 100mil./year collected from this tax, how you decide, how much every artist should get? Should British taxpayers give money only to British artists, or should they share the money with the rest of the world?

"The National Farmers' Union could also show up to Number 10 to demand that more money is given to it because more people appear to be vegetarian these days."

Oh please, how do you compare that with ripping off music? Your example would be like the music industry losing money because people don't like music as much any more. But they are making less money because people can just download songs for free instead of buying them.

I agree... What have the farmers got to do with anything, and where exactly are they supposed to be loosing out due to veggies? They grow vegetables too you know!

160 million divided by 100,000 is $160 per artist (not to mention other entities). This seems like a total waste of time, money and effort.

LOL tax CDs/DvDs, most people that download keep the download in digital form. Ipod anyone?

A flat, ISP based tax for unlimited download is the way to go.

That said, the tax should be divided according to the popularity of the downloaded content. Fair is fair.

Now, little missy Music Industry, meet the 350-pound Mr. Porn Industry, unzip his pants and start sucking.

CDs and DVDs are digital content too, even if you convert it so it will play in your CD/DVD player.

It looks like Canadians will have an election this fall, and the Pirate Party is trying to get candidates for as many ridings as they can. You can support them at:

http://www.pirateparty.ca/

They've been punishing the honest, buying public with their greed for decades. Nothing new here making the good folk pay for their money-grubbing habits.

And the honest,buying public has just continued to plop down their hard earned cash no matter what. They've earned this tax with their unfailing loyalty.

I avoid RIAA music like the plague. So why do I deserve a tax when I do not download music and I avoid RIAA music completely?

Screw you RIAA Fat Cats! You will never see another $ of my money ever again.

...to prosecute pirates.

The more the pirates pay for their crimes the less law abiding citizens will need to pay. Lock the criminals up for years and fine them millions. It's fine by me. If you can't do the time, then don't do the crime.

If Canada adds tax this will only fatten the lazy industry that scams off artists and rewrite contracts to fit their own. If the legislators write this they basically are conning the consumers some who never even go online or even listen to music. More or less this is a legislative scam for Canadians and Canadians should rise up and let their legislators know this is not tolerated since they are only feeding entertainment executives.

As pointed out, this is just wrong on so many levels.
First, there may have been an argument about casette tapes but CD-Rs DVD-Rs are widely used for things other than copying music or video. What about your backups? Your own family recordings? Will you get a rebate for those uses?
The distribution method of any levies collected is highly questionable and it's just to feed the fat cats as somebody said.
But wait! If the levy is charged, that is essentially legalizing teh copying, They can't charge money for something and then turn around and lock you up for it, as well.

why not castrate all men as they are potential rapists? lets face it guys, you all thought about having sex with a women you just saw walkign down the street and she didnt even give you permission to think such foul thoughts!

And we all know the good book indicates that though and deed are one and the same in the eyes of the Lord!

or, Fine me and put penalty points on everyones driving license as people break the speed limit - you could even fine people who dont have a license as they obviously are accessories to the crime that they or their drive didnt commit,

In the united States of America, blank music CDs have a built-in charge for RIAA. Hardly anyone remembers that it passed so long ago. So if we are to be assessed for unlawful downloads, that legitimizes such downloads. I am emphatically not a pirate downloader, but once I am assessed a fee for it, hell, I'll be an unrepentant participant.