$5 Piracy Tax Could Be Tip of The Iceberg
Posted on 14 March 2008, at 5:19 am, by Wayne Schulz
If the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the music industry get their way you’ll soon see a $5 per user per month tax on your broadband connection bill. Their argument is the fee covers out of control file sharing and pirating of music. How long before movie, software, retail, gossip and real estate industries want their own monthly $5 fee? Hasn’t the Internet changed everybody’s business model? Wired Magazine has a great article summarizing this. Does this seem reasonable to you? I’m missing how this is JUST a music industry problem. Music is the most visible but there’s seemingly no limit to the taxes that could be collected to offset industries damaged (newspaper industry anyone?) by the “new” business model of the Internet.
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12 Comments For This Post
March 14th, 2008 at 6:30 am
Wouldn’t this make people turn things around and say “Hey, so now I pay $5 a month because I download music, so I guess it’s OK now. That means unlimited music for $5 a month!”
I know this is not the point brought forward in the post, but it did come to my mind.
March 14th, 2008 at 7:11 am
@ spmwinkel
My thoughts exactly. I keep pounding into my kids’ heads that programs like kazaa and limewire are the same as stealing, and won’t allow it on our machines. If they start charging us anyway, just because they assume we are doing it, then aren’t they sort of giving permission? That’s the only reason I can think of for the EFF to be be pushing this.
March 14th, 2008 at 7:43 am
OK, I just read the Wired article and that is exactly what they are proposing. I agree with Wayne; where does this end? And what about sites, like the iTunes store, where you pay for music? Are we supposed to pay for it twice?
March 14th, 2008 at 9:40 am
This is a terrible idea. So, they are charging everyone for piracy ‘just in case’. That is completely unfair. Find the people response for the piracy, and fine them.
I would agree that if you are charged this ‘tax’, more people might try and go pirate music since they are paying for it anyway. I pay enough taxes, let the music industry actually put in some effort to fix what is wrong instead of just punishing everyone.
March 14th, 2008 at 10:42 am
Are they going to start sending me $5 iTunes giftcards every month then? This is like the old habit that I used to hate in school–one kid misbehaves, so punish the whole class. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
March 14th, 2008 at 10:46 am
I keep thinking about this, it’s just so ridiculous. As if we say “Well everyone has to go to prison for 6 months, just to pay in advance for all the crimes that are committed.
March 14th, 2008 at 11:59 am
Nothing like a little corporal punishment to keep the good children cowed and piss the bad children off even more…
March 14th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
This just makes me want to stay further and further away from the music industry. No concerts, no CDs.
With actions like this, no wonder they are losing money.
March 15th, 2008 at 8:11 am
Well, for legit users, now we pay for something we don’t do? That’s $60 a year…the cost of at least 3 games to 6 games in the bargain bin…or how many songs….$60? Or 5 CDs?
Or a week’s groceries, or a whole day of wages (hourly + commission)?!
If they apply that tax, civil disobedience comes to mind.
So, now that I WILL be paying….does that give me the right to download as well, I AM now paying…regardless I am the consumer, the customer, and if I’m paying that would make things legal right?
Let’s see, if we continue this train of thought…who would get the money? If everyone won the lottery, then it would be very little each person would get. So now, if that happens how would they devy up the loot that they have taken from us? Instead of rewarding artists or programmers for creativity, we’ve certainly took a giant leap to communism.
Go figure, I’ll need to write my congressman…
March 15th, 2008 at 6:19 pm
Just because they want to do it does not mean it will happen.
March 15th, 2008 at 11:31 pm
LOL Movie production companies are posting the biggest profits on record.. and they want more.
March 15th, 2008 at 11:41 pm
My opinion:
If they get away with this, I’m moving to Russia. Honestly, if Congress lets them get away with this (in other words, if they can manage to bribe enough congressmen), I’d be ashamed to live here. Honestly, the music industry is quite possibly the best example of why Capitalism is one of the worst economic systems. There are so many ways this is wrong that I cannot begin to name them all.
Honestly, putting this surcharge on your broadband bill is like saying “oh hey you can pirate stuff now!” and then when you get caught they tell you, “oh by the way, it’s still illegal, and you still need to pay us to make up for it.”
Either way, isn’t it illegal for the government to collect taxes for a private body?