Slashdot Mirror
Canadians May Face 25% Download Tariff
C-Yo writes "While Canadians have battled against an iPod tariff for more than a
year, now comes news that Canada's copyright collectives are seeking a
tariff on iTunes as well. Professor
Michael Geist (who last
week dismantled music industry claims about peer-to-peer) reports
that one collective is demanding an incredible 25% of the gross revenue
of music download services as well as 15% of webcasters' gross revenue
and 10% of gamers gross revenue (free
version of report or Toronto
Star reg. version). When combined with other tariff
proposals, it would appear that Canada's collectives want to the kill
the download industry, demanding at least 40% of everything iTunes,
Napster, and other new services earn."
"This is Lars Ulrich of the rock band Metallica. Do you know why he's crying? He was planning on getting a solid gold shark tank bar for his pool. But now, since people have been downloading his music from the internet, he has to save up for a couple of months first. Is it still no big deal?" -- Cartman from Southpark
I am not so sure that Canada's collectives want to "kill the download
industry" as much as they are still upset about the United States
failure to comply with the WTO ruling on the Byrd Amendment. In fact,
on March 31st of this year Canada put this out:
"The Government of Canada announced today that it will retaliate
against the United States in light of its failure to comply with the
World Trade Organization (WTO) ruling on the Byrd Amendment. Following
extensive consultations with domestic stakeholders, Canada will impose
a 15 percent surtax on U.S. live swine, cigarettes, oysters and
certain specialty fish, starting May 1, 2005"
Seems to me this download tariff is just another retaliation like the
above. It isn't just Canada either, several countries are upset that
the US has not complied.
For those that don't know, The Byrd amendment, passed by Congress four
years ago, provides that when foreign manufacturers are found to be
dumping goods in the U.S. market -- that is, selling at unfairly low
prices -- any anti-dumping duties that are imposed can be handed over
to the U.S. companies that brought the dumping case, rather than to
the Treasury. It has benefited U.S. firms in industries including
steel and pasta, with one of the largest beneficiaries being Timken
Co., an Ohio maker of bearings, which collected about $40 million last
year.
--greg Vulcan quiescent... Q: What machine shutdown with this message?
And I thought it sucked here...
25%? Isn't that a lot over the wider picture of things?
Derive Politics
And 7% of gross revenue from hamburger sales since it's been shown that copyright violaters eat them, and 11% of posters of 70s rockers in cheesy poses since their images retain valuable copyrightable money-making potential, and 3% of the sale of every wheelbarrel since they can be used to haul off copyrighted material, and 1% of every breath you take since that's part of a copyrighted song lyric...
We can safely blame Canada for killing music downloading?
503 Sig Unavailable
The Signature could not be accessed. Please try again later or contact the administrator
"Copyright infringement results in no revenue, so enjoy your 25% of nothing, you insensitive clods!"
The whole point of the tariffs were to collect funding based upon implied piracy. (IE tariff's on blank video tapes because blank tapes were used to "illegally" copy movies and broadcast NFL games and such)
But, at least in the case of iTunes, you're already PAYING for the product. So there's no need to tariff it because the product is being legitimately purchased.
(Of course, that won't stop your friendly government from figuring out how to tax you...)
I don't really like our new music & movie association overlords. Thank goodness for sites such as www.allofmp3.com. Since I already pay a tax on my blank media, I feel no shame in downloading from KaZaA or Usenet or Morpheus or IRC. And the music & movie industries blatant cash grabs such as this are simply going to make it harder for legitimate business to prosper, since users won't be as eager to move to them. Quite frankly, since I pay the copyright tax, I really haven't bought that many CD's. However, the movie industry still makes a killing off my kids
It doesn't stop with the cited sources either, this proposal has an extremely wide scope. From TFA:
SOCAN's proposal does not stop with music download services. The new Tariff 22 also calls for a tariff of 15 percent of gross revenues from both audio webcast sites that feature content similar to conventional radio stations as well as from established radio stations that webcast their signal. Moreover, gaming sites that communicate musical works as part of their games face a potential tariff of ten percent of gross revenues. In fact, to ensure that no one escapes Tariff 22, SOCAN envisions a tariff of ten percent of gross revenues for all other sites that communicate music.
Ultimately, this is all a bunch of legal poppycock. It's a proposal, and I'd argue that it's a damn stupid, untenable proposal. We need to let the Canadian government know that its a stupid proposal, but I have a feeling that they'll see it for what it is. After all, they've ruled positively in downloading cases before - what with our tariff on blank media.
"There's no success like failure, and failure's no success at all."
- Bob Dylan
When combined with other tariff proposals, it would appear that Canada's collectives want to the kill the download industry, demanding at least 40% of everything iTunes, Napster, and other new services earn."
I can't see it killing these globally, just in Canada.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Easy solution: pirate everything!
I need to hear it.
I really want to think it's true, but doggone, things like this and the way news that paints a government in power is stifled, and I gotta wonder.
But thats 25% Canadian so its less than 25% American.
as long as they can still upload for free, I'm not worried.
This is a manifestation of one fear I have about publicly owned internet access monopolies (municipal WiFi). Some activist city council somewhere could decide that these sorts of taxes are just the thing needs to fund libraries, kiddie daycare, free everything, etc. Or, perhaps, activist city councils could decide to ban access to politically incorrect activities on the internet (e.g. cigarette purchasing).
There are dangers to collectivist centralization. Give me the hell of high stakes competition and unclear standards.
Since it's on-topic, I'll repost a link from a recent Slashdot story about the petition for User's Rights:
http://www.digital-copyright.ca/petition/
Wow! What is wrong with these Socialists? How in the world can they say to themselves, "OK, our citizens are LEGALLY paying for music, however, they are all theives, so we might as well tack on another 25%!".
If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land,
it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. -James Madison
music download: 25%
radio-station-style audio webcast: 15%
video game music: 10%
recorded sex moans: 0%
They should tax the illegal downloaders. Then again 25% of 0 is... um... uh... get back to me.
Anyone know how the U.S. trial lawyers can use these proposed laws to "benefit" the average consumers? The trial lawyers used the legal environment in the USA to almost bankrupt the tobacco companies. RIAA/MPAA and the recording/movie studios look like a juicy target for the trial lawyers.
Hypothetical scenario:
Trial lawyer sues Columbia Pictures $1 billion for excessive harassment of innocent movie customers?
In France all blank writable media is subject to a special tax. The proceeds of this tax are distributed to the various copyright agencies. The idea is that since they are going to be used to rip music or videos anyway, the copyright holders should get some compensation. Uterly silly, but it has been effective since the first blank audio cassettes arrived on the market....
fine.. but then this money should be set aside to provide medical coverage to MP3 players.
It says clearly in the synopsis on the main page that this tariff is on music downloaded from vendors like the iTunes music store.
Well, thank Good Arizona's public school system is so good... or is it?
Will this produce a negative impact on any Canadian artists such as k.d. lang, barenaked ladies, Celine Dion, Avril Lavigne, etc., etc.?
Take the place where downloading illegally is probably more safe than most other places, and then charge extra to download legally.
riiiight....
"When the atomic bomb goes off there's devastation...but when the atomic bong goes off there's celebraaaaation!"
For those who don't keep track, Canada is currently (however not necessarily for much longer) ruled by a Minority government. Chances of any bill that smells even vaguely of Controversy is slim to nil. Now if the Conservative party should take control, it's time to move to a country where freedom is free. Like Quebec.
0110100100100000011000010110110100100000011000100
I can see SOCAN handing Bryan Adams a big fat check; monies accrued from the greedy hordes of music downloaders at iTunes. Yeah right.
Question is, if they were able to levy these tariffs, where would this money really go? Back to the artists? Into a legal fund? I doubt the artist would benefit one ioda from these taxes (much like Employment Insurance in Canada which is a huge ripoff taxgrab from the middle class worker).
SEO Copywriter. Just Say ON
This doesn't look like socialism, more like the work of corporate lobbyism.
So if I am paying for them with a tarriff does that mean I can download anything I want now and not pay a cent. Since technically I just already paid for it?
There isn't a single tax that Canadians don't like. Nothing new under the sun.
Holy Socialism Batman..
I mean, honestly. I don't know a single person who's ever BOUGHT a song online. Absolutely everyone I know has a ridiculously huge music collection that's come from napster, bittorrent, kazaa, morpheus, winmx, you name it. Anything but an officially sanctioned music site.
There's no incentive for us. We already pay a tax on our blank media, and downloading and uploading music are perfectly legal in Canada. Somehow I don't think that the online music companies are going to be shaking in their boots at all.
I was worried that successful legitimate services like iTunes would hinder the flow of free P2P music. Let's praise the Canadian government for helping to stamp out legitimate online music!
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
All I can say is, screw that, I'll just go back to getting my music for free...
Choose yer poison: Prophets or Profits
How does relate to a tax on online music stores and others? Maybe a tax on hard drives or the internet would be more analogous.
finally the canadians get screwed...
us Americans have had to put up with this for years...
*all of the USA collectively sticks out their tounges at Canada - "na na"!*
Is when you are on a dock and there's a man that goes "Yeharr, that be five shillings to be where you be"
*ahem* Or possibly when an official purchase is made.
My first reaction from reading the blurb, was "Oh crap, a 40% price increase on iTMS?"
After reading the article and re-reading the summary, the key point here is that these groups want up to 40% of the gross revenue. Unfortunately I'm not 100% certain as to the definition of "gross revenue," but if as I suspect, that means "whatever is left in the bank after paying the related expenses" then this would be 40% of Apple's cut. If they (or the runners of other music download services, for that matter) only get to see 5% of my $0.99, and assuming they raise their price to cover this tarriff, then that would only be a 2% increase.
Of course, I may be wrong in my understanding. IANALOA (lawyer or accountant).
Duct tape is like the Force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the universe together.
First, the fees are not a tax, they are a levy, which means the funds are given to the private sector. That hardly seems socialist to me. Second, this seems far better than to play the lawsuit lottery.
Note that I am not condoning the collection of such a high levy, because it will kill any chance for music downloads to succeed. On the other hand, it will be another reason to delay the time where canadians will be sued.
did non-gov't organizations get the ability to tax people or even suggest a tax? Hell, I'd love to start a company and propose they tax the hell out of everyone and collect it. Considering that those "collectives" do not represent everyone, it seems quite unfair. I'd say boot them out just for thinking about it.
Don't bothe reading any newspaper article with "may" in the title, or whose title is a question.... which also seems appropriate here (:-))
davecb@spamcop.net
Red Canada must be stopped. We've seen their kind before. God willing, our nation's forces will be victorious over this rogue regime and restore freedom to their oppressed people and secure them from tyranny, injustice, and excessive music fees. Thank you and may God bless America.
I don't see why anyone would think this tax would be a good idea. After all, if a compagny thinks that music downloaded from online store are going to get rip, why don't they just raise the price? Plus, how do you distribute fairly the amount of money raised by the tax? IMHO, the song that get downloaded the most get the largest piece of the pie. From my point of view, it seems the same as raising the price tag for a song.
Votator.com implements a fair voting scheme (free
I don't know how many times I've read that Canada is closer to a divine perfection than the US, well at least I can say something for sure, my state representative to the congress listens to its people instead of paying favors to the music industry, when canadians stopped having their voices heard?, oh I forgot, the so called canadian socialism is a dictatorship in disguise, prove me wrong with all the violations to human rights in canada and the goverment spending on so unimportant issues like music downloading.
Another cryptic Slashdot summary. Geez, we don't ALL know what to make of this mysterious "Canada" of which you speak. Whowherehuh?
Anyway, from a helpful primer I found:
"In fact, Canadians enjoy advancements such as refrigerated food, zippers and printing," notes Dorman, an "accountant" who goes to work wearing the comfortable trousers, dress shirt and necktie that form a traditional Canadian costume. "Our industries are large and varied, ranging from logging to automobile manufacturing."
Not too shabby for a nation that just 240 years ago had no electricity.
More info here. Good to know.
... just don't offer stuff where the old industry owns copyright.
the old music industry is doomed. why subsidize it any onger?
I'm not meaning to insult fans of the world trade organization here. I'm just saying that the it's scary to see the United States even being ASKED to bow down to the WTO. Of course, the US probably created the WTO, and if so this is exactly why I oppose the US trying to make rules for the world. Those rules eventually get rammed back up our own butts.
I say respect the sovereignty of America and of the rest of the world and only violate someone's sovereignty when our country is CLEARLY threatened.
That being said, Canada is free to retaliate as they please... it is, after all, their country.
(note, I'm not intending to be a troll or post flamebait here... I'm trying to make a genuine point.)
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
From the article:
"...The SODRAC/CMRRA proposals demand the greater of either 15 percent of gross revenues or ten cents per permanent download..." Emphasis mine.
If by "permanent download", they mean non-DRM encumbered file that I may have unlimited personal use in perpetuity, then to me, that is a fair tradeoff for a small tarriff. The 25% figure quoted on the front page would be way too high, but if I can legally download an mp3/flac/ogg/whatever and burn it as many times, put it on as many portable players, and stream it from as many computers as I want for my own personal use, without some retarded DRM app phoning home to ask for permission, then that might be worth a small surcharge.
If they insist or crippling it with DRM or if (download price + tarrif) > (price I'm willing to pay), then guess what? They've just outsmarted themselves out of potential revenue (though we know who they'll want to blame for that...)
True, legimate buyers end up covering the costs of the thieves, but the same goes for any other industry (retail, insurance, etc). I think it's more important for both sides to compromise a bit to keep the system usable for the vast majority of legitimate users, then to screw everyone in sight.
Canadians wouldn't retaliate in this way against U.S. companies, the Byrd proposal is in direct violation of Nafta which was a pretty damn big deal and Canadians were largely against.
That out of the way I have faith in Canadian regulators to find public methods of stimulating Canadians arts into which to dump the money so it won't benefit corperations (like it would in the states)...
The main reason, well if the RIC (or whatever is pushing it) then it's simply because they don't want to negotiate with apple which is silly because we have the same large music corperations (Sony etc.) but who knows maybe they're bitter.
The main thing that Canadians have and many other countries also have is regulations requiring media distributers to distribute a certain level of Canadian content (it's not bad maybe 15% or 25% but it's well regulated and has to be in prime time etc.) This leads to strange effects where artists become huge in Canada without any international acclaim.
Anyway this tarriff could be used to replace this clause, since we're getting RIC lawsuits anyway (Despite the fact that our laws will rule against them) it seems the only possible reason.
It's nice to be able to trust our government to have the interest of the citizens and artists at heart rather than industry, they do get a trifle misguided sometimes though I'll admit.
A reasonable tariff is zero. By your logic, they should go ahead and put me in prison for owning a gun "capable" of killing someone. Why does your country accept this idea of punishing everyone evenly for possible illegal use of something that is generally used for legal things? How come copiers aren't taxed? And who gets that tariff money?
Sharing is WRONG!!
Starsucks
they simply want to be the only ones that can do it. The simplest way to do that is to have the government tax any competition out of existence, and then make any such competition illegal. iTunes is certainly competition (even though it has to pay royalties for every song it sells). And, sure as Hell's a mantrap, you can bet that there will "exceptions" to any such tax regulations that exempt the big boys from forking over a penny. It stinks, any way you look at it.
... well, I certainly won't shed many tears for them.
Where it got written (in either Canadian or U.S. law) that monopolies are entitled to maintenance and protection by either of our respective governments is beyond me. It's ridiculous. I'm sorry, I like music as much as the next man, but I don't consider the studios to be such an important national treasure that they can't be allowed to stand a little competition. And, if that competition proves to be a little too stiff and the music cartels just happen to go under
I believe they are the "evil entities" that both Captain Kirk and Captain Picard referred to in a number of episodes.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
You have to put it in its proper perspective.
25% Canadian is only 20% American, after all.
And that's before converting from metric to Imperial.
Is it me or are these people sounding too much the same:
Michael Wiess
and
Michael Geist
Can you say conspiracy?
"Canadians May Face 25% Download Tariff"
:-)
Canadians are not facing ANYTHING. The governing party is in the midst of the biggest political scandal in 50 years. In addition, they are a minority government. They were only able to pass the budget because the conservatives were not ready for an election and allowed it to pass. By all the indication of the polls the next government will be a Conservative minority. That government won't be able to pass a bill against murder let alone something as complex as copyright. Canadians, for the forseeble future, have a government that is for all intent and purposes, nuttered; Just as it should be
Why a 40% tax for piracy on something that can't be pirated?
Somehow, I still think AssHol^H^H^H^H^hcroft and his band of merry goons would object. (SIGH).
...the government is looking for a sugar daddy to cover for all the wasted sponsorship money and what-not. .65 - .70 last summer.
:)
All I see is increases in taxes here, prices going psycho there. I just saw gas go over a fucking dollar/litre! ONE FUCKING DOLLAR! This jumping from about
I know I'm kind of off-topic, but c'mon. In London, the city recently chipped in a substantial amount of money to pay for The John Labatt Centre. They wanted to raise taxes in order to cover the expense. There was no vote, I didn't agree to this. People will have to fight this. I don't want to sound sensationalist, but this is just fucking ridiculous. We got them to just raise ticket prices instead of taxes.
I'm a signature virus. Please copy me to your signature so I can replicate.
AC is right.
$0.99 isn't enough, how about $0 biotches!
That free health care isn't as free as it appears. I suppose the funds have to come from somewhere.
... that makes it legal, right?
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
Well, it looks like BitTorrent is still free for Canada...
When you buy a song from iTunes, who gets the money? Apple gets a cut, and the rest goes to the owner of the rights to the music. It sounds like the copyright holders want to get paid twice for each song that gets sold.
"If it's real, then it gets more interesting the closer you examine it. If it's not real, just the opposite is true." -
I just got to thinking that the only type of legal decision that would ever stop this satanic greed by the music industry would be a judge with the wisdom of King Solomon in the bible.
The story goes that two women pitch up at King Solomon's court, both claiming that a baby they have with them is theirs. King Solomon, realising that he doesn't have his DNA testing kit handy, deals out a judgement that both women have a right to the baby and that the baby should be cut in half with swords and each woman should get a half a baby. One woman then shrieks that the other woman should have the baby, and wise old Sol knows then that that is the true mother, gives the baby to her and sues the other woman for bad parenting or something like that.
Now, if a judge were to lay out a legal decision that ALL music, downloadable, online, on CD, or even over the radio should cost $10 per song minimum, that would be a fantastic decision. And it would be a fantastic decision because it would kill the music industry overnight as no one, literally no one, would buy music any more, and then the music industry would be reduced to rags and selling heroin and coke on dark streets and other shady crap like they did before the music business became a way to legally rape the entire population of the western world.
I'm a signature virus. Please copy me to your signature so I can replicate.
Using a little quote from SouthPark... Blame Canada!! Blame Canada!! =P
João Pinheiro
Keep up with the news man. It already is legal to download music in Canada. You just can't upload anything. So just make sure to download your stuff off of foreign servers and you're in the clear.
I'm a signature virus. Please copy me to your signature so I can replicate.
I think the scope of that includes anything that isn't music either. And you could download off of local servers too. You wouldn't be breaking the law, although they would.
I'm a signature virus. Please copy me to your signature so I can replicate.
How odd, I think they keep forgetting the fact that us Canadians already pay over 20% taxation on blank media.
Canada, leading the world at being north of the United States.
... You can download, but not upload. It makes a world of difference if the RIAA ever comes after you.
I'm a signature virus. Please copy me to your signature so I can replicate.
Official Conservative Party policy is to eliminate the levy on blank recording materials. Since they are about to win the next election to be held (most likely) in June, this particular problem is solved.
WTF does this have to do with the article? Oh, nothing, but it criticizes the US, so mod it up to +5.
+5:offtopic,but anti-American
Strange, not only do us Canadians get taxed for blank media, but there instituting more taxation/tariffs?!? When will it end?
Title says it all. This is a proposal from SOCAN, which represents some Canadian musicians. It's just a proposal. As long as the government is still collecting the tariff on blank media, there's no way this would ever actually happen, because organisations like SOCAN are *already* receiving funds as anti-pirating compensation.
The government's already decided that the blank media tax more than pays for lost revenue from the artists, and I doubt very much that SOCAN et al. will ever be willing to give that up.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
Since a tarif is, by definition, a tax on imported goods, couldn't Apple just ship the servers to a Canadian based subsidiary that only ships profits back to the US, thereby avoiding the issue of revenue crossing the border?
If the price increases, demand decreases, more people give up on it and start pirating music, then the industry puts on their "so many people pirate! we're losing so much money!" show so they can have more impressive statistics when they sue people for piracy.
Perhaps I'm a bit paranoid, but it struck me as odd when the record industry in America first raised the price of CDs to compensate for "lost sales," thereby reducing the demand for them. I can't think of any reason for that kind of behavior except the above idea. Any other ideas?
Esoteric reference.
I mean yes there is piracy, but there always was. Before P2P, there was FM radio and tapes. When I was in college CD's were still kinda new, and people swapped CD's all the time. Little known fact is that a hifi-vcr will record audio at CD quality in an analog medium.
All this MP3 stuff is compressed and less than CD quality. Frankly things have gotten better for the music industry. They are just looking for reason for why people don't want to buy the crappy music they keep trying to shove down our throats today.
Think Deeply.
Not only is your post off topic, it's wrong. You appear to be equating a Canadian music organization with the Canadian government. The Canadian government isn't proposing a tax, a Canadian music industry organization is proposing it.
/. masses who really thrive on that stuff, blinding them to the trollishness of your comment. Well done!
So you've managed to make a connection where none exists - the heart of a good troll.
By throwing in a little US bashing, you appeal to the
Of course, you can only do this successfully by pointing out US government subsidies and carefully ignoring any other governments' subsidies to their industries - but, of course, that's the aim of a good troll, is it not?
I must applaud you for a very fine troll that has buffaloed the moderators. But, of course, in the great scheme of things, it doesn't matter anyway. The music industry won't get their tax, the Byrd amendment will stay in force and, by the will of the American majority, Republicans will continue to run the political show.
Karma gets you doesn't it?
Greed at least partly drove the music industry to digital format. Let's face it CDs should be cheaper than Vinyl records were but mysteriously they aren't.
Now that all of our music is nicely digitized it's entirely portable and 100% copyable.
Now they are scrambling for legislation to fix their dilemma.
Of course further stupidity like that mentioned in this article will not kill downloading, just LEGAL downloading. Someone in the industry needs a clue. Steve Jobs tried to give them a clue and they want to tax his service at 25% as a "thankyou".
Fire up a 2nd-generation onion-router, called TOR.
Nothing will stop this baby.
If you got Gentoo, simply do "emerge tor"
Enjoy all your P2P, bittorrent, and everything with perfect forward-secrecy.
As an Ontario Cannuk, I thank god you and your kind have moved to Arizon too.
:)
Now if we can get the memebers of the Alberta Conservatives to leave, we'd be OK.
Never by hatred has hatred been appeased, only by kindness - the Buddha
omfg seriosly this is bull shit all these laws canadians "may" face they never happen , this fuck asshole micheal geist or w/e the fuck his name is , is a fucking asshole who tries to think hes smart and shit by making up all this bull shit and then ppl read this bs and think canada is stupid and shit and omfg im gonna stop cause this is tooooo fuckin retarded basically don't beleive any of this bull shit and find something better to do for fucks sake u fagits! p.s Canada Rules 2Dads
Grandparent was using trickery to get you to admit that maybe, just maybe, the United States is not the big bad guy. If you agreed that the U.S. is evil for having this large trade surplus, then when you realize that the U.S. actually has a massive trade DEFICIT that you might actually admit that it must be other countries with the unfair trade practices.
But please don't think about posts before you moderate or reply. It would not be Slashdot otherwise.
This isn't IRC; take the time to make a sentence.
Aww poor widdle SUV drivers, they cant handle $3 because their CC will bounce?
England/Europe/Australia, all citizens pay about $4.50 per gallon and are still surviving, though the govts are reaping in HUGE taxes and not using most of it for roads etc.. but for other uses.
Sometimes I wonder why americans moan about prices of things, when they earn MORE than most in the world and get most things cheaper than everyone else (except housing).
Welcome to the real world, $4.50 gas, and $2.50 burgers and dohnuts, not 99c.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
There are a lot of flames going around as to how this is very bad, but it's the way things have worked above the border for a LONG time. We pay a tad more for MP3 players and blank CDs, and in exchange legally download and burn.
So why should online be treated differently from regular purchases in this case? This money then gets sent off to the music industry.
-M
when you see the word 'Linux', drink!
hey, if this means we get to tax Celine Dion an extra 40% of what she earns in Vegas, then that's fair.
If it would mean the end of Celine Dion's career, then it's even better.
youd think some good music would come out of canada.
If the recording giants are pushing to cut into the shares of Apple, Napster and others then the music download services should get into the recording industry and beat them at their own game -- offer cheaper studio time, market through iTunes and on store shelves. Apple has enough money. I'm sure that would throw a scare into the industry, maybe even make them back off. Of course this is overly simplistic. It's obvious I don't understand the industry, but it sure sounds good.
You know I watched the farm families in the Okanogan Vally literally starve because the assholes from the east forced them to try and compete against The US and Mexico. They could not and still can't do anything but farm their land. Why bother when we end up getting BILLED by the fucking packing houses? We fixed you and your oooooh we need the farm land or we'll starve, we plowed all the fruit trees under and let it go wild. Produces NOTHING not even tax revenue! There SO MUCH that is wrong with the way people are treated up there, of course in you vote NDP or the like and live in city what the fuck do you know.
Si vis pacem, para bellum! For evil to succeed good men need only do nothing!
Your greed and short-sightedness could be your industry's undoing. We Canadians are doing just fine without the hockey league and we could do just fine without purchasing any music whatsoever.
Think before you act or you could spell your own economic doom. Individuals such as myself are respecting copyrights. This proposed tariff is a slap in the face and tantamount to legalised racketeering.
Jesus was a compassionate social conservative who called individuals to sin no more.
Simple solution. STOP BUYING!
Imagine the chagrin of the Industry if it suddenly became hip and cool to not buy or listen to or watch anything they produce.
Its not like its any good anyway, and its time to cut the pigs out of the middle of the equation. Buy direct only from non-label artists and producers of content.
As for Canada, a 40% tarrif is just what I would expect from aging socialists.
Who gets the tarrif in the end? Is it designed to pay the artists? If so...are the artists not being paid already when the user BUYS the product to begin with?
The tarrifs on blank media is to get the artists paid when someone copies their work...this is ridiculous.
they have a donut shop on every corner..you gotta love that country...
As an advent of socialized arts.
American content is almost exclusively digested by canadian consumers as a result of the talentless hacks and their 350,000 dollar a year welfare cheques. Now these greedy hacks are whinning with tax dollars drooling for more...
The courts and politicians would be better suited listening to recommendations from the MPAA and RIAA.
This God damn socialist tax guise is a real fucking piss off. We already pay at least 20% of our gross annual revenue to the government, plus 14% (15% in Ontario, but I live in Manitoba now) to the provincial and federal governments whenever we spend what is left over from what they already plundered.
Sure we have "better" health care than the US, and a "better" education system (my ass -- education in Manitoba is severely disabled, and the Ontario government also managed to fuck theirs up over the past decade too). If that's the case, then why would my mother, who works with nurses all day, tell me that if I get sick we're going to the states to pay for real health care? Why would my girlfriend, who is a nurse here in Canada, agree with her?
This new tariff idea is one more reason to say "fuck off" to corporations altogether and download your shit for free (somewhat legal here in Canada anyway). Sorry Apple, I'm really happy with my iPod, and I'm really happy with the iTunes Music Store as well, but if they impose this tariff I'm gone.
putfwd.com - 1GB Free file storage with a twist
Canadian governments have long been nuttered, but now they're neutered too.
Just as it should be :-)
Municipalities do not have taxation powers in Canada; they can only collect school and property taxes (depending on province). I know in the U.S. the situation is completely different and must vary from state to state.
Oh, cities and municipal districts in Canada really, really want those powers, but no sane provincal government would grant them.
Remember also that Ch.11 of NAFTA states that any Foreign Corporation (say Apple) can defeat any domestic Law, if found to inhibit " property, ownership, the right to market and sell a product, and the right to earn a profit" by the foreign corporation.
.25 levy... well Apple gets to sue, especially if this law makes it unprofitable to sell (or unpopular).
So considering that Apple makes $.01-.02 cents a track, and now they want to charge
Apple will probably win, far more nefarious businesses have usurped popular Environmental law, so expect Apple to have a hay-day with this law.
Nope, the Canadian government is weak, so any unpopular laws are out, and even if it passed, I would expect Apple to sue under Ch.11 to have this law reversed.
As an aside, Ch 11 (IMHO) has largely been terrible for Canadians, so using it for our benefit would be nice. [Please don't cloud the issue with *DRM is good for you FUD*]
Bad spellers of the world untie!
Once again the RIA and government fails to grasp the bigger picture on how to USE file sharing rather than fight it. Essentially all this tarrif will accomplish will be to encourage those people who do download music legitimately via such systems as Napster to seek other methods. Essentially people are left with two options: 1) Accept an increase in cost-per-download to help companies like Apple cover the 40% charge. 2) Download these programs illegally because the price has become too excessive for a per-song download
Thank you for your post. I'm glad there is some reason on this forum.
Your ignorance is infinitely greater than you realize.
Too much /. hysteria is generated over these kind of dramatic proposals that are likely bargaining positions.
That's gotta fit into your schema somewhere
Why would we pay for services like iTunes and Napster when we can legally download whatever we want for FREE.
I call bull on this bill. You can't tax free stuff since 100% tax on zero is still nothing. A duty or levy maybe, but how is anyone going to enforce it?
and the right to earn a profit
WFT??? No company has a 'right' to earn a profit. While I don't know shit about the Canadian constitution I do know mine, and I can state unequivocably that no such right exists in the U.S. of A. Nor can a treaty put such a right in place (the 9th and 10th Amendments don't allow that).
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Quite possibly the dumest idea since someone decided to glue the bits of sliced bread back together again to make an unsliced loaf.
Coding Monkey.org - Spanging the heavy spade of truth into t
Ch.11 of NAFTA states that any Foreign Corporation (say Apple) can defeat any domestic Law, if found to inhibit " property, ownership, the right to market and sell a product, and the right to earn a profit" by the foreign corporation.
Only if compared to a domestic corporation. If this new levy only applied to foreign companies, then Apple could sue, and win. If the levy applies to all, then Apple can't do shit.
far more nefarious businesses have usurped popular Environmental law
You are probably referring to the MMT case. MMT is a gasoline additive that many people believe is hazardous. I will not argue if it is hazardous or not, it is irrelevant to this discussion. The Canadian government (under prime minister Jean Chretien), believing that MMT is hazardous, decided to ban the import of MMT, while still allowing Canadians to manufacture and use MMT in gasoline.
A US manufacturer of MMT sued, claiming that the Cdn gov't actions were protectionism and not health-related. The US manufacturer won, because a Cdn company could still manufacture and use MMT in gasoline.
NAFTA allows regulations to protect health & the environment. If instead on banning the import of MMT, the gov't banned the use of MMT by all, then the US manufacturer would have no case.
The moral of the story? The Chretien gov't didn't even read the law, fucked up (again) and cost Canadians several millions in damages.
cross-border traffic in pirated hardcopies of dvds, pr0n, music, and games increases a hundredfold after downloading in canada is stifled by a 25% downloading tariff.
THAT will teach those assholes who try to do things legally! Fucking useless customers! Go get 'em, MediaCorp!
Eagerly looking forward to the music industry's year-end report, showcasing an increase in piracy and the conclusion that legitimate download services have no value....
The story of the little kid who says:
"Daddy I want a pony"
"No Brittany, you can't have a pony"
"Whaaaaa. I want a pony!!!!"
"No Brittany, you can't have a pony"
"I'm gonna cry! WHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA"
"Well, you can't have a pony, but how about a dog?"
"(sniff) I guess I could live with that daddy"
"My dad is alive today becasue of universal health care."
Here's a universal truth.. he will die someday. So will you.
Nonetheless, if had been in the U.S. he wouldn't have gotten sick in the first place, since we have access to drugs that you have to go on a waiting list to get.
It sucks to be Canadian these days.
"I'd rather not waste my time with you."
Translation: I hate when you're right, so shut up.
How much do you weigh?
I'm just curious.
n/t
Constitutionally Correct
Sounds like standard negotiating tactics to me. They ask for 40% so an eventual compromise at 20% looks "reasonable". Tony Soprano would be proud.
Hasn't been passed yet - nor has C-38. (Legalisation of gay marriage recognising the decisions of most of the Provincial Courts)
Ironic that the Libs may need separatists to keep them alive.
Ahh, but the interesting thing that I would like to see litigated, is that the levy would apply to digitaly downloaded copies of music, BUT no such levy exists for CDs...
Not blank CDs (we have a levy on those), but iTunes downloads are *supposed* to be copies of what is on CD, so they add a levy that doesn't apply to physical copies, and Apple may have a case to litigate under Ch 11... it would depend on what the *product* being sold is defined as.
Bad spellers of the world untie!
Hurray for the communists in Canada!!
I think you'll find, if you research a bit, that it's not a canadian government organization pushing for these tariffs on mp3 players, blank tape media, blank cd media, blank dvd media, hard drives (when installed in music related hardware) etc.
It's SOCAN. The canadian equivalent of the RIAA. And there *are* already tarrifs on most of the items I mention above, they're trying to increase them, because apparently they just aren't making enough money off the existing taxes. And a point to note is that since the tarrifs went into effect, SOCAN has not yet paid out one penny to the artists they claim to be protecting.
We pay tariffs on recording media because "they could be used to record copyrighted material." Whether that's what its intended for or not. As far as I'm concerned that means we've paid for the right to use those media to record anything we like.
The last few years have yielded some tremendous Canadian talent:
...proud to be a Canadian music fan for the first time in years.
The Unicorns, The Junior Boys, Death From Above 1979, Feist, The New Pornographers, Stars, Caribou (formerly Manitoba), Russian Futurists, AC Newman, Broken Social Scene, Do Make Say Think, The Constantines, Raising The Fawn, The Arcade Fire etc. etc.
If you could be anything you want, I'll bet you'd be disappointed.
If this were the case, Americans would be gorging themselves on Alberta beef and building homes with B.C. lumber without protectionist U.S. interests interfering.
As it is, we are content that our *cough* friends *cough* to the south are smoking waaaay too strong B.C. bud.
Hi, I am a concerned Canadian citizen.
I don't listen to your shit. Fuck off.
Love,
mrseigen
P.S. Enclosed is a bill for using the Internet to download a copy of my software. What's that, you didn't download my software? That's okay, I didn't download your shit either.
People will be pissed off if this forces iTunes to close down or raise prices by 25%. They supposedly aren't even making a profit and now these bastards want to skim even more money from them.
This Rene hollan guy, is a total asshat. Every time there is a thread about Canada, this fuckwad shows up, and tells yet ANOTHER story about the Canadian helath care system killing off his family members. He is full of shit. Check out his posts. Sometimes it is his father who died (check out renes website, and look at his picture, I got money says he killed his father), sometimes a cousin, or an aunt, sometimes its not death, but close. He always ends with his tale of demanding that a Canadian doctor take an extra $100 from him while he took his kid to a TO hospital, just so good Ol Rene won't feel like he OWES anyone anything.
There is nothing funnier than a Quebecer crying about a bad deal. You, your family, and your extended family have taken MORE handouts than the average Candian family, just by living in Quebec. You whine about all the taxes you have paid, well, it wasn't enough. Your province of birth still has to beg for money from the rest of Canada (#1 receiver of transfer payments), to support your family. You want to complain, go talk to your Quebec family, and tell them to get fucking jobs.
If you really want to stick it to Canada, why not take ALL of your family (the ones who survived the Federal plot to kill you all off through free health care), and pack them up, and take them with you? It would remove a bunch of leaches from the system, and would let you see what it is like having to pay everyone elses bills. For a change.
Rene, please STFU. You are full of shit in the extreme. I am sure the American readers enjoy your little tales, of course thay don't recognize the lies that you present as facts (then once, they flew a guy from yellowknife to ottawa, just to work on an ingrown toenail, and that bumped my uncles surgery, and he died).
Sleep well knowing that an entire country is pulling for you to get your green card. I bet when you get your green card, you will keep that Canadian passport, won't you. I bet when you travel (no, not "leave the basement") you make sure everyone knows your Canadian, don't you.
Ass
Canada will impose a 15 percent surtax on U.S. live swine, cigarettes, oysters and certain specialty fish, starting May 1, 2005
All very true, but look at the reta(i)liation measures. The items targetted were carefully chosen to make a point, but also to have the least economic effect possible. The USA does not export significant quantities of these items to Canada.
A company has as much of a right to earn a profit to the extent of it's ability to give payola to politicians. The constitution doesn't have to give that right - all that has to be done is create a regular domestic law.
The constitution doesn't mean anything if it can be changed or dissolved. As soon as the wrong party gets into power, they can do whatever they want - wax treaties, convert government into a despotism, ban political dissent, etc. (Although this should be rare nowadays.)
Let's see.
rogers (the cable company here in toronto), just announced a 60GB data cap per month (should probably be a story to submit).
that works out to 100 cds, uncompressed. at a price of, say $5 average (we just want to cut out the actual brick and mortar store), this means that i am obviously downloading at least $500 worth of music per month.
i am not running any servers (no telnet, sshd, mail service, nntp, chat service or web pages) because that is against the agreement i have with rogers.
i can't be downloading movies, because, well, that would be illegal.
i only get a few megabytes of email every month. and my web browsing? if i get 10mb of data in a month, that's sure a lot of reading (mostly slashdot, thank you).
so, i must be using almost all of the 60gb of music, right?
so, my internet connection should be $540 per month.
glad that's settled.
ratboy
Just another "Cubible(sic) Joe" 2 17 3061
There is no such thing as "perfect forward-secrecy". While TOR is good at obfuscating the source/destination of traffic, someone who is determined enough can still pull a few tricks to track you down.
----
All of whose base are belong to the what-now?
John Marshall, U.S. Supreme Court justice, had this to say about taxation:
Little did he know that it would be taxen out of context and applied everywhere. Score one for the embarrassing soundbite from a government employee!"This quote is a product of the Frobozz Magic Quote Company."
This is just us canadians doing what we do best: hating americans.
It's likely just a political publicity stunt to snap back at all the crap the US government has been imposing on us these past few years, such at the beef embargo, canadian dollar boycotting and other asinine movements. It's like our MP's are saying "You can keep your hand up my ass, as long as you pay me!"
-Billco, Fnarg.com
they have not been able to get the government to just tax us because we are all just "criminals" stealing thier "IP".
I hope you're sitting down, because you're in for quite a shock. (Note that this was passed into law in 1994.)
So, umm... what was it you were saying about the "Socialist government that would even consider this"?
Something is wrong with this picture:
In the parent post, it says in the first paragraph that Germany has 12.6% unemployment. Also in the first paragraph, it says that Europe has "had to" import huge amounts of foreign labor.
How does that make sense?
"...and 1% of every breath you take since that's part of a copyrighted song lyric..."
As a Sting fan I have to admit, by Jove, you are right!
How does that make sense?
Ask the Bundesrat.
The labor market in Germany is currently structured in such a way so as to discourage employers from hiring workers. The value of the amount of labor they can get by adding an employee in many cases is much smaller than the cost of doing so, especially given the long-term risk, since it's very difficult to legally lay off employees if a firm goes south. The problem is a big one that may persist for some time as the country re-organizes its social structures, but it is being felt heavily in the short term.
The long-term problem is that Germany needs to, over the long term, bring in foreign workers to maintain it's population, to continue to fund the very expensive social programs and government pensions. It shouldn't surprise you that Germany has a severe baby boomer problem as a result of WWII. But the effects of the demographic bulge have been made much worse as the German birthrate has sunk. Check out this animation
It's a tough bind. Obviously a weak labour market does not take well to high net immigration of largely lower skilled workers, not to even get into the difficulty Germany has had integrating immigrants into mainstream German culture (a faily serious problem in many continental European nations). But, slowing down immigration is a death wish, even if the German people were accepting of a drastic cut in pension benefits and an older retirement age.
You're right, something is very wrong with this picture. Reform should have been taken up seriously a very long time ago. The demographics have been trending this way for decades.
Metamuscle.com - News in the Iro
Also check out this chart from a 1998 (!) economist article.
Those were fairly good years for the German economy. Can you see the structural problems between the lines?
Metamuscle.com - News in the Iro
From another 1998 article in the Economist.
Metamuscle.com - News in the Iro
There is good Canadian music?
I would never have known that based on what I hear in Australia. Please export some of the good stuff.
This sig is intentionally blank
For two main reasons. First, SOCAN is a perfoming rights organization, not a distribution or mechanical rights organization, so Tariff 22 falls 100% outside of their jurisdiction. Even if it passes in some form, SOCAN (and by extension, every artist/band who is a member) will not see a penny of the money.
:(
Secondly, the profit margin of an online music store is very low. Apple, by all accounts, loses money on iTunes (though it more than makes up for it with iPods). Puretracks, being based in Canada, is a little better off and probably manages to pocket around a dime on a dollar sale. That's only 10%.
Adding a 25% tariff to a download means either all of the legal music stores will go out of business (except iTunes), or prices will go up by about $0.25 in Canada (at least).
Will you pay $1.25 for a download? Especially when you know that extra $0.25 is simply a fee to line the pockets of the extorters? The artists themselves only get a dime on a sale if they're lucky, and they're the creators.
I really, really wish someone out East there would get a damn clue