Germany does that? You mean the country that's tried to take over the entire world TWICE in the past 100yrs charges a crazy tax like that? Well I'll be damned. What is the world coming to?
Prometheus
· 1 year ago
Laughing and Crying is sooo easy! (oh and whats wrong with the premptive music tax? If they say piracy is wrong and most of the users on an ISP are downloading a blanket tax is fair)
Fabrice Epelboin
· 1 year ago
Yeah... they though about this in France for some time... Guess It'll come back. We already have a similar tax/prepremtive fine on blank CD and DVD, HD and USB keys...
Derek
· 1 year ago
The music industry is simply too lazy or too unoriginal to solve the problem itself. So it's trying to rely on taxing individuals who have nothing to do with music piracy.
Plus, it sounds nice that the fees collected will be "given back to the artists." But, come on, who really believes that will happen. It'll get sucked up in the industry/record label bureaucracy and the artists still won't see it.
Anderson
· 1 year ago
How is is relevant to "social networking news".
Michelle Greer
· 1 year ago
Just shows that people aren't using the web space in a creative way. Musicians have personal brands, and if they don't know how to use a cheap medium, i.e. the internet to promote their stuff, they aren't thinking straight.
This just looks like a step in the wrong direction.
Calan
· 1 year ago
I don't think you're correctly communicating the plan. It doesn't suggest taxing everyone.
It will use ISP's to send letters to downloaders based on their internet habits. People could pay the tax and then download music.
I can't imagine a blanket tax on everyone could possibly have been the suggestion. We're slightly more progressive than that.
Stan_Schroeder
· 1 year ago
I don't see how you can separate the "downloaders" from the "non-downloaders". I choose not to download music, ever. And then, I open a Youtube link, and it's a music video. I fire up a MySpace page, and music starts playing. That's one of the problems with proposals such as this one: they can never be fair.
The proposal uses phrases like "regular downloaders", but who decides what's regular, what's casual, and what's accidental?
Prometheus
· 1 year ago
Very easy, check bittorent transfers to piratesbay, mininova ect sites and you've got 60% caught.
Ipay4myMedia
· 1 year ago
Not only are lawmakers incapable of doing this in a fair and just way for all intellectual property around the 'net, but what about those who pay, at least in some way, for all the media and sofware they consume? I make it a point to support artists, moviemakers, and programmers because I am a programmer.
Therefore, lawmakers are going to punish those who download leagally and those who download legally equally? That will only cause all who actually purchase media to become jaded and either stop consuming, or hyper consume for free.
This is completely vapid, and I cannot believe lawmakers are actually considering it. Plus, 30 pounds is absolutely exorbitant. 2 USD/month distributed directly to the artists would end up being MORE THAN THEY CURRENTLY MAKE FROM RECORD COMPANIES. I can't remember the exact statistic, but I think it goes a little like Radiohead made an average of 2.15 USD per album on In Rainbows when they gave it away as 'donationware.' That's more than 15 cents they would have made per album sale just by cutting out the middleman. Does anyone see a problem with how top-heavy and cumbersome our media outlets have become? Everyone wants a pound of flesh from these artists, and from the people. I cry outrage!
Andrew Wise
· 1 year ago
I say we put a tax on ISPs and give the money to educators who are seeing their wages constantly being pushed lower, with costs increasingly skyrocketing. No Child Left Behind and all that crap does nothing for teacher's pay, and why should we be catering to musicians who are GETTING PAID TO PLAY MUSIC!
This country needs to invest more money into the people that help to shape our future, instead of pandering to the music industry.
Michael Kimsal
· 1 year ago
Allen Stern had it wrong the other day - don't click on ads, just get governments to impose a fee to then redistribute to bloggers. There's load of copyrighted blog content that's shared, I dare say some of it illegally, by millions of people every day. I bet some RIAA employees even redistribute blog content illegally, with company computers no less!
The gov't should collect $50/year - only $5/month from each ISP per user - and set up a blogger fund. Bloggers would get paid from this proportionally to the amount of content they create (not how much is 'stolen', just created).
Whaddya all think?
Daniel B
· 1 year ago
I can't see that it matters how much money some musicians make. Taxing the web would be a bad idea even if all musicians were really poor.
Also: what about porn? That is intellectual property as well, and there's A LOT of it being downloaded out there...I've been told, by a friend. At least it would be funny seeing the goverment trying to decide who should have the most money: the producers of "Butt Pirates of the Caribbean" or "Scat Monsters III".
Payam
· 1 year ago
Stan, I would like to know what made you qualify to write an article on this subject? Do you work in the music industry? and it would have also made sense to link your past article to this post so we know where you coming from.
Youre forgetting about independent musicians that piracy is killing because they invest the little money and time they have in themselves to make a product that someone might want, and people just steal it... so the artist is unable to get a first step forward financially. There are alot of great artists out there with wonderful recordings and songs that are being choked out by people who just want to take because they can... without consideration for the time, effort and money that goes into the creation of the music, especially when every penny counts.
Offshore Disclosure
· 8 months ago
I don't think its not good to put tax on these cases..Its against the entire music lovers.. Offshore Disclosure
tori
· 6 months ago
There are several ingredients it takes to be a successful musician: • Incredible musical talent • Charisma, good looks, charm... all the things it takes to have people want to listen to you • Endurance. Think of all the early years that musicians spend writing songs, band practice, organising gigs, hauling all their s*** to places far and wide to play their songs, slowly getting exposure, etc, etc. It is not easy to 'make it' in the musical world and that one little carrot that hangs in their faces is the one piece of hope that keeps the industry turning out great stuff. When all those ingredients combine, don't you think they deserve a little credit? To say they're lavish and indulgent (a.k.a Lenny Kravitz) is judging a life you'll never live. What is it like to have to live indoors because the paparazzi is up your a**? If this answer is 'I don't know' then you're not really fit to judge how that person spends their money.
All Comments
Plus, it sounds nice that the fees collected will be "given back to the artists." But, come on, who really believes that will happen. It'll get sucked up in the industry/record label bureaucracy and the artists still won't see it.
This just looks like a step in the wrong direction.
It will use ISP's to send letters to downloaders based on their internet habits. People could pay the tax and then download music.
I can't imagine a blanket tax on everyone could possibly have been the suggestion. We're slightly more progressive than that.
The proposal uses phrases like "regular downloaders", but who decides what's regular, what's casual, and what's accidental?
Therefore, lawmakers are going to punish those who download leagally and those who download legally equally? That will only cause all who actually purchase media to become jaded and either stop consuming, or hyper consume for free.
This is completely vapid, and I cannot believe lawmakers are actually considering it. Plus, 30 pounds is absolutely exorbitant. 2 USD/month distributed directly to the artists would end up being MORE THAN THEY CURRENTLY MAKE FROM RECORD COMPANIES. I can't remember the exact statistic, but I think it goes a little like Radiohead made an average of 2.15 USD per album on In Rainbows when they gave it away as 'donationware.' That's more than 15 cents they would have made per album sale just by cutting out the middleman. Does anyone see a problem with how top-heavy and cumbersome our media outlets have become? Everyone wants a pound of flesh from these artists, and from the people. I cry outrage!
This country needs to invest more money into the people that help to shape our future, instead of pandering to the music industry.
The gov't should collect $50/year - only $5/month from each ISP per user - and set up a blogger fund. Bloggers would get paid from this proportionally to the amount of content they create (not how much is 'stolen', just created).
Whaddya all think?
Also: what about porn? That is intellectual property as well, and there's A LOT of it being downloaded out there...I've been told, by a friend. At least it would be funny seeing the goverment trying to decide who should have the most money: the producers of "Butt Pirates of the Caribbean" or "Scat Monsters III".
Offshore Disclosure
• Incredible musical talent
• Charisma, good looks, charm... all the things it takes to have people want to listen to you
• Endurance. Think of all the early years that musicians spend writing songs, band practice, organising gigs, hauling all their s*** to places far and wide to play their songs, slowly getting exposure, etc, etc. It is not easy to 'make it' in the musical world and that one little carrot that hangs in their faces is the one piece of hope that keeps the industry turning out great stuff.
When all those ingredients combine, don't you think they deserve a little credit? To say they're lavish and indulgent (a.k.a Lenny Kravitz) is judging a life you'll never live. What is it like to have to live indoors because the paparazzi is up your a**? If this answer is 'I don't know' then you're not really fit to judge how that person spends their money.