Canada May Tax Legal Music Downloads

FuriousBalancing writes "MacNN is reporting that Canadians may soon pay a small tax on every legal music store download. This fee is the work of a measure proposed by the Copyright Board of Canada. About two cents would be added to every song downloaded, with 1.5 cents being added to album downloads. Streaming services and subscriptions would also be taxed, to the tune of about 6% of the monthly fee. Most interesting - the tax would be retroactively applied to every transaction processed since 1996. 'The surcharge would help compensate artists for piracy, according to SOCAN's reasoning. The publishing group draws similarities between this and a 21-cent fee already applied to blank CDs in the country; the right to copy a song from an online store demands the same sort of levy applied to copying a retail CD, SOCAN argues. The tax may have a significant impact for online stores such as iTunes and Canada-based Puretracks, which will have to factor the amount both into future and past sales.' The full text of the measure is available in PDF format."

Re:WTF?

[monkaru]

In theory there is no reason to DRM music in the Canadian market as copying is legal when a levy is paid on media and downloaded music from on-line stores would also be legal to copy hence the tax. It's a case of a much larger country having Draconian copyright laws while a smaller neighbour goes at the issue in an entirely different way. Obviously, American labels aren't about to make an easy to copy version for the Canadian market.

Re:Has anyone followed up?

[monkaru]

Interestingly, the CRIA has refused to collect the money. So, there are billions in artists money sitting uncollected.

Re:Ex Post Facto Laws

[monkaru]

Yes, you are right. It's the same in Canada as the States. Your Constitution probits that sort of thing and our Charter of Rights and Freedoms does the same. They will have to rethink that part of it because it would be a slam dunk for the retailers in court.

It is NOT piracy in Canada!

[John Jamieson]

I have mod points I would love to use, but I have no chance because no one is correcting the Myth of Piracy.

In Canada it is NOT piracy to copy a song for personal use. It is not stealing, it is not copyright infrigement. It is a right granted by law, a law that was encouraged by the music industry back in the Audio Cassette days. Yes, they now regret it... too bad!

Re:A tax on not committing piracy

[diamondmagic]

Treatment of a smoker is even more expensive then the longer life of the average non-smoker, and there are plenty of sources to back it up. Google pulled up these articles:
http://www.cdc.gov/MMWR/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5114a2.htm [cdc.gov]
http://www.bera.com/smoking.htm [bera.com]

Re:Ex Post Facto Laws

[russotto]

Retroactive taxes are legal in the United States (most recently decided with a retroactive income tax increase during the Clinton administration). The Ex Post Facto law provision hasn't applied to taxes since Calder v. Bull in the 18th centry, and since the Gun Control Act of 1968 and the various "Megan's laws" it really doesn't apply to much anymore. Probably the final nail was Kansas v Hendricks, the decision to allow those who had finished serving their sentences for certain crimes to be indefinitely confined to a mental institution.

The US Constitution: It's just a goddamn piece of paper.

Re:Ex Post Facto Laws

[Anonymous Coward]

But of course, it's Canada, and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms only affects criminal retrospective laws (and section 33 can be used to obtain a 5 year mulligan if it is). BUT I AM NOT A LAWYER, so maybe I'm wrong (but I may be right).

In Canada, the government cannot increase taxes after the fact. They have tried in the past, and been slapped down by the courts.

Instead, they just increase taxes from this day going forward.

Re:It is NOT piracy in Canada!

[ceoyoyo]

Actually they've been demanding that the copyright law be changed to prohibit copying. They were even willing to scale back the levy to get it, but the copyright board still told them where to go. So now they're trying the next best thing -- more levies!

Why a *TAX*?

[pla]

For blank recordable media, the CRIA has no ability to affect pricing directly, thus the tax on them.

For legally purchased music, the CRIA defines the price, via their contracts with individual distribution channels.

Thus, if they see the need for an extra $0.02, they could just, y'know, raise prices by that much per download. No need to go through the government and needlessly complicate the issue.



So, why phrase this as a tax?

Scarily obvious answer: This has more to do with Radiohead than with piracy. Piracy scares the music industry, but not nearly as much as artists like Radiohead, Issa (née Jane Siberry), and NIN finally figuring out a viable way to escape the industry's evil clutches.

...Or should I say "almost escape", since the CRIA has evidently returned fire.