Canadians Overpay Millions on Copyright Tax

An anonymous reader writes "Michael Geist has up a post on his site about the Copyright Board of Canada's decision last week on the controversial private copying levy, which functions like a tax on blank media. The good news? The Board reduced the levy on certain media such as CD-R Audio, CD-RW Audio, and MiniDiscs. The bad news? The millions of dollars in overpayment from these media will go into the pockets of manufacturers, importers, and retailers, not back to the consumers who paid in the first place. 'In addition to the overpayment issue, the decision contains several interesting revelations ... the decision sheds some light on the CPCC's enforcement program. The collective has aggressively targeted those parties that do not pay the levy, with 21 claims over the past three years. In fact, the enforcement program has been so effective that the Board found that concerns about the emergence of a gray or black market for blank CDs has not materialized.'"

Comments

Re:As a record store owner.

[dattaway]

Sounds like a good business, but who is going to buy a HUGE CD when alternatives like SD chips are much more portable and more resistant to abuse? Who buys cassette tapes anymore? Is the decline of reel to reel tapes and vinyl due to piracy?

You need to have a good business plan. Don't blame others for your lack of technological vision.

Nothing mentioned about DVD-R

[sayfawa]

So I wonder if there's no tax on DVD-Rs. And if not, why not?

Last year I got 100 DVD-Rs for $25. At 25 for 4.7GB there's not much incentive to even buy CD-Rs if the tax alone is 21 for 700MB.

Re:Nothing mentioned about DVD-R

[CastrTroy]

First, it's a levy, not a tax, and no, there aren't any levies on DVD-+*/^R's. I think the reasoning behind this is that you can't copy a DVD because of all that CSS stuff (nevermind how easy it is to remove). You can often find a spindle of DVDs for cheaper than a spindle of CDs, because there is no levy.

So, maybe this IS the solution?

[Maury Markowitz]

So we pay a little more for CD's, and that money goes to the copyright holders (we hope).

Umm, maybe this isn't such a bad idea? After all, there is a TV Tax in the UK for the same reason. Everyone complains about it, but not *that* much.

Maury

Re:So, maybe this IS the solution?

[Grendel70]

As I recall, when this levy on recordable media was put into effect, the purpose was to ensure that the artists would get the money to offset loss of revenue due to copying of recorded works. As such, I've never really had a problem with paying a few extra cents per blank disk providing the collected revenue went to the right place. (Of course it the system didn't address the difference between media purchased for burning data etc. but then, no system is perfect.) I find it interesting that nowhere is there any mention of giving the surplus cash to the people that deserve it.

Re:So, maybe this IS the solution?

[SuperMario666]

Which copyright holders? Who gets to pick? Do we really want government (even the Canadian government) deciding who is rewarded for producing content?

Re:So, maybe this IS the solution?

[suv4x4]

So we pay a little more for CD's, and that money goes to the copyright holders (we hope).

Umm, maybe this isn't such a bad idea? After all, there is a TV Tax in the UK for the same reason. Everyone complains about it, but not *that* much.

Maury

Oh even better, it's a great idea. Pure capitalism economics forces in place.

So you buy blank CD-s and copy hard metal all day long, and the fee you paid goes to... Britney Spears' come-back album. Since according to "statistics" she has much larger market share than anyone.

Of course it's even worse than this, since right now the actual singers don't see a single cent from the blank media fee. It goes back to RIAA (and equivalent in other countries) and the labels.

Re:Back in the hands of the consumers...?

[SamAdam3d]

I can imagine it. How about this: since Canada has public health care, why don't they use the money to fund that? Then the people, who paid for the CDs, will get their money back!

Brilliant!

Will trade CD-Rs for Meds.

[Hohlraum]

Lets make a deal.

An Alternative perhaps...

[Ajehals]

Here is an alternative - Ive been seeing the origional one pop up so regularily that I am surprised no one else has messed around with it yet... - I had to... appologies to the copyright holder of this much used piece, this derviative is intended as a parody...:

My business faces ruin. Software sales have dropped through the floor. People aren't buying half as many products as they did just a year ago. Revenue is down and costs are up. My store has survived for years, but I now face the prospect of bankruptcy. Every day I ask myself why this is happening.

I bought the store about 12 years ago. It was one of those little software stores that sell well known, major software releases that everyone uses, even the people that don't them. I decided that to grow the business I'd need to aim for a wider demographic, the family market. My store specialised in family software - stuff that the whole family could use. I don't sell sick stuff like violent games or gambling simulations , and I'm proud to have one of the most extensive education sections that I know of.

The business strategy worked. People flocked to my store, knowing that they (and their children) could safely purchase software that worked without coming accross profanity or violent games. Over the years I expanded the business and took on more clean-cut and friendly employees. It took hard work and long hours but I had achieved my dream - owning a profitable business that I had built with my own hands, from the ground up. But now, this dream is turning into a nightmare.

Every day, fewer and fewer customers enter my store to buy fewer and fewer titles. Why is no one buying software? Are people not interested in compters? Do people prefer to use pen and paper, outsource;? I don't know. But there is one, inescapable truth - Free and Open Source Software (F/OSS) is mostly to blame. The statistics speak for themselves - seven in ten webservers now run F/OSS. On The Internet, you can find and download replacements for thousands of dollars worth of software in just minutes. It has the potential to destroy the software industry, from lower management, to upper management to stores like my own. Before you point to the supposed "economic downturn", I'll note that the book store just across from my store is doing great business. Unlike software, it's harder to make F/OSS books and distribute them over The Internet.

A week ago, an unpleasant experience with these F/OSS'er communists gave me an idea. In my store, I overheard a teenage patron talking to his friend.

"Dude, I'm going to put Debian on my PC instead of this Vista junk, I'll download it right away."

"Yeah, dude, that's really lete [sic], you'll get lots of respect."

I was fuming. So they were out to destroy the software industry from right under my nose? Fat chance. When they came past the counter to leave, I grabbed the little shit by his shirt. "So...you're going to use unamerican, communist F/OSS replacements to good honest god-fearing proprietry software and tell your friends about it, punk?" I asked him in my best Clint Eastwood/Dirty Harry voice.

"Uh y-yeh." He mumbled, shocked.

"That's it. What's your name? You're blacklisted. Now take yourself and your little bitch friend out of my store - and don't come back." I barked. Cravenly, they complied and scampered off.

So that's my idea - a national blacklist of F/OSS'ers. If somebody cannot obey the basic rules of society, then they should be excluded from society. If F/OSS'ers want to give stuff away for free, with the source code and divert cash from the software industry, then the software industry should exclude them. It's that simple. One strike, and you're out - no reputable software store will allow you to buy another title. If the F/OSS'ers can't buy the software to begin with, then they won't be able to make alternatives and give them away free over The Internet, will they? It's no different to doctors blacklisting poor people from access to non-emergency medical care.

Set us up?

[Himring]

Michael Geist has up a post on his site

He set us up the post?

What solution?

[Opportunist]

We pay that "copyright mafiaa tax" too, but that doesn't mean we actually may copy anything. We still are not allowed to remove or circumvent copying restrictions to actually execute our right to create a backup, we still have no right to actually burn copyrighted content on those media, so I wonder what this "tax" is based on.

In fact, we pay for nothing.

Re:As a record store owner.

[dattaway]

Sales of vinyl have been increasing year-over-year for the last 10 years according to several music mags. It is a small percentage, but it is increasing.

True, but I haven't noticed a change in the number of joggers running down the street with phonograph players in their hands.

Re:Back in the hands of the consumers...?

[vorpal22]

I'm Canadian, and the majority of Canadians I've spoken to don't have the (seemingly) common US mentality about health care being about the individual. (e.g. "Why should I have to pay money to treat someone who overdoses on heroin?") Here, health care is viewed collectively as being about the people, and yes, some people require much more of the health care dollars than others, but in the end, it brings us a better society as a whole, which benefits us all.