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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."
for the next 2 years while this is in effect, the online music services will be raising their prices to milk the system.
They most likely won't but I wouldn't put it past those seeing this as a good money grab opportunity.
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?
How many cards can I get and can I buy my own music with it from my own 'label'?
25€ to be spent in WHICH music store ? iTunes, Amazon, Napster ?
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Musical socialism?
France has regular riots with minorities, an economy down the drain, one hell of a reputation with the deportation of Roma and now it gives a 200 million euro subsidy to the music industry?
Just WTF?
Is his wife payed for by the music lobby? And it still requires people that in the plan are claimed to be unwilling to pay for music, to pay for music. Just not so much. Once...
And why does the state have to pay for this? Can't the music industry itself offer a discount action? Why must the average french taxpayer pay for 50% off for some kid for an American song with the money going abroad?
This isn't even corruption anymore. It shows a level of detachment from reality in the French government that is closer to insanity. "Let them eat cake", at least showed an awareness that the issue was related to food. This proposal doesn't even grasp. "42, beezlebug for I am, bibble", Marie Antoinette was heard to say, just before her head came off. Insanity.
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How is that not illegal state aid under EU law? Because they dont target specific content providers? Sounds highly dubious.
Note that this is "may" in the sense of "is permitted to," rather than "might."
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Here be Dragons
Where does the French government "earn" it money from? The French government isn't subsidising squat, the French people are.
Hope is the currency of fools
French government subsidises breathing air. You will be able to buy a €50 card for just €25, the rest of which will be paid for by the state. Any guess how many takers there will be?
In a normal market, that would lead to lower prices.
Even in an abnormal market, it will lead to lower prices eventually.
(There are also more movies than you can ever see now, more tv shows, more books).
Unless the music, book, movie, etc. is spectacularly special, I'll choose the less expensive one first.
I stopped paying over $10 for DVD's several years ago. Actually, I mostly just stopped buying DVD's as I realized they were clogging up the house and I was never going to watch most of them again.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
'Free' music is your god given right, so much so they government even gives it to you as a social service?
what happens when those cards run out (quickly)? Yea a bunch of 'kids' who now think they are entitled to it are going to steal it and have a whole new mindset about doing so
Young people can purchase a €50 card for just €25, with the balance paid by the taxpayers.
This certainly sounds like the perfect deal for the record companies though -- basically state-sponsored welfare for them.
I wonder what I'd have to do to get a product listed on the "government gift certificate" list.
Can the french government get any worse? First they implement the 3 strikes law.
Now they will throw 25 million euros a year (according to their estimates) - in order to pay the music industry. Why not grab the 25 million and use them to build more parks, or reduce homelessness, or put into education?
Answer: Because there aren't any 'homelessness lobbies'
Vote Pirate Party in the next elections. It's the only sane thing to do.
No sig today...
Cut out the middlemen and give it directly to recording industry lobbyists.
Ya, I see where this is going. What, people in the late 20's and up don't listen to music? Oui oui, it's le racism! And what happens when the cash is gone? They won't need to download any more music? I honestly can't fathom how this helps anyone except for the same music publishers who have raped us with their music prices for decades. You know what this really is? Some deal was made behind closed doors.
... until the RIAA decides that they want that money the customers saved thanks to the subsidies and sues the legit downloaders, despite having received government grant money for that very amount.
Dump the middleman who is profiting from the hard work of the musicians and producers and just buy the music directly from the artist.
For example: Purchase Radiohead In Rainbows for 7.5 pounds or $12 US.
Seems fair to me.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
Not all teenagers are obsessed with music.
Why can't Jean-Paul use his €25 to buy books or clothes?
This is just sick, it's sick that any government would subsidize any business ever at all.
You can't handle the truth.
This is utterly stupid, why should the government (ie TAXPAYERS) pay content distributors?
If anything, the government should put pressure on those distributors to lower prices, not pay them off.
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Art is suppose to be something governments try to suppress, which gives it more, pardon my french, séduire. Having the government approve your art is like having your mother approve your sexual technique.
Why dont they just write a cheque to the record industry and cut out the middle man.
Because the point of this program is to train the 12-25 yo crowd to pay for music. Apparently the French government believes they're all pirates (who might vote pirate party if not trained).
Oh good, just what we need. More shitty electronica from DJ Neckbeard, released under Creative Commons.
"We welcome initiatives from member states to increase the availability of music online at a lower price for consumers and through legal distribution channels. Music online is certainly a driver for the success of the Internet and for economic development," said Almunia.
You know what will do that, without any extra money from the people? Just put copyright back to sane terms or abolish it altogether. Stop criminalizing a whole generation of people and stop cutting families off the internet based on accusations only.
http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
Can't wait to see it's impact in over the next 10 years.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
You can by instilling a sense of fairness in the kids. I.E. people should get paid for their efforts.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
that's because they don't give them free music.
they are forcing them to pay for music with that card actually. and the lobbies get the money.
My local college continues to subsidize music for students by way of free, unsecured wi-fi internet and bittorrents.
Nice to see that the French government supports badly suffering music business.
It's unreal. The French government needs to raise the retirement age to, a still absurdly young, 62. They've been cutting healthcare coverage and benefits for years now. I had family members who've had to get private insurance to augment what the government has cut. But apparently they have the means to do something as stupid as subsidize music downloads.
There are all the absurd subsidies to a wide variety of industries. The government cut the work week back but forced companies to maintain current salaries with the delusion this would somehow increase jobs. They made it excessively difficult to fire employees, particularly college graduates, in the hope of providing job security and instead increased unemployment. The French government, and quite a few other European governments along with them, have created this expectation of handouts amongst their citizens. They can't make necessary cuts now because the unions all take to the streets and shut down the nation. But it seems like for every sensible measure there are several stupid ones which offset it.
This isn't an inherent failing of socialism. It's socialism applied stupidly. I'd argue it's quite difficult to keep a socialist nation from spiraling out of control with excessive handouts but the system certainly has some benefits.
People here seem to be forgetting that the American standard for conservative is quite different from what is considered conservative in Europe. A conservative in Europe is still heavily socialist. Although, the US is a lot more socialist than Americans seem to realize. A corporate handout is just as socialist as national healthcare.
Does this mean we will be seeing a huge influx of music cards showing up on eBay that are worth 50, but selling for 30 or 40?
The world is how you make it
+1 Funny, but what Musopen actually does is provide Free recordings of classical works (Bach et al) - even if the music composition is way too old to be under copyright, a new performance of it is still copyrighted in that regard, so Musopen addresses that issue.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
-1 WTF?
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
likely the french music industry pressured the government to give them these handouts, but in all reality, THE CURRENT SYSTEM MUST DIE so that a new and better system of music distribution and sales can replace it. Time to kill the fucking music industry dinosaurs.
Remember kids, if you're not paying for the service, YOU ARE THE PRODUCT THAT IS BEING SOLD.
"All you can eat" music plans are substantially less than €25. Why doesn't ask "unlimited play" providers to bid on the purchase of a blanket license to everyone under 18. Then the music companies get paid, the kids get free music, it winds up costing the state the same or less than the current crazy plan, and everybody's happy. Except maybe the lawyers.
There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
In Canada, we put a tax on blank CDs and DVDs, to skim off some of the "illegal" copying. Almost no-one today uses a CD, and from the web, if anything is being downloaded, it goes from hard-disk to your music player or remains on the hard drive. So, we do not see the government rescinding the tax ever, it becomes another milk cow.
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada