Have You Paid Your Bertelsmann Tax Today?

Mwongozi writes "Germany is planning to slap new taxes on computer, telecommunications and Internet products to ensure that authors are properly rewarded for the use of their work, a newspaper said Wednesday. The Berliner Zeitung said proposals had been drafted requiring manufacturers of goods from computers to printers, modems, compact disc "burners" and other devices to pay royalty fees that would then be forwarded to music and film companies." My guess is that Bertelsmann, the world's third largest media company, has a little something to do with this. In the U.S., any devices intended for digital audio are already taxed similarly to the above proposal but general-purpose computing devices are not. (Though the RIAA sought to include them too.) Has anyone considered what an extraordinary situation it is where government tax collectors are collecting taxes which are funneled straight to corporations?

Comments

Absurd...

[Fnkmaster]

Well, if I'm going to be paying for the right to copy music, then morally there is nothing wrong with hitting Napster and leeching away, since I've already paid for the right to do it. This completely removes any moral imperative to respect copyright laws or to ever go buy the CD of an artist that you actually like.

Re:Absurd...

[TheGratefulNet]

yes, this is logical. if the authorities are saying "we know you're copying copywrited works - you have a computer so you MUST be guilty of this. so lets dispense with trials and such and just slap a fine on you. you know you're guilty - just pay the fine" then I guess since we've already been judged and are paying the fine, we at least owe it to ourselves to enjoy the fruits of our 'crimes'.

don't they see that this promotes breaking the laws?

its like a cop that stops you before you enter a very fast highway and says "we're collecting in advance for any speeding you're likely to do". who in their right mind would NOT speed after being charged for it? especially if your car is up to it.

...and the fight escalates further.

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Re:US Gov't Doesn't Collect the "Tax"

[jms]

The US gov't does not, and never has, collected any "taxes" that are distributed to artists as royalties. Period, end of story.

Makers of Music Minidisc, DAT Music Tapes, and Music CD-R discs for sale in the US do throw money into the music industry, but it's the same corporate channels that already existed for music royalties.

Sorry, but your information is eight years out of date. Read Title 17 Chapter 10 if you don't believe me.

Since 1992, the U.S. Government has collected a royalty on all blank digital audio recorders and blank digital audio media manufactured in or imported into the United States, and handed the money directly over to the RIAA companies.

The money collected is, as mandated by federal law, divided as follows:

(1.75%) of the royalties are paid to the American Federation of Musicians, to be paid to "non-featured" musicians (studio musicians)
(0.92%) of the royalties are paid to the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, to be paid to "non-featured" vocalists (backup vocalists)
(25.60%) of the royalties are paid to "featured recording artists", including such bands as Metallica.
(38.40%) of the royalties are paid to "copyright owners" (the RIAA companies)
(16.67%) of the royalties are paid to "music publishers"
(16.67%) of the royalties are paid to music writers, including such bands as Metallica who write their own songs.

This is completely above and beyond the other systems of royalty payments, such as ASCAP, BMI, where the copyright owners go after businesses to get them to sign licensing agreements. In this case, the royalty fee collection system is part of Federal Law.

Incidently, if you're curious as to why downloading from Napster is not illegal, or immoral, read paragraph 1008. This is what you, the consumer got in exchange for a federal law mandating direct payments from your wallet to the RIAA whenever you buy a blank audio CDR.

About Bertlesmann

[Pinball Wizard]

Since Michael saw fit to speculate that Bertelsmann was behind the proposal to tax electronic devices for the benefit of media companies, I thought I should point out just how much Bertlesmann affects us all.

IMO, Bertelsmann is a monopolist trying to grab as much of the media market as they can, especially in the book arena. They own the largest publishing company and the largest chain bookstore, Random House and Barnes & Noble. They attempted to purchase Ingram Book Company(big distributor-something like 60% of Amazon's books come from Ingram), luckily that was stopped by the antitrust folks in our govt. If they had pulled that off they would have had a complete vertical hold on the book industry - from publishing to distributing to bookselling. They would have profitted from the majority of internet book sales.

They are definitely a company /.ers should know about and be wary of.

Re:What's wrong with this?

[Sloppy]

It may be a 'big evil corporation' that's charging you money, but you still owe it to them.

No you don't. You might owe it to them. More likely, you owe it to someone else, or no one at all. If an unsigned garage band burns from CDR demos to send out to reviewers and fans, please explain how and why they owe money to some arbitrary record label who will use the money to promote some pop star. If I copy a CD published by media company A so that I can listen to it in my car, why does media company B get a cut of the CDR sales revenue?

If you're so against things being free, then why do you defend the media companies getting this unearned money for free?

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