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iPod Fee Proposed For Canada
innocent_white_lamb writes "The Canadian Private Copying Collective is pushing for the implementation of an iPod fee in Canada to compensate them for 'losses' when people copy music to their digital music players. They have collected a fee from every CDR sold in Canada since 1997 and now want to extend that to digital music players. From the article: 'Some have argued that once they buy a CD they shouldn't have to pay again and again to listen to those songs — which they already purchased — on a personal compilation CD or on their MP3 player. But for people like Milman and Basskin, it's about recognizing the value of those works. "There has to be some sort of way to compensate the artist for the hours and the sweat and the blood and the tears and the extreme, extreme expense that goes into making music," Milman said.'"
a refund on all purchased music in Canada to compensate :-P
"There has to be some sort of way to compensate the artist for the hours and the sweat and the blood and the tears and the extreme, extreme expense that goes into making music," Milman said.
Yes, and that happenned when you *bought* the song from iTunes. Why would you want some blanket fee for then moving it onto your iPod?
There has to be some way for people to compensate me for having to hear the shit reasons these people spew out for being greedy.
The artist never receives a penny of that extra fee! Damn those pot smoking hippies!
Sarcasm aside I really do doubt that any artist on a major label gets half the money that they should. This Milman guy is clearly a douche (put simply) for trying to even suggest that the fee is for the greater good.
Or when you paid for the cd. Just because you made an mp3 and listen to it on your iPod doesn't mean you should have to pay for it again. You paid to listen to their music, you can listen to it on whatever device you want.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
> "extreme, extreme expense that goes into making music,"
Bullshit, there are no extreme expenses in making music.
Extreme expense that goes into making music? What extreme expense? I am an artist and I have yet to encounter this. I recorded an album for about $100 and then posted it for download on the internet. These people want to insert themselves into music and sap money away from artists and listeners, they contribute nothing.
living in suburban wasteland, but I can break out, I can be free.
There has to be some sort of way to safeguard the buyer from undue taxation by private companies given the hours and the sweat and the blood and the tears and the extreme, extreme expense (in terms of time) that goes into making a decent salary.
Isn't that so Mr. Milman?
- "They misunderestimated me."
music isn't necessarily born out of a desire to make $ from it but it sure helps. The problem is not the money, it is how that money is obtained. Right now the middlemen get most of their cut from a corrupt and broken system of copyright law. Artists should be able to make $ from music if they want but the current system is geared toward benefiting the big labels [unless the author lives 120+ yrs after writing the song or is a zombie]
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
If they want to raise the price, then so be it, and don't waste my time with arguments about why fees are "justified". I'll decide what I'm willing to buy at the new prices.
But why raise the price of the ipod and not the music?
There is no natural right to make a profit. You have the right to try. But if you fail, even if you've previously been successful, that's not society's problem: it's yours.
You paid to listen to their music, you can listen to it on whatever device you want.
In an ideal world, yes. You pay for something, you use it. But not these guys. They want you to pay for every format shift. In the case of televised programs, they want to you pay for every time shift. But what if you need to time or format shift it to properly use it? Tough luck, bucko, then you just bought a very nice coaster, good luck returning opened merchandise to the store. They've already pushed the idea that you're only borrowing their music, that putting down money for a disk doesn't grant you the right to use it in any legal way you please.
Their ultimate goal appears to be pay PER USE. Did your daughter put the latest bubblegum pop princess single on repeat ALL this afternoon? Fifty cents a play autocharged to your credit card. Good thing you pay $50 a month for the discount plan, or that would have been a buck fifty a play! We can also sell you the ultra-discount plan that's only $100 a month and ten cents a play! This week only, get TEN FREE PLAYS of any Flava Flav song already in your collection with a three year contract!
Banning or restricting time shifting and format shifting is of no use to the busker on the street, but allows a company to profit by re-selling the same product to the same customer in different wrappers should technology or even a person's work schedule change. Many of the 'little people' (or people who claim to represent the 'little people' or the 'starving artists') who insist that Canada needs copyright reform so they can better feed their families strangely don't explain why their neighbor, whose family won't see paychecks in the fifty years after he dies, should have to enjoy the things he has bought and paid for only on their terms, even if it means he never gets to enjoy them at all.
To my fellow Canadians: The more of this shit we put up with, the more that they'll shovel on us.
http://copyright.econsultation.ca/ - Let them know what you think of the copyright reforms - like this one - being discussed right now.
http://www.pirateparty.ca/sign-up - Let's see if we can get an actual political party off the ground, one that actually fights for the rights of the people!
(Do I sound like an activist? I was completely politically apathetic, voted twice in my entire life, until they started pulling this garbage. We can't put up with this anymore.)
Unless that CD is blank, then you pay again.*
Canada needs to stop repeating it's ridiculous history regarding this corporate puppetry.
I'm sick of trying to explain to people why DVDs cost less than CDs where I work.
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_copying_levy
The real question is whether these fees actually help musicians, or just pad the pockets of the recording industry.
I'm guessing you know the answer. The real way to help musicians is to socially encourage paying for music. Seems to be working okay for Jonathan Coulton.
"Grandpa, is it true that back in the old days music didn't have gps location built in? You didn't have to pay the record studio executives a fee when you listened to music in a different room of your house?"
"Hell, back in the day, we didn't even have the skin cell DNA identification built into the iPods!"
"OMG!!! You could listen to OTHER PEOPLES IPODS?? EWW!!! That is just wrong."
They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
1) Make a site where everyone in Canada can karaoke into and sing whatever they want, or upload their garage band songs. however badly (bring on the Thrash yodling). 2) Have the EULA of the site say the uploader releases his revenue via the iPod Fee to the site. 3) Make said songs available for ipod download. 4) Go to the Canadian Private Copying Collectivem and demand the percentage of the fee your users represent.. if there are 10.000 artists and you have 10.000 users, you should get half. 5) Profit.
Won't work. They'll only give the money to who they want to. My proof? Look at the blank media levy. You burn a CD full of Swedish metal, do they send a few cents to the Swedes? Nope. They keep a cut, and send the rest to Avril Lavigne. Burn a CD full of pictures of your baby, do they refund the levy? Hell no! They keep a cut, send the rest to Celine Dion. They've said as much when artists who didn't get a piece of the levy - hell, garage artists who had to PAY THE LEVY TO GET THE BLANK DISKS TO DISTRIBUTE THEIR MUSIC - came calling for a slice of the pie. The money goes where they say, how they say, and anyone not on their list of worthy recipients can go fuck themselves - because once the Collective is done fucking them, they're not even gonna give a reach-around.
They want you to pay for every format shift.
And I want to rule the world. So? Nobody cares about that, why should we care about their wishes?
Because they've got the lobbyists to make it happen.
I don't give a flying fuck about what the content industry wants. They obviously don't care about what I want, the quality of what has been released lately is enough proof of that. Gimme a reason to waste a nanosecond pondering what they could possibly want.
Because of things like the blank CD levy, where you pay even if you don't do anything illegal, or even anything related to them. You buy no music whatsoever but back up your business data onto CD-R? If you're Canadian then congratulations, you've paid them money without even being a consumer of their product. So they add iPods to that. How long before flash RAM and hard drives get added to the list? They've already proven they can get a levy on a form of storage, regardless of what you do with said storage. If you want to pay an extra cent a gig, fine, but my terabyte drive array takes issue with that.
The first thing that will happen if such restrictions appear is that people will break out their digital crowbars and break it. Simple as that.
Which is just another sort of crime, and one which they're pushing for ever stiffer punishments for. Think they'll never catch you because everyone's doing it? Tell that to Joel Tenenbaum. Just because everyone does it doesn't make it legal, it just means they have more targets. And if they can think of a legal gimmick that lets them drag one hundred thousand people through the court simultaneously (or extort settlements out of same), you can bet they'll do it. Then the fact that there's a million people doing it is trivial. Suddenly you're not one of a million, you're one of TEN.
Why? Because they don't care what someone wants who doesn't care about what they want.
Disproven by the CD levy. Since it gets every CD-R, it's safe to assume they've made profit off deaf people.
Illegal? Here's a phone, iPhone, no less, call someone who cares. Crack down? Ok, go ahead. Encryption works like a charm and sorry, that isn't encrypted, that's data garbage from my last HD crash, I saved it but so far couldn't get around to figuring out what this is, but you're experts, right, have fun.
They've threatened people who don't even have computers. Do you really think hiding your data matters? They've hauled people into court on less than an IP address. Flimsy evidence? You bet, but you gotta pay your lawyer by the hour, not by the strength of the opponent's case. If they make it too expensive to fight, then they'll make money on settlements, and the evidence will never see the light of day.
If everything else fails, dear content industry: I can live without music. Can you live without my money? I hope not. Please die.
Again, you could be stone deaf and still required to give the music industry money. They don't even have to produce much music, all they need to do is convince politicians that your entire demographic group is stealing whatever they do produce and they can tax it out of you. Still doesn't affect you?
When you stop to think about it, the music RECORDING industry is actually a parasitic one living off the blood, sweat and tears of the musos. It is a separate industry living off the fading body of one of the most ancient and universal professions.
Before I get modded down, think of it this way. Say I own 15 CD's. The artists received maybe $3 out of that - if that. Those CD's keep me pretty much entertained for a year or two. If we didn't have such ubiquitous mass released music recordings, where would I get my music from? Well, probably to a large degree from live musicians. On street corners, in concert halls, coffee shops. For any decent party I'd hire musicians. Same for big events in life. Weddings, funerals etc where a lot of people now just play CD's. The wealthy would be patrons of music again, sponsoring musicians to play in their homes. Just like in the developing world, there would be a lot more musicians making their living out of performing and writing music.
The big recording labels and organisations such as this one TFA refers to are not helping musicians, but stifling music as a profession.
sudo mount --milk --sugar