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Canada's CD Tax Out of Hand?
CRIA Watcher writes "The Canadian Copyright Board has just announced that it is bringing back the tax on blank CDs, called the private copying levy, in 2007. Michael Geist demonstrates how the tax has created a huge distortion in the retail price of blank media on his blog with as much as 70 percent of the purchase price now heading directly to the music industry."
Sales of blank CDs in Detroit area soar! Details at eleven!
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
This is a load of crap, I'm sick and tired of paying a fortune for blank CDR's while the Canadian Recording industry is out to call everyone a criminal and lobbying to cripple our rights by introducing ludicris laws to ruin what us Canadians take for granted. Either fuckoff trying to take our rights away, or do away with this stupid tax!
...their Olympic gold medals for recording media!
Sig? - yeah, whatever.
Even if I set aside the flawed logic, why does the music biz get it all? What about other businesses that are hurt by "copying". Surely some of this money should go to software companies, as well as private media/content producers that distribute their work via CDs.
Since this tax goes to the recording industry to apparently make up for "lost sales due to copyright infringement"....where can independant Canadian artists who are not affiliated with the labels sign up to receive their cut of this tax? I mean...people use these blank CDs for things other than the music of the labels...
And if this tax applies to ALL CDRs, rather than just the music CDRs that nobody buys in America...how does a Canadian citizen dispute the tax on something they've never used (assuming of course they don't burn music to CDs?
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
...buy cheap CD's from the US. This is perfectly legal, and a great way to save money.
Yes, but as an 'importer' I'm liable for the levy on imported CDs. Excuse me for a second, the doorbell's ringing...
Maybe the Canadians can get their pharmacies to fill prescriptions for US customers and accept payment in blank CDs!
Sigh. I have never illegally downloaded music. 9 out of 10 CD-Rs I use are for data backup, and occasionally I do make a fair-use copy of a CD I bought.
It has been said a thousand times that the revenue losses for piracy are basically made up. Pulled out of thin air. I know, because I was a teenager once. I went to college and lived among other students. The basic fact is that people buy the things that are important to them, and anyone who "pirated" music or games valued their collections so little that a failed hard drive or lost disc simply meant nothing. A shrug of the shoulders, and they move on. The perception of value is what drives the free market, right?
The only successful competition for Free is Better Than Free. Apple seems to have learned this. Red Hat is still in business. Somehow, GNOME and Firefox have found corporate backing. Or, am I dreaming all of this?
Obviously you do not appreciate the melodies of Avril Lavigne, the emotional maturity and unpretentiousness of Alanis Morrisette, the economy of expression of the Bare Naked Ladies, the understated phrasing of Céline Dion, or the raw production style of David Foster.
Tear off your ears, Sir! You are not using them, anyway.
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.
be stupid not to copy as much as I can get my paws on, eh?
I got mad enough before to start dreaming up "piracy booths", where you could burn cds from a "collection" - for free, of course, with your own hands. My understanding is this would be completely legal..
..don't panic
If that law was passed in the U.S.A., people would be protesting in front of Congress by burning blank CDs on their laptops and tossing them at their representatives.
Yeah, in the same country where we went to war on questionable intelligence and are still there fighting for who the fuck knows what reason. Or in the same country where e-voting fraud could occur and no one could give a shit. Or in the same country where the President authorized wiretaps on American citizens and no one batted an eye. Or perhaps in the same "free" country where protesters are told where they can and cannot protest and are removed for exercising their right to freedom of expression.
Right. Like anyone in America gives a fuck about their rights and how they are losing them.
People need to realize that blank CDs don't just grow on trees. In order to sell a blank CD, you have to take a regular CD and remove the content. It doesn't make sense to remove content people want, like software, so most blank CDs are originally Britney Spears or N'Sync CDs with the songs taken off. The music industry gets the money because only the music industry produces CDs with content so poor that it's worth paying a little to remove it and resell as a blank.
paintball
I do.
I play in a small punkrock bands. We produce everything "D.I.Y." which means we burn all our CDs on blank CDs and sell them for 3$.
We don't care about the CRIA. We don't care about their crap and we don't want to be on their labels. It seems they'll still have a cut off of every CDs we produce... awesome.
We've always been at war with Eurasia.
Looking closely at the material, this is still in the proposal stage, and there is time to object to it (I just sent in my objection). The actual proposal and the contact information for writing in to object can be found here: http://www.cb-cda.gc.ca/tariffs/proposed/c25022006 -b.pdf
Speaking as somebody who has dealt with proposals in the public sector before, when you object, make certain that you make a reasoned argument. Point out the flaws in the assumptions behind the levy (such as the fact that not everybody is going to use the media they're taxing for copying music, etc.), and how it makes the levy unfair. Whatever you do, don't make statements about good and evil, or corruption - it's a surefire way to get ignored. Just point out the flaws in the proposal, give concrete examples if you can when you do, and give your name, city, and province/territory.
Robert B. Marks
Author, Demonsbane in Diablo Archive