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French Government May Subsidize Music Downloads
angry tapir writes "The European Commission has approved a French program to subsidize legal music downloads for young people. The Carte Musique scheme gives €25 (US$35) to French residents aged 12 to 25 to spend on music downloads or subscription services. Young people can purchase a €50 card for just €25, with the balance paid by the state."
Our taxes are already spent on plenty of really really dumb stuff, last thing we need is "free" music downloads. Think of those poor sorry record companies though, how are they supposed to make any money?
Well of course, the intention is to divert taxpayers' money into the "legal music download" industry.
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Cards are limited to one per person, per year and the French government expects one million cards will be sold each year.
25€ to be spent in WHICH music store ? iTunes, Amazon, Napster ?
From TFA:
there are concerns that the largest operators such as iTunes, FNAC and Amazon may not participate.
Is his wife payed for by the music lobby?
Considering Nicolas Sarkozy's wife is herself a "singer/songwriter", it's less likely she's paid for my the music lobby and more likely she actually is the music lobby. It's baffling logic, to say the least - to combat the fact that a percentage of young people are consuming music without paying for it, we'll make a percentage of older people pay for music without consuming it!
EU law is about promoting competition between member states (and theoretically non-member states, although in practice I'm sure they care far less about that). Since this apparently applies to all content providers, it doesn't technically disadvantage anyone unlike, for instance, if they offered subsidies on music performed in French, which would blatantly favour national over international content. Outside this remit, the EU is pretty much powerless to intervene, it's much more a local issue if you feel your government is wasting money during a time of economic crisis and "austerity measures" by propping up an ailing business model.
The law is supposed to cap the total subsidy to €5 million.
SSC
> Doesn't sound like government enforcement, ownership or monopoly.
He means copyright, which certainly is a government-enforced monopoly.
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