Slashdot Mirror
Canadian Music Industry Wants Royalties on Net Usage
Dr. Zoidburg writes "Apparently Internet music and movie sharing in Canada has gained enough popularity to turn the heads of the music and movie industry. CTV has a report about a Canadian organization named SOCAN (Society of Composers, Authors, and Music Publishers of Canada) that will "ask the Supreme Court of Canada next week to force Internet service providers to pay them royalties for the millions of digital music files downloaded each year by Canadians". Says the president of the Canadian Association of Internet Providers, "Consumers could very well see an increase in their Internet costs and they could see a slowdown in the transmission speed of their Internet communications"."
All of a sudden I *don't* want to be classed as an ISP any more (re: that story
Simon.
Physicists get Hadrons!
Finally Canadians get a taste of RIAA's medicine. Theyve had these freedoms for way too long.
Vote for new mod!!! Score:-2,Imbecile
when your stuff gets downloaded. If you're gonna tax everyone, then you can't complain when they take what they paid for.
Slashdot is proof that Sturgeon's Law applies to mankind.
Relatively speaking, of course. If "Screw the big labels, who overcharge for music and cannot assemble a coherent internet strategy - I'll just get it for free" is a reasonable response to the status quo, then a blanket tax on traffic to "reclaim lost media revenue" is also reasonable.
That's great. Raise internet prices for everyone for no apparent reason to the consumer. Reminds me of some of those obfuscated extra charges on my phone bill.
Always going forward, 'cause we can't find reverse.
Hey lets tax internet access.
I dont feel like we are making enough money.
So lets try to get the govt to tax other businesses
to make up for what we feel like we are not
getting. right...
I think this whole movie and music thing is way
overblown.
Or how about STFU (SOCAN Takes money From end Users)
As much as the DMCA is unpopular among Slashdotters, and rightfully so, at least it gets one thing right. It establishes that the ISP isn't responsible in any way. As the article states, if the music and movie industries get their way in Canada, they could soon be responsible for the traffic through their network. I know the DMCA gets a lot of things wrong, but protecting the ISPs is one thing it actually gets right. Think about it.
Surely payment upfront on the assumption that people will be using their connection for legally questionable activities will help to justify the 'crime'* to people before they even sign up? "If I'm paying for it, I may as well be doing it"
* I say crime, I mean 'copyright infringement' (or whatever - Lets not start this one again!)
Friggin America, always trying to take away my rights! I'm moving to Canada!
Oh wait...
After all, the food companies keep illegal downloaders alive, so ultimately they are responsible!
...who would never sign with a 'major' label (or even a really large indie one)... when is my cheque coming? ...and how much do I get?
I make a good portion of my music freely downloabable from my site... and if they're going to tax people for downloading my music, then I should see that money, shouldn't I?
If our Internet bill helped to fund the music industry, I would suddenly have an attitude that I can copy and download music freely without restriction.
Currently I believe that it is important to respect the owner's copyright and that music should be payed for, if the artists ask for payment.
We already pay $0.25 per cd-r, "they" want to increase it to around $0.59. As an example, that would increase the take by the music industry of a 30 pack of cd-r's to $17.70, from $7.50, an increase of $10.20. I for one find it offensive that the recording industry is charging me for the right to back up my own, non-musical data, and I doubt that any of the levies collected are rightfully distributed to pornstars that most /. readers have stored in the way of movies on cd-r's. Large per GB levies have also been proposed for portable players, and if I recall correctly, if implemented, the levy on an iPod would be around $200.
There has been a lot of opposition to the proposed $0.59 levy lately, spearheaded by large retailers, so the music industry has turned elsewhere, and that is to ISP's.
Look at the laws. What you're allowed to copy isn't linked in any functional way to what you pay the levy on, in the law. The law also doesn't have anything to say about the source that one copies from.
The Copyright Board has actually found that the source needn't be a legitimately purchased or owned medium for a perfectly legal personal copy to be made. There's no reason downloading music shouldn't be covered by the existing legislation. You run into trouble if you start uploading music, though, as it violates the legal restrictions on usage of a personal copy. It violates, off the top of my head, the prohibitions on transmitting copies across a telecommunications system as well as the prohibition on distributing your personal copies.
The gist of it is, uploading is sure as hell illegal under the current legislation, but downloading is fine unless some magic way to argue against it is found.
... I feel like freakin' moving!
This is the first I'd heard SOCAN had gotten this far and quite frankly I'm pissed. I don't even have a P2P app installed in my computer, my MP3 collection consists solely of my own CD collection and is in that format for ease of access.
What's next? Royalties on showerheads, shower curtains and bathtubs in case we happen to mumble out a tune while showering?
The problem with our Supreme Court is they'll likely side with SOCAN and we'll end up paying. This is the same court who sided with our domestic DTH satellite providers and outright made it illegal to subscribe to US services in our country, yup for years we did our darndest to broadcast signals behind the iron curtain but when it comes to protecting a few broadcasting monopolies it's ok to ban foreign signals.
Shit we don't get to vote for a new government until next spring but the media have all pretty much named the new PM who is just the guy taking over from the retiring PM, lucky for us in the rest of the country it only takes Ontario and Quebec to vote in the same idiots time after time, the new guy is very pro big business, heck in his private career he made an effort to get around Canadian tax laws by using ships registerd at foreign ports, just the guy to put in charge!
It's common knowledge that electricity is only used by illegal filesharers, so increasing its cost to recoup diminishing profits^W^Wdamages makes a lot of sense.
Naturally, this also includes batteries. Solar panels are allowed (for now) but there's going to be a tax on sunlight soon which should be able to close that gap.
Remember folks: You are consumers. SO START CONSUMING ALREADY! Your unwillingness to consume our drivel^Wproduct is costing us MONEY. If this trend keeps up, we'll be forced to sue you.
Cooper
--
I don't need a pass to pass this pass!
- Groo The Wanderer -
There is a way that the Canadian people could actually end up having a sorted system if this does become law. Unfortunately it requires a high degree of faecal unity on the part of many people.
..... obviously it makes a difference to the record company - just like it makes a difference to McDonalds when you eat at Burger King.
While this is going on, you could lobby your MPs {assuming that is what they are called in Canada} to ensure that if any royalty fees are charged on downloaded music, they should be payable directly to the performer {assuming the performer is the copyright holder} and not exceed the amount that would have been paid had the songs downloaded been obtained on the least expensive pre-recorded medium available {whether this be cassette, CD, LP, MiniDisc or To Be Invented}. If Avril Lavigne {faute de mieux} gets x cents when I buy one of her albums, I don't see why it makes any difference to Avril Lavigne if I just make a copy of the album and pay her the same x cents directly. I mean
And, of course, in the case of unauthorised downloading, you would only ever be held liable for those x cents per track - not the thousands of dollars the RIAA conjures up out of thin air. Call me quaint and old-fashioned, but if you steal a dollar you should pay back a dollar; or at the worst no more than what would buy when you come to pay it back,whatever a dollar would have bought when you stole it.
It would be interesting to see exactly what objections anyone could raise to this proposal. I've even come up with a name for it: non-discriminatory licencing. Basically, if an artist allows a record company to package up and distribute their work for a fee, they have to allow anyone to do the equivalent job for the same fee; anybody's money is as good as anybody else's.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
SCAM PC? Sounds reasonably accurate to me...
Well now, if the ISP's can be made to pay for theft that occurs on their infrastructure, why, then the government is obviously required to do the same for every thief that uses a car to drive on a street during the getaway. I mean - hadn't the street been there, he wouldn't have gotten away. So therefore the street owner is partly responsible for the success of the theft.
Does everything include nothing?
In canada, there's already a levy on blank CDRs which goes to the music industry...
The taxi companies must pay Teosto license fee if their drivers wish to keep the radio on when they've got a customer in the car. It doesn't matter if the broadcaster already paid for the songs...
They also tried to extort money from kindergartens, schools and churches for the copyrighted children songs/hymns that were being sung by the kids and churchgoers. That didn't go through - yet. I bet they'll try again soon.
holy shit, canada has music?!
Business needs to change, to adapt to the benefits of our technology.
Look at it this way:
Technology advancements are supposed to be good for us. They are supposed to make our world better, our quality of life better.
At what point does the old economic systems need to change in order to work in accord to such benefits of technology?
The whole point of money is that of a value exchange system, but what happens when our production of value reaches the ultimate point of being able to supply everyone with the basic needs for near nothing?
Lets say I'm an artist, I produce some work that is popular, I want value I can use to exchange for other things, including investments, etc.. and all of this is a matter of my quality of life and influence on the direction of things (personal power)...
At what point of world quality of life and wealth does money hinder more than help?
We need incentive to keep going, we need to be doing something productive that adds or helps to maintain the wealth we have..instead of becomming fat and lazy..
But its clear that music production is alot less costly then it used to be and distribution can ultimately be practically free. Making it possible to have a higher percentage of return against the investment... which might be less than the old expensive way.
But if cost reduction is spread across all products and services...at some point it can be reduced to near nothing.... leaving only the need for incentive to keep going...
SOCAN is a performing rights agency. It is the Canadian equivalent of BMI and ASCAP in the United States. These organizations collect money for the composers and publishers of music. They do not collect money for the recording artists. (Note that the composers and publishers are often different from the recording artists.) And they're not an industry lobby group like the RIAA.
Eric
you are assuming that laws are logical. Let me challenge that assumption: here in Germany we pay sort of a tax on blank media and recorders. Music industry is even trying to broaden the scope of these royalties: they are currently pushing for a copy tax on printers (older link here.).
In addition to that, there is an entity called GEMA which makes sure that radio stations pay for each song they play. Public radio and TV cost consumers a monthly fee, too.
Recently they made a new copyright law. Copying for private use used to be legal, and strictly by the letter of the law still is, but circumventing copy protection mechanisms in order to do something the law explicitly allows you to do is now illegal. In other words: They didn't outlaw crossing the road. They made touching the ground with your feet while crossing the road a crime.
So consumers over here are forced to pay for the same product multiple times. All attempts to set that straight have failed so far. I have a hunch that this kind of legal creativity may become an exportschlager.
Speaking as a non-Canadian, they should pay me for having to endure that Celine fucking Dion at all hours of the day and night.
;-)
Hey, we had to endure her singing for YEARS before we finally convinced her to move away. She's your problem now...
You can't take the sky from me...
The above was an attempt at humor
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I'm waiting for the tax on all people with ears. Those people with ears are untrustworthy! They could be walking along one day and hear music created by starving artists just trying to get by. They should pay royalties to be able to listen to other people's music!
Here's the thing:
I don't mind those taxes on blank CD's and wouldn't mind taxes on bandwidth. As long as they are for the end user minimal in impact. No tax should stiffle growth.
But the stupid thing is: why should the music industry have sole benefit?
Come on, guys/grrls! Programmers Unite!
A shitheap of illegal and legal downloads and copies are made of your work.
In the end, if the money is well spent I say: "More power to you", but for every ten CD's I burn, maybe one is music - LEGALLY aquired, thankyouverymuch - and the rest is backups, pictures, my own work and programs. I actually don't think I'm very different in this than most people.
Cheers
I think, therefore I am...I think.
I see a lot of "this isn't so bad" comments, but you really need to take things one step further.
So $5 per month gets added to our ISP bill (it won't be a tiny amount), and now the music industry is happy. Now it's the movie industry's turn -- let's add another $5. Oops, software association is losing their money too -- $5. Almost forgot ebook publishers -- $2.
And if past performance on our CD-levy is anything to go by, that rate will just keep rising. Every year the "levy" we pay on blank CDs keep climbing. What's to stop them from hiking the "levy" on ISPs each year?
This could turn into a mess quickly.
"The market alone cannot provide sufficient constraints on corporation's penchant to cause harm." -- Joel Bakan
"Consumers could very well see an increase in their Internet costs and they could see a slowdown in the transmission speed of their Internet communications."
But remember, the law would be for your protection and to serve the interestes of the people, as all laws must do.
I see this same idea again and again and I HATE it.
So, because something has worked for the last fifty to one hundred years that is how it must always be? Just keep a bad idea on life support for about a generation and that's it you can go to court and be declared a national necessity.
It is not the artist but the industry that has popped up to support the commercialization of music that are in trouble here and since they all have skills other than being artist they should be able to find work in other industries. End of story. Thanks music biz, it was nice knowing you but as of about now you are all dinosaurs. You have to do what so many others before you have done, go somewhere else and get a job.
Now back to the artist, my friend is in a band that has been around for over twenty years. They have had a few "record deals" but have always kept ownership of the music. They tell me they have always made more money touring and selling from the fan club than any contract. Now with the internet they are making more money than ever and the fan club (paid members) is the largest it has ever been.
It is the opinion of this band that "music sharing" helps them because they would never get on the radio any way or not enough to help but when someone finds their music and likes it, it eventually leads them to the web site or a show and that, is what brings in the money.
So this proposed tax (and that is what it is, Canadian's have a problem being honest with taxation) will increase costs to the consumer, devalue what ever funds are collected (the cost to process this tax), and what little gets back will likely go into the wrong hands.
Now more bad effects, by propping up a dying system with tax dollars you not only put off the enviable but the wasted (now) tax dollars put a negative effect on the economy, exactly the opposite effect you were hoping for in the first place. Gee thanks.
DATs and CD-Rs are already taxed here for the benefit of Canadian artists.
But if ISPs are taxed, I curious how you can then enforce laws claiming that the 'sharing' is illegal? Might become an interesting test case.
-psy