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No Levy on iPods in Canada
colinemckay writes "The fight over a levy on iPods and other digital music devices ended Thursday when the Supreme Court of Canada refused to hear any further arguments on the matter. That means there will be no levy applied to digital audio recorders such as Apple's popular iPod and iPod Shuffle as well as other MP3 players like iRiver."
Who the hell are they giving tariff royalties to from blank media? That's asinine. The CPCC are just like our RIAA, all a pack of crooks. If you want royalties to go to the Artists, than lower the damn price of the music your sell and people might actually buy a CD. Inflating the price of a CD to pay for the CPCC/ RIAA Rats, who claim to "protect" Artists is wrong! I'm curious how much of these collected tariffs actually makes its way back to the Artists.
"Simplify, simplify, simplify!" Thoreau
"The money is sitting in an account and will be returned to the importers and manufacturers of the products, said Basskin."
I think it should be going to the consumers not the corporations and distributors. I spent way too much on my 3Gen iPod when it first came out. I wouldn't mind an extra $25 in my pocket.
in fact, of the legal products and services generated in Canada, music is in the top ten, along with telecom and other useful things.
So if they don't need this tax, why do we, music importers in the US, need one?
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
"Obviously we're disappointed. We felt it was self-evident that those products are sold for the purpose of copying music," said David Basskin, of the Canadian Private Copying Collective (CPCC), the non-profit agency which collects tariffs on behalf of musicians and record companies.
Yes, yes, everyone who owns an mp3 PLAYER, must have bought them to STEAL MUSIC. As opposed to, oh I dunno, LISTENING TO MUSIC.
Next thing we know everyone who owns a kitchen knife must have bought them to KILL PEOPLE.
There is an insane clown who stands on a podium in the middle of the computer room to make sure that all the code is extremely poor in quality. The clown holds his cock all the time for no reason.
Oh, he has his reasons.
So why in gods' names do we pay a levy on blank CDs, when blank CDs are MUCH more likely to be used for non-music purposes?
I hate politicians and special interest groups.
--
Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
Since the link is down, here's another article.
For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.
And why would I want him on my iPod anyway?
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
How is $4million, split between the many record companies and artists, a substantial amount?
The $4 million was only the amount collected on non-removable memory, such as iPods.
How about DAT? minidisc? Those are digital recorders too, are there levies on those?
No to DAT, yes to minidisc.
"Anyone that has ever gotten an idea based on any of my work and done something better with it-good for you."--J.Carmack
"How about DAT? minidisc? Those are digital recorders too, are there levies on those?""
;)
Here is the law that enforces the levy. It just says "blank audio recording medium". I don't see how a CD is a blank audio recording medium any more than a hard drive is, but let's not tell them that. Before we know it we're paying the levy on RAM too.
My memory is really foggy on this, but when I was a teenager back in the late 1970's, I had heard that when you buy blank cassette tapes, you paid a one cent [tax|levy|fine] for each cassette. I asked my father (whom worked peripherally with recording studios) about this. He told me that you are paying "the industry" because they think you are going to pirate music with it.
I'm thinking that this is the same or similar situation happening now.
-Scott
My other sig is a Glock
BTW: If you import your media into Canada from another country (the U.S. springs to mind), you pay no levy on media.
And Canada Customs will NOT collect the levy at the border (they've said that it's "someone else's problem to collect" - quote from a customs officer when I asked him).
N.
"Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence." - Charles de Gaulle
I buy the media labeled 'music' on purpose actually. Then I fire up a bittorrent client, or limewire pro, and get whatever music I want. You know why? 'Cuz Fuck em, I'm not paying twice! If you treat people like criminals, then that's what you get.
Actually I don't feel like you act like a criminal. In my opinion, buying "data" CDs and burning music from P2P on them would be criminal, but you've chosen to pay the CD tax, so you should bloody well be entitled to download 700M worth of music to put on each CD.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Umm...get your own blog dude.
Canada most certainly does have fair use exemptions to copyright. But regardless of that fact, the levy was designed as a way for corrupt scumbags to steal from consumers, it has nothing to do with fair use in any way.
3 9149
http://laws.justice.gc.ca/en/C-42/39129.html#rid-
Let's consider for a moment what would have happened if this levy passed. Quite simply: Free music for everyone!
Does this sound counterintuitive, or just nonsensical? Hear me out.
As a Canadian university student, I feel I have a pretty good idea of how the music-swapping scene looks in Canada. There's one group of people who happily share as much music online as they want; then, there's a second group of people who still buy CDs (either because they like the pretty package, or because they actually want to pay for the things they receive).
However, everyone I know in that second group (including myself, among many people) stopped purchasing audio CDs after the Canadian levy was placed on blank CD media -- after all, even though it was of grey legality, the prevailing thought was, "Hey, I'm already paying the music industry each time I purchase a blank CD, to compensate them for people downloading songs and putting them on blank CDs. By that token, it is my right, since I have paid this compensation, to go and download all the songs I want and put them on this CD."
This very line of thinking played a role in trials held against music sharers in Canada in early 2004 (they were all exonerated).
Since I no longer burn songs to audio CDs, but rather put them on iPods, I (and everyone I know in that "second group") have once again started purchasing music CDs in stores. However, were a levy to be placed on iPods, well...that exact same argument used for blank CDs could be applied to iPods. And you know that wouldn't make the industry very happy. I mean...40 GB iPod vs. an audio CD...heh.
Of course, now some audio CDs in stores include copy protection. I have yet to purchase one, but I assume this would make it impossible (or difficult) to get the songs onto my iPod from the CD. So, you can probably tell exactly what will happen with that "second group" as soon as this protection becomes more prevalent. The industry is so skilled at alienating its remaining customers (with what is an illegal practice in the first place, since under Canadian copyright law, to the best of my knowledge, you must be allowed to make a backup copy of any digital media you purchase).
As a musician, and member of a musical band, I would say that I encourage "free music". Our CDs aren't sold that much, as we did not sign any contract with big label corporations such as Sony Music. We do not make our profits from the CDs we sell directly but more on the shows and materials we sell there such as t-shirts. We even intentionally share our music over the internet! As a result, we get to make more shows and the t-shirts sells more. Long live the MP3! Long live Free music! :)
yes copyright infringement is theft,
No it's not, it's infringement. That's why it has a separate definition in the law.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Last time I checked, 100% of the monies collected from the very beginning were still with the record companies. Nobody had been able to find a single example of an artist who had received even $1 from the levies. This may have changed in the last year, however.
Apparently it has. My friend used to play in a band who put out a CD. Some time ago he did received a check in the mail from that very levy, it was only for $1.29 but receive it he did.
I stole this Sig