France Planning Non-Windows Tablet Tax?

An anonymous reader writes "Lots of countries around the world have private copying 'levies,' which are effectively taxes on products that store data, which is put into a pool to be handed out to copyright holders, as a sort of payment for the 'copying' that individuals do. This was quite popular with blank CDRs, for example, but has been expanded in certain countries to cover hard drives, iPods and other such devices. Over in France, they're looking to expand the levy to tablet computers, but apparently if that tablet computer is running Microsoft Windows, it will be exempted from the tax. iPads and Android-powered tablets will have the tax. Why? Well, the argument is that if a tablet is running Windows, it's really a 'computer.' But if it's running one of those 'mobile' operating systems, suddenly it's a brand new category. Not surprisingly, makers of Android tablets — including the French company Archos — are not at all happy about this."

Comments

Uhhh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Planing?

"Planing?"

[Ferzerp]

Was the initial design of the tax too rough or too thick that it needed planed?

Re:"Planing?"

[Anonymous Coward]

"needed planed"?

Grammar Nazi, I am disappoint.

Re:"Planing?"

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you hear that?! It's the sound of hundreds of spellcheckers stampeding this way on their high horses!

Re:"Planing?"

[JonySuede]

something you don't want to be when you grow up !

Re:"Planing?"

[PatPending]

It's like a Soup Nazi.

Re:"Planing?"

[HRbnjR]

Alot of people here aren't known for their superior grammar capabilities ;)

Re:"Planing?"

[hackerman]

But I thought alots had great grammer. They're spelling is another ishu, tho.

Re:"Planing?"

[Just Some Guy]

It wasn't on the level.

Re:"Planing?"

[Mordok-DestroyerOfWo]

Is this your way of getting...even?

Re:"Planing?"

[TheABomb]

What, were you hoping TFA would surrender?

Re:"Planing?"

[Silfax]

It's like a Soup Nazi.

no grammar for you!

Re:"Planing?"

[Creepy]

That was grammatically correct, I believe, just spelt wrong. And yes I used spelt intentionally - it is the equivalent of spelled despite Firefox dictionary not recognizing it OotB (it is a rarely used, yet still correct form). Spelt is also a form of wheat my grandpa used to grow in the US, mainly to sell to the German community in South Dakota, though the majority of his wheat was bread grain like most farmers.

Planed was obviously incorrect spelling, but was corrected by the time I read the headline.

Re:"Planing?"

[Fnordulicious]

As a real linguist, I feel I should point out that there are dialects of American English which have a “need Verb-ed” construction which is approximated by “need to be Verb-ed” elsewhere. Thus one can say “the dishes need washed” or “the dog needs walked” rather than “the dishes need to be washed“ or “the dog needs to be walked”. This construction is perfectly grammatical in such dialects, and is possibly spreading so that it will become grammatical throughout much of North America in the next few generations. There’s no semantic difference apparently, it’s a purely syntactic distinction.

It *is* however dialectal at this point, and hence should be avoided in most written contexts.

Re:"Planing?"

[drcheap]

Spelt? German community?

So they were really Spelling Nazis,not Grammar Nazis as previously alleged. Glad you could settle that for us, now back to France...

Re:"Planing?"

[drcheap]

There’s no semantic difference apparently, it’s a purely syntactic distinction.

Syntactic distinction is the basis of most Grammar Nazi arguments :)

Re:"Planing?"

[Artifakt]

This is Slashdot, please convert your analogy to use Quadrotriticale (A fine Canadian product).

Re:"Planing?"

[mcneely.mike]

Quadrotriticale (A fine Canadian product).

Yes! Us Canadian Tribbles love it, especially in our beer!
Mmmmmm.... Canadian Ale.... beats the sh*t out of that Romulan piss.

Re:"Planing?"

[mcneely.mike]

"You hurt your what?"

Re:"Planing?"

[timnbron]

Need whooshed...

Re:"Planing?"

[Myopic]

It's true, and actually I like it. I've begun to adopt that convention as an adult. The insertion of the generic verb "to be" into such constructions pretty much meaningless. I'm also sort of a stickler for rules, though, so I'm conflicted about it.

Re:"Planing?"

[Myopic]

I hope CmdrTaco can smooth things over.

Re:"Planing?"

[LongearedBat]

Wouldn't the two have subtly different meanings?

I would interpret them as...
"the dog needs walked" meaning the job should already have been completed, as in "the dog needs to be walked already"
whereas
"the dog needs to be walked" meaning the job will have to be completed at some point in the future, as in "the dog needs to have been walked soon".

Re:"Planing?"

[uninformedLuddite]

A cunning linguist?

Re:"Planing?"

[jbuk]

Rarely used? I've never heard anyone in Britain use any other form of the word — "spelled" sounds incorrect to my ears.

Re:"Planing?"

[Ramze]

Why not simply state, "The dog should have been walked." or "The dog should have been walked by now." with the implication that it has not been done, it should be done immediately -- if that was the intended meaning?

Re:"Planing?"

[garyebickford]

The parent is probably from Pittsburgh. In Pittsburghese, phrases like "My car needs washed" are a common form. Call it a participial gerund. :)

There is a book of Pittsburghese, which includes other forms such as "y'uns" (or just "yuns"), possibly a contraction of "you ones", which means something like "Y'all", the southern objective singular form of "you". Plural of y'all is "all y'all". I'm not sure what the plural of "yuns" is - I think it's the same for singular or plural, but I only lived there a few years - I'm not a native speaker.

Re:"Planing?"

[garyebickford]

They ain't no wrong path - think of it as 'free, open source linguistics' ;) English grows and survives largely because when a new usage becomes commonplace, it is accepted as part of the 'standard'. Think of it as having a short version/update cycle. :) So English always converges toward the popular median - a very successful strategy. The alternative would be Latin, which became gradually irrelevant.

English started out as a mongrel combination of germanic Old English (spoken by the peasants) and Old Norman French (spoken by the ruling class - descendants of the Normans who took over in 1066). From day one it has absorbed not only words but usage, spelling, grammar from all sorts of places. (Where did 'barbeque' come from? There are at least a half dozen viable theories.)

English constantly, and happily, adopts new vocabulary, new idioms, new grammar, new spelling. When I was young, the rules said that trailing consonants had to be doubled when adding an ending, for example "travelling". Now the correct (i.e. commonly accepted) form is "traveling". This still grates on me, but times have changed.

In the late 1800s there was an attempt to formalize the rules - that's when "ain't" was dropped from the "correct" vocabulary even though it's a perfectly good and useful form in common use - it just didn't fit in with the grammar nazis' view of how contractions ought to be derived. As we can all remember from our school days, this rule-making resulted in a lot of rules that are notable not so much for the rule but the raft of exceptions ("I before e, except after c, or when sounding like a as in neighbor and weigh, ...").

However, to a great extent, English has become ubiquitous because it is so adaptable. One of the interesting benefits of this adoptive vocabulary is that it is common for several words to mean almost, but not exactly, the same thing. Many languages without this feature have to use complex and lengthy phrases to express such slight differences. This also makes English often the least verbose language - take a look at the instructions for your latest widget. The English instructions are almost always the shortest text.

Re:"Planing?"

[garyebickford]

Efficiency wins! :)
"The dog needs walked": 4 words, 4 syllables
"The dog needs walking": 4 words, 5 syllables
"The dog needs to be walked": 6 words, 6 syllables

These mean something slightly different:
"The dog should have been walked by now": 8 words, 8 syllables
"The dog should have been walked": 6 words, 6 syllables

Re:"Planing?"

[GameboyRMH]

is possibly spreading so that it will become grammatical throughout much of North America in the next few generations.

Do not want! :-(

Re:"Planing?"

[BetterSense]

You shouldn't use comma splices.

A

Re:"Planing?"

[fishexe]

As a real linguist, I feel I should point out that there are dialects of American English which have a “need Verb-ed” construction which is approximated by “need to be Verb-ed” elsewhere.

Apparently also in Scottish English, as in "Their empty bellies needed filled" (Battlefield Band lyric).

Re:"Planing?"

[Sczi]

That's just wrong, considering you have another substitute for “the dishes need to be washed“ - it's “the dishes need washing” rather than “the dishes need washed”

This is participle country, boy. Why don't you take your yankee gerunds and ride on outta here?

Re:"Planing?"

[fishexe]

It's true, and actually I like it. I've begun to adopt that convention as an adult. The insertion of the generic verb "to be" into such constructions pretty much meaningless. I'm also sort of a stickler for rules, though, so I'm conflicted about it.

The "to be" sets up the relationship between the second verb and the subject in a way that is consistent with the logic of the rest of the English language. It establishes that the "washed" or "walked" is something done by another to the subject (passive voice). While most often this would be unambiguous anyway whether proper English or the new convention were used, in corner cases it's a problem; I'm too tired to think of any examples at the moment, but I know there are plenty, so I'll try to come up with some and get back to you. The new "convention" is also at odds with the way many other verbs are used such as "expect (to be) compensated", "want (to be) loved", "hate (to be) kicked" et cetera. You wouldn't say "the dog hates kicked" and expect anyone to understand WTF you meant, would you?

Re:"Planing?"

[M. Baranczak]

"Walk the dog" - 3 words, 3 syllables. It's also less ambiguous, and more likely to bring tangible results, since you're making it clear that the person being addressed is the one that should do the job.

Tangent: why do robots always say "affirmative" instead of "yes"? It takes four times as long to say, and the meaning is exactly the same.

Re:"Planing?"

[garyebickford]

That's assuming the imperative is what's desired, rather than a statement of fact. :)

The robot thing is probably related to the way that technical and academic writers often use four dollar words unnecessarily - we (probably all) have a tendency to think it sounds more 'official', 'academic', educated, formal or whatever. So Hollywood writers used their limited understanding to decide that robots must talk like overblown scientists, and 'affirmative' was science-speak.

OTOH, it might be from the military - wasn't affirmative used on two-way radios back in WWII, because it was not ambiguous, given the noisy transmissions? 'Yes' could be lost in a moment of radio static, but even if a part of the word were lost, enough of 'affirmative' would come through even if some static did interfere.

This reminds me of an analysis of speech (in English, as it happens) I read a few years ago, which found that there is a high level of redundancy and 'correlated words' (my term since I forgot the original - words that often appear in pairs, sometimes in different parts of a sentence) such that the hearer can reconstruct missing terms and get the full meaning. IOW, error detection and correction are built into human language. :)

Re:"Planing?"

[ArsonSmith]

yes sounds lame in a robot voice.

Re:"Planing?"

[EvilSuggestions]

I've wanted to ask a real linguist: is there a technical term for that construct? I know a few people here in the US Pacific NW who occasionally make use of that construct in day-to-day speech, and I'm curious about how much it has been studied. For example, does it have a well defined regional distribution?

Re:"Planing?"

[Myopic]

/shrugs

You could change my mind with compelling corner cases showing ambiguity, but yes I would use constructions such as "the dog hates kicked" -- and yes, it sounds a bit funny today, like new constructions typically do.

What is Apple's iPad OS?

[G3ckoG33k]

What is Apple's iPad OS?

That should matter here.

Re:What is Apple's iPad OS?

[cyranix]

ahem... If windows makes it a real computer, I'd love to know what the "entirely new category" is...

Re:What is Apple's iPad OS?

[h4rr4r]

The non marketing name for the OS it runs. IOS is actually what runs on Cisco Routers, apple pays to use that name since it fits the i$thing theme they have.

Re:What is Apple's iPad OS?

[jedidiah]

Call this new category "Archos knock-offs".

Perhaps the Apple fanboys will like that approach better... '-p

Re:What is Apple's iPad OS?

[Lobachevsky]

Not to mention Android isn't an os, it's a platform involving the linux os, some device drivers, and libraries. Moreover, Android and iPad prevent copying because device manufacturers heavily lock those devices down.

Re:What is Apple's iPad OS?

[LaRainette]

No it doesn't.
Actually it's not at all a question of true computer or not since the guys designing the piece of legislation couldn't tell the difference between a computer and a microwave hoven, it's more about who enforces all the "anti-piracy" policies and technologies ( such as DRM rofl...) and who doesn't.
Microsoft Does so they get a free pass, the others don't so they have to pay.
This is an OUTRAGEOUS example of how french poilitics is becoming more and more like American politics, big company lobbies to have a stupid and unfair law, other big companies sue, big company conter-sues etc...
Meanwhile the consumers get fucked in the ass, and the citizen pay for all the legal crap...

Re:What is Apple's iPad OS?

[GameboyRMH]

Locked-down toys? Seems like a fair distinction if they can be consistent about it.

Windows Phone 7, iOS, Android = locked-down toys

Desktop Windows, Linux distros, OSX = "real computer"

I don't want devices like PDAs and tablets to be categorically considered "locked-down toys" or "like game consoles" because that's an excuse the anti-freedom crowd uses to justify the trend towards decreasing software freedom on mobile devices, but I have no problem making the distinction at the software level.

Now about this law, there's nothing keeping you from ripping a DVD and re-encoding it (and jumping through any other necessary hoops) to play on any locked-down toy, so how are they different from a "real computer" in this regard? AFAIK none of them require mandatory DRM on all media.

Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail again

[Iphtashu Fitz]

So because it's a computer it's unable to distribute copyrighted materials? Now that is some pretty twisted logic right there.

And what the hell does a "clean operating system" mean?

From the Google translation of the French article:

"Windows 7 will not be affected by the fee for private copying, which by definition is adopted touch pads "provided with an operating system for mobile devices or a clean operating system".

Need a computer to do the copying

[GreatDrok]

Devices like the iPad are just holders and consumers of media. A Windows PC is the usual culprit when it comes to actually defeating copy protection and doing the duping. This seems bass ackwards to me as they should be taxing the computer, not that they should be taxing either.

Re:Need a computer to do the copying

[Concerned Onlooker]

Well, not to put too fine a point on it but there are hundreds of apps that allow content creation on the iPad. My current favorite is the Korg iMS-20 sequencer. There's also the full complement of Apple apps such as Pages, Numbers and Keynote. Also, don't lawmakers ever consult a real technical person when it comes to stuff like this? The Android and Apple mobile OSes and the devices they run on ARE computers. Sheesh.

Re:Need a computer to do the copying

[anti-human 1]

Also, don't lawmakers ever consult a real technical person when it comes to stuff like this?

What? No. You're getting this backwards. Lawmakers don't seek out people informed with opinions. People with opinions (and agendas) lobby lawmakers to get their views legislated.

This is the result of profit-driven enterprise gaining access to political power, and nothing else.

Re:Need a computer to do the copying

[GIL_Dude]

Devices like the iPad are just holders and consumers of media

Actually I think that may really be the whole point. Levies of this type (as the summary says) have typically been applied to things like CD-R, blank DVD, music players, etc. - because of the fact that they ARE holders of (often copyrighted) media. I don't agree with these levys at all; I think they are very misguided, but I can see how they got into a quagmire trying to define what is "like a CD-R" (holds content) and ended up getting it a bit wrong.

Re:Need a computer to do the copying

[shutdown -p now]

Devices like the iPad are just holders and consumers of media.

That's precisely the logic they're using. They seem to think that, to copy something, you need some medium to copy it too - like tapes. So the more you copy, the more tapes you buy - and therefore the tax on tapes is indirectly a tax on how much you copy.

That logic still made some (albeit little) sense when it was applied to CD-Rs, but then they also started to classify everything with storage as a potential target for copying. Except computers, because, well, they obviously aren't like a tape or a CD or a USB stick.

The idea is fundamentally BS, though, so who cares? Just get rid of it all.

Re:Need a computer to do the copying

[betterunixthanunix]

Devices like the iPad are just holders and consumers of media

No, the iPad is a tablet computer, albeit one that Apple designed to thwart attempts by its users to control. Hard drives and SSDs are holders of media, people are consumers of it, who use software to aid them in that consumption. Dividing tablet computers into different classes based on what some corporation thinks you should use it for is not a game I want to play, and it is frankly counter-productive. The sooner we start calling the iPad what it is, the better.

A Windows PC is the usual culprit when it comes to actually defeating copy protection and doing the duping

As are a number of other systems -- routers, switches, etc. -- which operate the Internet and enable the existence of file sharing networks and hosting services. Why leave out all of the other computers and operating systems involved in the process? Why single out "consumer" computers?

This seems bass ackwards to me as they should be taxing the computer, not that they should be taxing either.

Now there I agree with you. Frankly, I think it is time to start asking why we are continuing to placate the recording industry. Nobody shed a tear for all those typewriter companies, or those film manufacturers, or those buggy whip producers and horse breeders, when their industries became obsolete. They either learned to adapt and play by the new rules (e.g. Kodak seeking other ways to make money on photography) or they went out of business. Why should we not expect the recording industry to do the same? The age of CDs is long gone, we just continue to cling to it because the record executives are whining about how awful it is that all these horrible computer users are destroying their business. If they want to stay in business, they need to find a new way to make money on recorded music, rather than trying to fight back against the new technological reality that is here to stay.

Re:Need a computer to do the copying

[RocketRabbit]

OP knows that, he was just trolling. YHBT and DFTT and all that.

Re:Need a computer to do the copying

[Opportunist]

So... a tax allegedly levied to compensate for copying exempts the platform that most copying takes place on?

France has finally fully shifted into Bizarro world.

Re:Need a computer to do the copying

[jc42]

Also, don't lawmakers ever consult a real technical person when it comes to stuff like this? The Android and Apple mobile OSes and the devices they run on ARE computers. Sheesh.

Actually, it could just be a case of an old and well-documented attitude in the computer market: it's only a real computer if it comes from IBM or Microsoft. Everything else is a toy used only by academics and techies.

It could also be an example of a phenomenon that's now rampant in the US, and may be starting to infect Europe: The richer you are, the lower your taxes are. Actually, that may not be a very new phenonenon. The change may be that now in the US, the right-wing part of the political spectrum openly advocates this policy, rather than implementing it on the sly while pretending to be friends of "ordinary people".

Myself, I'd wonder who got paid off for this policy decision, and how much money changed hands. Anyone have any data on this? Since the 2000 elections here in the US, Microsoft has been among the top political campaign contributors. Do we have numbers on this in the EU?

Re:Need a computer to do the copying

[Concerned Onlooker]

Jeez. Hook, line and sinker.

Article Title

[Mongoose Disciple]

Maybe we could have gotten a more inflammatory article title to stoke the inevitable posting flamewar. Such as: "France to Apple Fans: Your iPad is a Toy, Not a Real Computer Like A Windows Machine."

Which is pretty much what the summary says. I'm sure that'll go over well.

Re:Article Title

[matazar]

Not to provoke further, but an I don't consider an iPad a 'real computer'. It's running the same OS as an iPhone.
I also wouldn't consider a tablet running Windows Mobile xx (or Windows Mobile CE) a real computer anymore than my phone (which is not a real computer).

If they are taxing iPads, they better be taxing Windows Mobile devices, along with Android devices. If they aren't taxing Windows 7 (XP/Vista) devices, then they shouldn't be taxing systems running Mac OSX or systems with whatever the Google operating system is called nor anything sold with Unix/Linux on it.

The tax is stupid, but as long as it follows the same rules across all platforms then people should be upset about that, not comparing iOS to Windows 7...

Of course, the linked article doesn't actually give versions of windows this applies to, which is an important point.So I assume this is just to start a flame war because someone said their iPad is not a real computer...

Re:Article Title

[jc42]

I also wouldn't consider a tablet running Windows Mobile xx (or Windows Mobile CE) a real computer anymore than my phone (which is not a real computer).

Heh. You have your right to think that way, but technically speaking, you're wrong. The new-fangled phones these days contain a real, functional computer processor chip and real memory. They're real computers, more powerful than the "mainframe" computers from the 1970s. They just don't seem like real computers because the vendors (i.e., the phone companies) have locked you out of most of their capabilities, and crippled them to the point that they seem like little more than a comm device. This is merely antagonism (against you and me) on the part of the phone companies, who want to keep control of your phone for their own nefarious purposes.

At its heart, your phone contains a very real computer that wants to get out and do some real computing. Maybe we need a "phone computer liberation front" or some such organizations to free the poor little victimized things. (But we need a better name, with a pronounceable acronym. ;-)

(Everyone hates their phone company, right?)

Re:Article Title

[GameboyRMH]

I don't consider it a real computer unless it is at least runs an OS that you can freely modify and develop for, and ideally can run any OS the user chooses, regardless of what the hardware is capable of. So I'd say an older PalmOS PDA is a real computer, while a modern eFused Android phone is not.

From TFA comments

[C_amiga_fan]

"Good for microsoft. Legislation is an easier way to get rid of pesky competition than work is."

That's about right..... and no this isn't just an anti-MS slap. Lots of Megacorps do the same thing, like how McDonalds bought an exemption from the health insurance requirement. Don't play on an even field IF you can get lawmakers to give you special exemptions or favorable laws.

Re:From TFA comments

[shentino]

Or you can just start a huge harassment campaign against employees of the IRS and then walk in and demand unique tax deductions that nobody else will get, in exchange for dropping the attack.

Oh wait, didn't Scientology do that? I believe they did. It sounds exactly the sort of thing they'd do considering that they use copyright law to protect their scriptures.

And I don't fucking care if I get sued for saying this.

Re:From TFA comments

[PatPending]

McDonalds didn't "buy" an exemption; the Department of Health and Human Services said it granted waivers in late September so workers with such plans wouldn't lose coverage from employers who might choose instead to drop health insurance altogether.

I found it interesting that you chose to mention "Lots of Megacorps" but failed to mention all the unions that "bought" their exemptions too! And, oh, by the way, waivers are available until 2014.

From FactCheck:

Q: Has the Obama administration allowed corporations to "opt out" of the new health care law?

A: No. The government has granted more than 200 waivers, but these merely give companies a temporary delay before being required to improve the coverage of cheap, bare-bones plans they currently offer.

Re:From TFA comments

[Opportunist]

Why the fuss when you have a government that's pretty much for sale?

France just proved that they now have the best government money can buy (as if that needed any more proof).

Not buying it

[DoofusOfDeath]

This has the smell of something that's so moronic that (for real) it will never get very far.

That, and I'm sure makers of non-Windows devices will be exercising the EU court system like it's going out of style.

Re:Not buying it

[Kyusaku Natsume]

It's France's Sarkozy government. His cabinet is made of such a clowns that this is perhaps the most well thought law that they have in the pipeline for the next year.

Re:Not buying it

[godrik]

That's so true... I'm french... And I am crying... I hate Santa for not bringing France the resignation of the president...

Re:Not buying it

[spyfrog]

Perhaps it is time for a new revolution and a new republic?

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Anonymous Coward]

Yea, I think you fail more than them if you run an article through Google Translate and then complain about the writing because you don't understand something.

I question the comparison....

[klwood911]

That's like saying that every car that isn't Chevy isn't a car (but ironically all can carry people?). Someone needs to strung up for this definition.

Re:I question the comparison....

[jedidiah]

No. It's more like saying that a car that comes with a governor that limits it to 25mph isn't a real car.

The "real car" in question also happens to be a golf cart.

Re:Apple Tax

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

So people have to pay an Apple Tax for owning a iPod XL (err, I mean iPad)? Yeah, I can live with that.

Until it extends to a product you wish to have.

taxes are needed to fund executive pay

[Anonymous Coward]

Canada has had a copying-tax for many, many years. It's worked very well for the executives of the RIAA and the CRIAA:

Canadian Recording Industry Faces $6 Billion Copyright Infringement Lawsuit

Monday December 07, 2009
Chet Baker was a leading jazz musician in the 1950s, playing trumpet and providing vocals. Baker died in 1988, yet he is about to add a new claim to fame as the lead plaintiff in possibly the largest copyright infringement case in Canadian history. His estate, which still owns the copyright in more than 50 of his works, is part of a massive class-action lawsuit that has been underway for the past year.

As my weekly technology law column (Toronto Star version, homepage version) notes, the infringer has effectively already admitted owing at least $50 million and the full claim could exceed $6 billion. If the dollars don't shock, the target of the lawsuit undoubtedly will: The defendants in the case are Warner Music Canada, Sony BMG Music Canada, EMI Music Canada, and Universal Music Canada, the four primary members of the Canadian Recording Industry Association.

The CRIA members were hit with the lawsuit [PDF] in October 2008, after artists decided to turn to the courts following decades of frustration with the rampant infringement (I am adviser to the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic, which is co-counsel, but have had no involvement in the case). The claims arise from a longstanding practice of the recording industry in Canada, described in the lawsuit as "exploit now, pay later if at all." It involves the use of works that are often included in compilation CDs (ie. the top dance tracks of 2009) or live recordings. The record labels create, press, distribute, and sell the CDs, but do not obtain the necessary copyright licences.

Instead, the names of the songs on the CDs are placed on a "pending list", which signifies that approval and payment is pending. The pending list dates back to the late 1980s, when Canada changed its copyright law by replacing a compulsory licence with the need for specific authorization for each use. It is perhaps better characterized as a copyright infringement admission list, however, since for each use of the work, the record label openly admits that it has not obtained copyright permission and not paid any royalty or fee.

Over the years, the size of the pending list has grown dramatically, now containing over 300,000 songs. From Beyonce to Bruce Springsteen, the artists waiting for payment are far from obscure, as thousands of Canadian and foreign artists have seen their copyrights used without permission and payment.

It is difficult to understand why the industry has been so reluctant to pay its bills. Some works may be in the public domain or belong to a copyright owner difficult to ascertain or locate, yet the likes of Sarah McLachlan, Bruce Cockburn, Sloan, or the Watchmen are not hidden from view.

The more likely reason is that the record labels have had little motivation to pay up. As the balance has grown to over $50 million (Universal alone owes more than $30 million), David Basskin, the President and CEO of the Canadian Musical Reproduction Rights Agency Ltd., notes in his affidavit that "the record labels have devoted insufficient resources to identifying and paying the owners of musical works on the Pending Lists." Basskin adds that some labels believe addressing the issue would be "an unproductive use of their time."

Having engaged in widespread copyright infringement for over 20 years, the CRIA members now face the prospect of far greater liability. The class action seeks the option of statutory damages for each infringement. At $20,000 per infringement (the amount owed on some songs exceed this amount), potential liability exceeds $6 billion. These numbers may sound outrageous, yet they are based on the same rules that has led the recording industry to claim a single file sharer is liable for millio

Hadopi and copy tax...

[FranckMartin]

What I don't understand, you pay a tax on any digital media to compensate for artists loss of revenue and then you go after people for copying materials via hadopi.

I think we should have one, but not both?

Sounds to me like double jeopardy.

What do you think?

Re:Hadopi and copy tax...

[Kjella]

Sounds to me like double jeopardy.

What do you think?

No. Double jeopardy has a specific legal meaning, and this is not it. Some forms of private copying may be legal but taxed while others can be illegal under Hadopi, at best you have a conflict between two laws/regulations that need resolving. In any case a tax is not a legal punishment, and double jeopardy means being punished twice by the legal system for the same crime.

Re:Hadopi and copy tax...

[Cley Faye]

It's interesting, but you missed another point.
Way before the HADOPI mess, copying of CD/DVD/YouNameIt was already prohibited, because you'd have to circumvent some kind of protection (yes, breaking DVD CSS is illegal here, although totally stupid).
So, for a long time, it was illegal to made a private copy of almost any media, and yet we were paying for it. Now, they want to extend this tax without any reasoning behind it.
In short, the french government doesn't even try to hide anymore when raising a new tax/extending existing ones.
There's a bad history of the same thing, like french internet providers that had to pay another tax to "help" some industries (guess which...), and in exchange they had a reduction of their VAT. Recently, this reduction was lifted, but the tax remains...

Re:Hadopi and copy tax...

[Kyusaku Natsume]

Is more akin tho the media cartel eating his cake, forcing the artists to buy them another one, then forcing taxpayers to buy them another one, even if they are not consumers of their products. Despite what narrow minded people believe, tablet computers can be used for far more useful things than to listen to music or playing videos. If they want so badly these kind of levies, then lawmakers must abrogate all laws punishing non commercial copyright infringement since copyright holders are already compensated for it anyway.

Re:Apple Tax

[Stregano]

I am not too worried about that. My main gaming pc is Windows (would not apply), my server is Unix (does not apply), my netbook is Windows (does not apply), and I have no use for a tablet. My phone is not a smart phone, but an older Nokia phone (does not apply).

It is about time people started taxing the people who buy Apple products.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Anonymous Coward]

And what the hell does a "clean operating system" mean?

Means the company that sold it to you, took you to the cleaners.

Ubuntu Tablet?

[coolmadsi]

What about an Ubuntu tablet, like one mentioned in a story on slashdot earlier today?

Re:Apple Tax

[I8TheWorm]

I've got news for you, people who own Apple products have already paid an Apple tax ;)

I've said it before, I'll say it again

[spidercoz]

Fuck the French.

Re:I've said it before, I'll say it again

[DoofusOfDeath]

Fuck the French.

If you mean literally, absolutely!

Re:I've said it before, I'll say it again

[Ismellpoop]

Maybe some quality time with a razor. Imagine your old lady's armpit hair tickling your nose when you snuggle up to her at night.

Re:I've said it before, I'll say it again

[aurelianito]

Maybe some quality time with a razor. Imagine your old lady's armpit hair tickling your nose when you snuggle up to her at night.

It seems you have never gotten out of your mom's basement. Here, in the big room with the cyan ceiling, French girls are great.

Re:I've said it before, I'll say it again

[gaza3g]

Excuse my French but fuck this shit.

Overblown

[euroq]

I think too many people here are overblowing the situation. It is not the western world going to shit, corporations taking over the little guy, etc. It's just a bad law, and I highly doubt it is any form of favoritism. The more complicated any rule or plan is, the worse it is (if they have problems with storage, they should just tax all storage media across the board, and not try to specify it based on such details as OS.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Lunix Nutcase]

And what the hell does a "clean operating system" mean?

It means you're relying too heavily on a shitty machine translation that just picked the first meaning of "propre" it could find.

and this is why...

[chaboud]

This is why these taxes were ridiculous in the first place. Take money from one industry or product to give to another for the crimes that might leverage the first's? This should immediately freak any sane uninterested party right the hell out.

It is really not the place of good government to make "crimes" (unproven) right by stealing from one industry to placate another. If your government does this (and yours probably does), your government is corrupt.

I knew the French was commies!1!!

[RightwingNutjob]

See, see!? Some tablets are more equal than others!!1!one!eleven

Define Computer

[Archangel Michael]

If you design a piece of hardware, capable of running Windows 7, but DOESN'T is it a computer? What if it runs Windows 7 in a VM on another OS?

I hate governments more each day.

Re:Define Computer

[kaizokuace]

mobile computing has always not been considered to be computing just because of the power difference between workstations and mobile devices. But it's gotten to the point that what you can carry in your pocket is enough to do the same functions as what you would use in a office computer which blurs the lines of what people want to refer to devices as. There is really no difference! they are all computers! as they compute! people is dumb.

Re:Define Computer

[Archangel Michael]

My Droid has more power than a "computer" that ran Windows, from ten years or so ago.

Arbitrary distinctions in law don't serve any purposes. Law should be about absolutes and shouldn't define things that will obviously shift over time.

Re:Balmer must have sucked

[Lunix Nutcase]

You have it backwards. They were most definitely the ones sucking Ballmer's cock.

How about neither?

[betterunixthanunix]

Why not take the same approach with the music industry that we took with the typewriter, camera film, and buggy-whip industries?

Re:Apple Tax

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

I am not too worried about that.

Yet.

You should think a little bit more about wishing for things like that. Every single thing you said "does not apply" to only means "does not apply today".

"Computer" - you keep using that word.

[RevWaldo]

I do not think it means what you think it means.

.

The intent would seem to include Win7

[ArbitraryDescriptor]

Sarkozy isn't an MS shill, he's a shill for the french equivalent of the RIAA. This seems like an extension of the tax they put on mp3 players, as it is based on the internal storage capacity of the device.

"The scale ranges from 0.09 euros for models with up to 128MB of 12 euros for those with 64 GB

Article linked from TFA

Thus I suspect 'mobile/clean operating system' is meant to refer to any operating system that can run on a mobile device, and then be used to play music that you probably stole. We all know how the copyright cartels think, why would they intentionally exclude windows users?

Re:The intent would seem to include Win7

[Lunix Nutcase]

Thus I suspect 'mobile/clean operating system' is meant to refer to any operating system that can run on a mobile device, and then be used to play music that you probably stole.

No, that's not what is being meant and the "clean" part is a mistranslation by Google Translate. What they are saying is that there are "mobile OSes" (aka android) and "proper OSes" aka (Windows) and thus they are only going to tax the mobile OSes not what is considered a "proper" OS.

Re:The intent would seem to include Win7

[ArbitraryDescriptor]

Consider their viewpoint. They would tax every single means of data storage if they could. People would (rightfully) balk at the idea of taxing any hard drive, or their laptop, but they presently pay a bs tax on MP3 players. So there is a clear line there. So they're thinking "What if they just bought an iPad instead? We can't tax those!" and trying to move tablets and 'mobile devices' to the taxable, 'MP3 player' side of that line.

Ask yourself: Why would they intentionally exclude tablets running Win7 from their potential pool of revenue? Microsoft does not have the legislative influence in France that they do in the states, I really doubt that this is a case of MS massaging their laws and not (poor wording)/((poor/sensational) interpretation) by the press.

Re:The intent would seem to include Win7

[robot256]

Who is actually getting the payout from the "mobile OS netbook tax"? Are they applying it to non-Windows machines under the assumption that you will install an illegal copy of Windows on it? Or does it even matter?

Re:The intent would seem to include Win7

[ArbitraryDescriptor]

Who is actually getting the payout from the "mobile OS netbook tax"? Are they applying it to non-Windows machines under the assumption that you will install an illegal copy of Windows on it? Or does it even matter?

I can't find anything about how the existing tax on media, USB sticks, and MP3 players is disbursed, but I doubt it's going to Microsoft. I think they're just trying to add 'tablets' to that list of things get a levy on behalf of whatever copyright think-tank writes their laws, because everyone is, apparently, assumed to be a criminal.

Re:The intent would seem to include Win7

[jedidiah]

It's not just the copyright cartels.

If your stuff isn't in an Apple approved format, the Apple fanboys will happily repeat the pro-RIAA rhetoric.

They love to accuse you of stealing.

Re:The intent would seem to include Win7

[Smask]

Sarkozy isn't an MS shill, he's a shill for the french equivalent of the RIAA.

Sarkozy is a MS shill. Remember when MS bought the ISO standard? The French ISO members were supporting ODF, but were ordered by the French government to vote for MS. The boss of MS France and Sarkozy are old friends.

Re:The intent would seem to include Win7

[ArbitraryDescriptor]

Sarkozy isn't an MS shill, he's a shill for the french equivalent of the RIAA.

Sarkozy is a MS shill. Remember when MS bought the ISO standard? The French ISO members were supporting ODF, but were ordered by the French government to vote for MS. The boss of MS France and Sarkozy are old friends.

I stand corrected; I did not remember that. He's a regular bag of dicks (sac de bites?), that guy.

Re:The intent would seem to include Win7

[amorsen]

I don't know about France, but in Denmark the media tax is supposedly because you are allowed to e.g. copy your CDs to your MP3 player. We should be grateful for such a privilege and appreciate that we only have to pay a little for it. Right.

Just to make it extra funny, you are apparently allowed to break DRM to copy the content you "own", but you are not allowed to help others copy the content they "own". So no showing them how the photocopier works or telling them about DeCSS.

Re:Balmer must have sucked

[hedwards]

Balmer has a cock? Why wasn't I informed? I didn't realize he was a rooster aficionado.

Crony Capitalism

[MindlessAutomata]

Nothing to see here or much to discuss, really, this is just another case of crony capitalism.

Bill of rights?

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

In the US(at least for people who aren't suspected of terrorism, or in one of the other undesirable categories) we have a constitutional guarantee of due process of law, presumption of innocence in trial, and such. My understanding is that the EU is, if anything, even more expansive in declaring assorted things to be human rights(if occasionally at the expense of some of the ones that we get touchy about, like free speech...)

How does a "copying" levy, applied more or less indiscriminately to virtually all media and devices, and then paid as atonement for all the sinful copyright infringement presumed to be done with those media and devices, possibly pass "due process"(or any analogous formulation) muster? Is there some way in which making buying a stack of CD-Rs presumptive evidence of partial guilt for hypothetical future copyright infringement, and punishing it on the spot, different than treating buying a knife as presumptive evidence of partial guilt for hypothetical future murder, and making each purchase require a few days in prison?

Beware of mixed metaphors!

[mangu]

Why not take the same approach with the music industry that we took with the typewriter, camera film, and buggy-whip industries?

I parsed your post like this:

Storyline is about copyrights
- typewriters can be used to copy text
- camera film can be used to copy images
hmmm, so far this about old methods used in the past to copy things
buggy-whips? WTF?

Re:Beware of mixed metaphors!

[betterunixthanunix]

Oh, my apologies. The real point was about industries that died in the face of new technology, not about the ability to copy things. I suppose I should be more careful next time!

Re:Beware of mixed metaphors!

[Ismellpoop]

buggy-whips were for when the scribes weren't scribing quick enough.
But I think the parents point is its a dead/dying industry.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Anonymous Coward]

The French word is "propre".
The most common use of a word spelled that way would be "clean", but here, the meaning is different.
I think what the quote means is that the law would affect mobile device OSs and OSs that were created specifically for whatever device it's running on.
"Propre" would mean "specific"

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Lunix Nutcase]

Or it can actually just mean "proper" as it is a cognate of the English word. This would also make sense since many people do view a mobile OS as not really being a "proper" computer OS considering most mobile OSes have reduced functionality compared to what most people are used to on a full-blown desktop.

Re:Apple Tax

[MoonBuggy]

It is about time people started taxing the people who buy Apple products.

Any real reason, or just being a grouchy bastard for the sake of it?

Seriously, I'm sure you can see that entirely arbitrary legislation like this just lines people up for problems in future. I don't care that much because I don't live in France, but I still think it's asinine to create a specific legal distinction between Windows and Android/iOS/Unix (but only if running on a tablet, not a netbook, apparently).

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Anonymous Coward]

In the french text it says "d’un système d’exploitation propre". In this context "propre" means "of it's own". So if it has an operating system for mobile devices or it has it's own operating system (so develloped with the touchpaddevice in mind) it is taxable. Since windows seven is develloped for personal computers this supposedly does not apply.

The voters get the government they deserve

[n6kuy]

... even in France.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Yvanhoe]

The rationale is that computers make illegal copies on CDs and USB sticks so CDs and USB memory sticks must be taxed proportionally to their the space of storage they offer. Of course this is already silly and was created at the time where CDs were the most common movable storage devices. In order for it to not look too silly, it was made so that the tax would not target computers, as a 100 GB HD would make the tax ridiculously high. Then it was extended to devices that could be plugged to computers and provide storages. It sound sensible when applied to MP3 players, like the iPod, as their main use is actually to listen to music. Then came some devices with very high storage space, the design of a computer but the possibility to be seen as a USB storage.

This law was silly to begin with but now that it is a bit too blinding they will change it. Bah, it will have lasted a few years already and netted the music labels several millions.

Windows for tablets -- NT-derived, or CE derived?

[whoever57]

MS is going to announce an OS for ARM-based tablets, Lots of people have assumed that it will be a derivative of the desktop OSes. However, it seems more likely that it would be a derivative of WIndows CE (like Windows Phone 7). Until more details come out, we won't really know.

If it is CE, why should MS be treated differently from other OSes?

iOS is not Mac OS X

[perpenso]

What is Apple's iPad OS?

That should matter here.

iOS, formerly iPhone OS, is the operating system for iPad. It is related but different and distinct from Mac OS X. The French could make a similar exception for Mac OS X as they have for Windows 7 and iOS and Windows CE would still be taxed.

Re:iOS is not Mac OS X

[drinkypoo]

iOS is provably OSX with some API stuff dropped and some tacked on.

Re:iOS is not Mac OS X

[TheRaven64]

Kind of. It's the same XNU kernel as desktop OS X, running more or less the same userland, including the window server. On top of this are the same CoreFoundation (C) and Foundation (Objective-C) APIs for userspace programmers. Just like desktop OS X, your communication with the window server is via the CoreGraphics / Quartz framework and related frameworks like CoreAnimation. iOS uses the same Objective-C runtime as desktop OS X, but does not support garbage collection. It omits a number of legacy APIs, such as the Carbon[1] frameworks for porting old MacOS Classic apps (and the Classic layer for emulating MacOS 9). Instead of the NeXT-inherited AppKit framework for interacting with the GUI and related services, it provides UIKit, which is largely a slimmed-down version of AppKit. Quite a few classes in UIKit are directly equivalent to AppKit ones, just with s/NS/UI in the source, although others (such as the ones dealing with multitouch) are new in UIKit and some (like NSTextStorage / NSTextView) have no direct equivalent in UIKit (you use the lower-level CoreText framework if you need nontrivial text layout in iOS).

So, basically, it's the same OS with the legacy stuff ripped out, anything that won't work in a small memory footprint ripped out, and a new UI toolkit. It's far less different to desktop OS X than Ubuntu is to Android.

[1] Apple is a bit confused about what exactly Carbon is. Some versions of the documentation call all Apple C APIs (including CoreGraphics and CoreFoundation) Carbon, while the newer ones only use Carbon to refer to the Mac Toolbox based APIs.

Re:iOS is not Mac OS X

[perpenso]

iOS, formerly iPhone OS, is the operating system for iPad. It is related but different and distinct from Mac OS X ...

iOS is provably OSX with some API stuff dropped and some tacked on.

and some stuff changed and not entirely compatible anymore.

Just curious but how is all this different from "related but different and distinct from"? I'm not sure where we are disagreeing.

Re:iOS is not Mac OS X

[dgatwood]

Apple is a bit confused about what exactly Carbon is.

Sadly, this is almost inevitable when you have something that is both a marketing term that dates back to the Mac OS 8/Copland era and a technical term for a specific framework in Mac OS X. In effect, the terminology has morphed to more accurately reflect the structure of the underlying OS.

The classic Mac OS definition for Carbon was much broader because it referred to the entire set of APIs that were expected to be compatible with Copland whenever it eventually came out (which it never did) and subsequently Rhapsody (which morphed into Mac OS X). Those APIs were in something called CarbonLib.

The modern Mac OS X definition refers to a specific framework that contains only a fraction of what was originally in CarbonLib. The other bits of former Carbon API (the ones that were not deprecated en masse) are now in the CoreServices framework, and should no longer be described as "Carbon". If you see places where those APIs are still called "Carbon", feel free to file a bug through Bug Reporter.

To add somewhat to the confusion, Carbon is sometimes used (incorrectly) to describe all the deprecated C APIs in all frameworks (or worse, all the C APIs including the fully supported APIs). Again, if you see such terminology abuse in any Apple documentation, you should file a bug through Bug Reporter.

if i were taxed

[overcaffein8d]

all this tax would tell me is that it's A-OK to pirate as much music as I want, as long as i put it onto the taxed media.

Re:if i were taxed

[Pence128]

That's how it works in Canada.

That "tax" in the US would encourage piracy.

[TavisJohn]

If I purchase blank CD's, DVD's or hard drives and I got charged a "Piracy Tax", I would consider that my payment to copyright holders and I would pirate all I wanted.

They have no way to prove what I will be using the media for. If I am doing business backups than copyright holders are getting money from me for not pirating anything.

However there is one, and only one way that I would happily accept such a tax... Is if in adding this tax, copyright holders could no longer file lawsuits against anyone for copyright violations. That their ONLY course of action would be to fill out forms and submit them to the federal government to get some of that "Piracy Tax" money.

Re:That "tax" in the US would encourage piracy.

[mijelh]

In my county (Spain) it's even more draconian, because you have to pay the "Privacy Tax" even if file sharing has always been legal.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[interval1066]

"And what the hell does a "clean operating system" mean?"

Linux doesn't qualify as a "clean operating system"? In whose twisted world? (Besides the French?) In any case, perhaps they felt that Microsoft's own tax on OEM systems (in which the "privilege" of selling a system pre-bundled and non-opt outable Windows install cost is born by the consumer, thanks Bill) was tax enough?

Re:Apple Tax

[MickyTheIdiot]

First they came for the iPods, and I did not speak out --
Because I didn't own a crummy iPod

Then they came for the Android phones, and I did not speak out --
Because I don't like Google and I don't have a smart phone

Then they came for the flash drives, and I did not speak out --
Because I still use CD-Rs, so screw it

Then they came for all non-Windows devices -- and Bill Gates just laughed his ass off.

Stupid

[gilesjuk]

Everyone knows it is much easier to pirate music and films on a real computer compared to a tablet.

If anything the tax should be the other way around.

This is important...

[benjamindees]

This is one of the most important things for supporters of Free Software to understand: businesses are subsidized by the tax code. All businesses, even the terrible ones. Especially the terrible ones.

It doesn't matter which country you're talking about. The economies of nearly every Western government are equally hosed up in the same ridiculous way. Tax agencies assume that everything an individual purchases is consumed, and that everything a corporation purchases is an investment. As far as taxing authorities are concerned, a Windows computer is an investment. It is capital. It fits the obsolete model of production that governments know: labor + capital == profit. When you buy anything as a business, you write it off your taxes and pat yourself on the back.

A non-corporate, non-business operating system, on the other hand, is a toy. It's a distraction, a hobby. Governments consider it not to be an investment, but a consumer item. Same goes for an Android phone. It's assumed to depreciate in value. A Windows phone, though, is for business. It's assumed to produce value. Nevermind the fact that most Windows phones are unproductive toys, or that most Windows computers are inefficient cludges. Nevermind the fact that free and open source software can be orders of magnitude more efficient and productive than proprietary, closed source software. Windows is a capital investment. Free software is a toy.

The result should be obvious. Responsible, non-consumer individuals are punished. Wasteful, non-producing companies are subsidized. Long term investments in things like open standards are discouraged. Short term speculation is encouraged.

It really is as simple as that. Governments don't consider it further. The idea of a Windows computer running a nuclear power plant, therefore, seems perfectly natural. Debian? A toy. Red Hat? One of the most expensive operating systems ever. They are 99% the exact same code. One is a tax write-off produced by a legitimate company. The other is a toy produced by a bunch of hobbyists. In the US, we see all of these crap small businesses that can no longer afford their rent. Corporate real estate is about to take a dump all over itself. Banks are over leveraged, and it turns out they own no real assets. They were subsidized. They bought a bunch of consumable junk like Windows computers, shoddy houses and uninsulated office buildings, wrote it off as a brilliant investment, and waited for the profit to roll in. Unfortunately, everyone else did the same, all the real assets went overseas, and now the US economy is utter crap.

Re:This is important...

[InterStellaArtois]

I just bought a Sony eReader which qualifies for a tax rebate. I just have to figure out the '???' step, and then I profit.

Re:This is important...

[Hatta]

Sounds like it's time for the French to dust off the Guillotine.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[WaroDaBeast]

In this context "propre" means "of it's own". I was about to point that out, but it seems you beat me to it. ;-)

To everyone else: never forget that translators are never flawless, humans and non-humans alike.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[dunng808]

The rationale is that computers make illegal copies on CDs and USB sticks so CDs and USB memory sticks must be taxed proportionally to their the space of storage they offer.

[snip]

I thought this was too devious for Microsoft to dream up on their own. But is it possible for the French government (or any government) to be more devious than Microsoft? Reminds me of a visit to the optometrist: which is better, #1, or #2?

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Creepy]

Probably because Windows tablets will probably include heavy handed DRM out of the box and the French think that will keep people from sharing... um, er stealing.

Re:here we go again

[Malenfrant]

If it wasn't for your bad-tempered reply to yourself, I would probably have moderated you up. I rarely use my moderator points for any other purpose than correcting troll/flamebait moderations I consider unfair. But you shot yourself in the foot instead. Maybe a bit more patience would serve you well. Also gratuitous shouty swearing doesn't help.

Windows under emulation?

[currently_awake]

So what you are saying is if a company (ie arm) makes the effort to run windows (version 3 looks possible) on their hardware through software emulation then they don't have to pay this tax? Companies are rather good at finding loopholes in laws, where doing so means big money. I would think if someone offered a bounty for this, that you'd get it.

Re:Balmer must have sucked

[shking]

Well "le Coq Gaulois" is symbolically important after all...

April Fools already? (maybe France is Fools)

[Nyder]

A tablet running Windows is actually a computer?

Really?

Windows is what makes a computer, huh?

You go France, no wonder we make fun of you these days.

Re:here we go again

[jedidiah]

Sure. I am not free to install Flash on it myself, therefore it's just a consumer electronics toy.

It's a souped up Walkman. The fact that it could be so much more really doesn't matter so much.

Do Tivo owners get their panties in a bunch about this like Apple fanboys do?

Stupid, stupid, stupid!

[kheldan]

Why not add a tax to all paper products and writing implements while you're at it? After all someone might COPY something from a book, newspaper or magazine, and OH NO we can't have that now can we? After all, if an MP3 file, which uses lossy compression and is therefore an inferior, degraded copy of sounds is an illegal copy for which you get the living fuck sued out of you, then something you write down on a piece of paper that someone else copyrighted is also a degraded but still illegal copy, right? Why not put a tax on the HUMAN BRAIN because it's got memory, too, and we can REMEMBER what a song sounds like, even though those memories degrade over time? Shouldn't they get some money for that, too? Hey, here's an idea: let's tax the air we breathe, because sound waves carry, and someone who didn't PAY for the content might actually hear it with their ears, connected to their brains, and they'd remember what it sounds like, therefore that's an illegal copy, too, isn't it? Quick! Someone copyright the MOON, backdated 10,000 years, and make every living person on the planet who has ever looked up into the night sky pay a fee because they looked at The Moon © 2010 MPAA!
There's only one real solution: we need to have technology that completely wipes people's memories of everything copyrighted they ever hear or see. It's the only way!

It has existed in the US for almost two decades

[DragonWriter]

If I purchase blank CD's, DVD's or hard drives and I got charged a "Piracy Tax", I would consider that my payment to copyright holders and I would pirate all I wanted.

The U.S. has such a levy/tax on blank audio recording media, adopted as part of the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992.

iOS for Wii

[tepples]

IOS is actually what runs on Cisco Routers

I thought IOS was what ran on the CPU in the Wii console's northbridge.

Unix tablets

[tepples]

my server is Unix (does not apply), my netbook is Windows (does not apply), and I have no use for a tablet.

Until the netbook and tablet sectors merge and someone tries selling (GNU's Not) Unix tablets. Oh wait, this has already started to happen. Then once your netbook breaks, the successor to your netbook might be a tablet.

MOD PARENT DOWN

[LordLucless]

Please. He's complaining that they fail because Google translations of their language don't make sense to him?

Dia de los inocentes in spanish world, today

[Kyusaku Natsume]

Most spanish language newspapers publish this day news in the same vein that is April Fools, but in this case, is just Sarkozy's usual stupidity.

Makes sense

[lahvak]

From what I have heard about Windows 7 on a tablet, these people are unfortunate enough to have to run Windows on their tablet. Surely you wouldn't want to make them even more miserable by making them pay a tax on it. I am glad that French lawmakers show some compassion with the unfortunate victims.

It's a mystery to me

[NormAtHome]

Aside from the obvious that as someone else stated these laws assume that anyone buying these products is guilty or that the innocent must help pay for all those evil copyright infringers there's a couple things that I've never understood. If governments are collecting this tax money, who or what organization are they turning it over to that decides what artists get reimbursed and by how much for the illegal copying of their works? Do artists / studios have to file paperwork stating that their works were illegally copied and ask for a specific amount of monetary reimbursement?

As has been covered extensively here, studios claim outrageous damages from file sharing and one trial awarded damages against Jammie Thomas in the amount of $9,250 per infringed work so are studios trying to recoup that money from the fund and do the artists in question actually ever see any of that money? Also does the government get to keep a share of the money collected for the work of collecting it and disbursing it?

It just all seems highly suspicious to me.

Can someone explain how to pirate with my iPod?

[macslut]

So, the tax is also on iPods, even the nano, Shuffle and classic. Can someone explain how you use one of those devices to pirate music? I know how to do it on any Windows PC, but last time I checked there was no Kazaa, LimeWire, Bittorrent or for that matter any 3rd party apps whatsoever on those iPods.

Re:Can someone explain how to pirate with my iPod?

[ratboy666]

Copyright

Do you imagine that you have the right to copy a song from a CD to an iPod? In some jurisdictions, you do; in others, you don't.
Indeed, in MAI v. Peak, the Ninth Circuit Court found that copying Software into RAM infringed Copyright. Which was not the intent of the law (US); so changes were made allowing for this, and archival copies. If it were not for those changes (remember they are quite recent, MAI v. Peak was decided in 1993), it would be a Copyright violation to transfer a CD to an iPod in the US as well. But I don't know the law in France (and my French is not good enough to do French legal research).

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Yvanhoe]

Actually France is showing the finest mix of incompetence and corruption in the latest internet/copyright laws.

Wrong reason

[PPH]

Windows won't be taxed because they figure you've suffered enough already.

"Clean" translation

[DavMz]

French: "ou un systeme d'exploitation propre"

Correct translation: "or an OS of their own" - understand: an OS that has been made specifically for the device.

I guess google translate is not subtle enough yet to discriminate the different meanings of "propre" in french.

Uh oh...

[RavenousBlack]

Sucks for TENQ's new Ubuntu powered tablet.

Re:Uh oh...

[someoneOtherThanMe]

Why? If it runs Ubuntu then it is a computer as well.

Fail

[Darkwood]

This news should be posted on FailBlog.

Product development

[amightywind]

Governments should resist becoming developers of commercial products. Collecting taxes is a better business anayway.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[Gadget_Guy]

Probably because Windows tablets will probably include heavy handed DRM out of the box and the French think that will keep people from sharing... um, er stealing.

You seriously want to use that argument when it is being compared to the likes of iOS? Sheesh!

This could turn out to be a good thing...

[Requiem18th]

If you define Mobile OS tables as devices because they aren't running a general purpose OS, remind these people that a rooted tablet does is a general purpose computer. Meaning Androids and iPads could be tax-except if they surrender their root password to their user. That could turn out to be a good thing.

Alas, it could, it won't.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[dbIII]

And what the hell does a "clean operating system" mean?

No grep, touch, strip, finger, mount or fsck.
That's why Apple's OS is X rated.

Re:...but who still uses that media?

[hudsucker]

The U.S. has such a levy/tax on blank audio recording media, adopted as part of the Audio Home Recording Act of 1992.

The U.S. has such a levy/tax on blank digital audio recording media -- but today it essentially only apples to CD-R Audio discs, not ordinary CD-R discs. CD-R Audio discs would be used in consumer electronics audio recorders, which by law will reject recording on "computer" CD-R discs.

Re:Apple Tax

[Crudely_Indecent]

In the spirit of your comment, how does that apply to all the other *nixes out there? Servers, non X-Box consoles, modern smartphones....

Re:Apple Tax

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

In the spirit of your comment, how does that apply to all the other *nixes out there? Servers, non X-Box consoles, modern smartphones....

I'll be obnoxious and answer your question with a question: Why does it even apply to tablets? The rationale isn't strong, so it's not like *nixes are safe from a tax in the future.

So what they're saying is ....

[PPH]

.... Microsoft has failed yet again to produce a 'mobile OS'.

niead

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those cheese eating surrender monkeys failed

[unity100]

again, because they had the naivete to elect a right wing government. right wing governments are always pro-corporation, anti-people in any given country.

Pretty simple

[TheDarkMaster]

It is interesting to analyze what is implied in the article. As example, shows that if Windows 7 is considered an operating system "clean" by the music industry, then that means he has the mechanisms to prevent copying "unauthorized" content and/or prevent the user from doing anything the industry does not want, while others have no such restrictions.

One more reason for me not to install Windows 7.

Whats wrong with "The dishes need washing"?

[Viol8]

Or is that just too simple for these "dialects"?

Re:Apple Tax

[GameboyRMH]

You know "iPod XL" sounds a lot more reasonable than "iPhone that can't fit in your pocket, make cell calls or take pictures."

Re:here we go again

[GameboyRMH]

The system works!

Re:Apple Tax

[that IT girl]

They do. It's called sales tax, and the neat thing about it is that it applies not only to Apple products, but to everyone equally. Cool, huh?

I mean, what the hell? I don't even have any Apple products aside from my old iPod, but your logic ("hurrrrr let's tax people who prefer a particular brand more than others!") is ridiculous.

So we have paid to copy - let's copy!

[bradley13]

Just to point out the logical inconsistencies of these fees:

• They go against the fundamental concept of "innocent until proven guilty".
• Since we pay the fees, we have paid for copies - therefore we should be entitle to make copies. This is, by the way, true in some European countries.

Re:Those cheese eating surrender monkeys fail agai

[tompaulco]

Wouldn't it be illegal to tax someone for "personal copying" considering that you are allowed by law to make a personal copy?
If you don't make a copy of anything onto your memory stick, where do you go to apply for your refund of the tax?

Linux doesn't support HADOPI spyware

[cpghost]

Linux doesn't qualify as a "clean operating system"?

Maybe, to the French legislators, the only clean operating systems are the one that are certified compatible with the HADOPI-mandated spyware. Just thinking...

Re:here we go again

[dwightk]

yeah, I read your previous posts.

Slashdot, we are truly losing one of the great wordsmiths of our times. Something should be done to correct this.