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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."
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?
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....
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.
actually it's not a government tax, the government doesn't get any of the money. it's a copyright collective representing the copyright owners that gets the money, which is called a "levy" rather than a "tax". the money goes to the musicians. and their lawyers. well mostly to their lawyers i'd guess :-)
No, that is net profit.
Out of the $.99 they want $.40.
It is even more ridiculous in that at least in the US, $.70 on average already goes to the various copyright holders.
Just a Tuna in the Sea of Life
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
Nope, Canada Customs, which is directly linked to the TAXMAN sees everything coming across the border. While it could be possible to 'sneak' some across marked as a gift, etc, there's probably a good chance they'll get it on the way across. So, then I'll pay the GST, plus duties, and then even worse, the 'shipping' company will charge me $10-20 for the 'convenience' of not having to pay the customs charges myself, and pay them, whether or not I wanted them to.
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.
The Canadian Government does not make rulings. It passes laws.
Courts or tribunals make ruling.
The government on the other hand, merely votes and passes a law. The government is essentially free to completely ignore reality if it chooses to, and put anything a majority of MP's would support into law.
What the government puts into law has nothing to do with any kind of "ruling". It is just politics.
It is illegal to lobby the courts in Canada. (at least in any way the court would notice your lobbying).
This makes sense, because to lobby the court, suggests that the court's ruling would be based on external factors beyond the "law" and the "facts" of the case at hand. It is insulting to the Court to suggest that sign waving and yelling has any relevence to the case. If you have anything RELEVENT to say, you would be permitted to testify under oath just like all the other witnesses.
So, unless you want to get slapped with a contempt of court charge, I would restrict your act of "let the Canadian government know" to the actual Government. Which does not make rulings.
No one has a right to their *own* opinion. They have a right to the TRUTH.