Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000% • Hacker News Board

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#81

Post by freehunter » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 1:29 PM UTC

nickik wrote: post #74

mtts wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the great thing is that your country, being entirely surrounded by EU countries, has no choice but to implement all those "stupid regulations" as well as it won't be able to do business with its neighbours otherwise.

Not sure why this is a great thing. Yes it has to do that to some regard but it can not be forced to and we still hold democratic control over the most importend of these things. Joining the EU would be spitting on the democratic system that Switzerland has built up over the last 200+ years.

"Great thing" is sarcasm.

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#82

Post by sp332 » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 1:35 PM UTC

foob wrote: post #28

We have similar 3% in the US on blank media cds ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Private_copying_levy#United_Sta... ). The Audio Home Recording Act of 1992, the same legislation that put these levies into place, also protected the rights of individuals to make non-commercial copies of copyrighted works. At least that's my read on it, though I am not a lawyer. All of the comments here seem vehemently opposed to the levy…

That only makes sense if the tax money goes to the artists, to offset the income they lose from selling copies.

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#83

Post by Xylakant » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 1:47 PM UTC

mironathetin wrote: post #79

Xylakant wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're confusing GEMA and GEZ. The GEMA is not related to public TV and is (practically) only concerned with music. The GEZ-issue is a completely separate topic. It's about whether we want an independent, not private or state-controlled broadcasting organization. The GEZ-Gebühr is like a special tax to pay for that. There's quite a bit wrong there as well, but alas, that's a different discussion.

I am not confusing the two. The issue is the same: static payment in the form of a tax/obligatory fee, without providing a service. You pay a tax for empty CDs, because you COULD copy music onto them. You pay a fee for public broadcasting, because you COULD use it. The companies are different, but the idea and the mindset is the same. Collecting money, even if a service is not used.

No, we pay for public broadcasting because there once was a consensus that public broadcasting is an important thing to have in a democratic society, not because we might listen to it. We also pay for operas, museums, street maintenance, public transportation and another ton of things we may actually never use and might not have a need for. This is a completely different issue and folding them together will not help.

If you disagree on the notion that a public broadcasting organization is required, you're free to lobby for it. Up to now, the democratic consensus in germany is that we're glad to have one, and so we pay for it. I agree that the current way things are organized is royally fucked up, but that's a secondary issue.

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#84

Post by mxfh » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 1:49 PM UTC

mxfh wrote: post #77

It's 1850%[1] but still outlandish, also they are taxing external hard drives yet not internal ones, it's a farce in every way possible. Just wait until they figure out what dropbox is. [1] http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=en&tl...

Fun fact: One of the shareholders of the ZPÜ is the GÜFA [1] (Collective rights management for Adult Entertainment).

Of every ZPÜ taxed media you buy 1% [2] of the video associated part of the ZPÜ-fee goes to the porn industry. This summed up to 1.9M EUR in 2005 and 4M in 2010 including some cumulative special payouts, but its safe to say that the GÜFA gets at least a million Euros a year out of that. [3] [4]

I'm O.K. with people buying porn, but that everybody subsidizes this by buying storage media has just another quality.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%9CFA

[2] http://www.heise.de/tp/artikel/7/7586/1.html [GERMAN]

[3] http://dipbt.bundestag.de/dip21/btd/16/049/1604914.pdf [PDF GERMAN Page 16]

[4] https://www.bundesanzeiger.de/ebanzwww/wexsservlet?global_da... [GERMAN - Session protected - ZPÜ numbers under 4.1]

click on «Jahresabschluss zum Geschäftsjahr vom 01.01.2010 bis zum 31.12.2010» and solve the captcha, remember that the Bundesanzeiger is a by-law-open official publication in Germany, its a farce.

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#85

Post by Xylakant » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 2:06 PM UTC

hef19898 wrote: post #78

Xylakant wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's simple to answer why they are able to pull this off: There's a law for that, a law that dates back to the introduction of tape drives. Back then, there were two options: 1. Allow copying for private purposes, introduce a flat fee on empty media (tapes back then, later cassettes, cd-roms, ...) 2. Ban all private copying, prosecute it at all costs. Ban tape drives, control all technology that can be used for priva…

That was back in what, the 50s and 60s? I completly agree that the system worked back then. But in the 21st century well you can't adopt to new times by charging more from everyone you can. By doing simply that, you will pervert the very idea behind the system. It seems, at least to me, that the systems somehow developed a life by itself. And since that life currently fits into a lot of agendas, nobody will do someth…

I agree with you that the system does not fit with current times. It's fundamentally incapable of dealing with such basic things as the fact that copying is now digital and lossless, filesharing or the internet as a whole. But still, it's the system we currently have and since we all agreed to some rules we should stick to the rules while we try and find a consensus what the new rules should look like. And part of those rules is that there is a levy on empty media, as much as we both might hate it.

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#86

Post by dmatthewson » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 2:18 PM UTC

ARGGGGGGGG. As someone who doesn't pirate, I really resent having to pay money to media companies just because they feel entitled to it.

I remember years ago there was a tax on cassette tapes, so every tape we made and of our own band we had to pay Michael Jackson and Madonna for the privilege. Completely absurd and infuriating.

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#87

Post by dalore » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 2:19 PM UTC

rplnt wrote: post #56

dalore wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I lived in a country where the "pirate" levy was in place I would feel justified in copyright infringement because I would feel I have already paid for it.

What country you do live in? I'm just curious where this doesn't exist. In Slovakia (and also Czech Rep.) you have to pay for empty hard drives, DVDs, ... But pirating movies/music isn't illegal so I guess it evens out?

I live in the UK.

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#88

Post by lvh » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 2:25 PM UTC

macspoofing wrote: post #71

rplnt wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What country you do live in? I'm just curious where this doesn't exist. In Slovakia (and also Czech Rep.) you have to pay for empty hard drives, DVDs, ... But pirating movies/music isn't illegal so I guess it evens out?

>But pirating movies/music isn't illegal so I guess it evens out? I don't live in Slovakia or the Czech Republic but I'm just going to go ahead and say you're wrong.

In many countries, downloading (which I assume GP means by "pirating") is fine, redistribution is not. Example: the Netherlands, where the govt. has recently affirmed that not only is it legal, it will remain so: https://torrentfreak.com/dutch-parliament-downloading-movies...

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#89

Post by tomkin » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 2:30 PM UTC

Problem I have with this is that it is incredibly short-sighted. So we know, indefinitely, that our songs, movies and other media will exist on USB/CD/DVD discs, right? Wrong. What about when we all start using anonymous, p2p cloud storage? What about streaming pirated content to my iPhone from my Mac at home? Or any of the countless other innovations that may pop up in the future?

Re: Germany Increases 'You Are All Pirates' Tax On Solid State Media By 2000%

#90

Post by dmatthewson » Wed, Jun 06, 2012, 2:37 PM UTC

Xylakant wrote: post #43

LinXitoW wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To clarify your first point: They've justified this by saying that compression algorithms have gotten better meaning people can store more on less, which is idiotic, seeing how files get a lot bigger because of higher quality. Their explanations are based on a study that isn't even available to the public. The tax is also levied on SD cards, which afaik no one ever uses for anything else than as a storage for media y…

I actually use SD-cards for audio files. They're small, sturdy, convenient, every modern macbook has a suitable slot and lots of car audio systems accept them. They're kind of like a usb-stick without the clunky connector and wrapping.

OK, but most people use them for their cameras, I never even heard of anyone using them on car systems, but I'll accept it is true.

Given this, why should the 99% that are taking their own photos pay a tax to support a record label organization that one of the posts above from a German says doesn't even pay out to the musicians?