French Government May Subsidize Music Downloads 187
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."
I guess that means (Score:4, Interesting)
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.
Fraud (Score:5, Interesting)
How many cards can I get and can I buy my own music with it from my own 'label'?
Which music store ? (Score:3, Interesting)
25€ to be spent in WHICH music store ? iTunes, Amazon, Napster ?
Truly amazing (Score:5, Interesting)
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.
State aid? (Score:5, Interesting)
There is more music than you can listen to (Score:3, Interesting)
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.
And what does this say to those 12-25 (Score:2, Interesting)
'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
Wow... (Score:4, Interesting)
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'
Re:I guess that means (Score:3, Interesting)
The French government is subsidizing entertainment for a select part of the population, and THIS is your concern?
If there's any European people reading... (Score:3, Interesting)
Vote Pirate Party in the next elections. It's the only sane thing to do.
Why the middlemen? (Score:3, Interesting)
Cut out the middlemen and give it directly to recording industry lobbyists.
Re:I guess that means (Score:2, Interesting)
When you consider that the "Health Care Industry" also includes the Health Insurance companies, yea. I do blame the Health Care Industry for charging too much too.
Among other problems in the industry...
Re:Glad this is France (Score:3, Interesting)
I can't see this providing any social or cultural value: most of the music people are going to be downloading is probably going to be readily available. This is why it is a waste. A better use of the money would be to invest it into music education programs where people actually LEARN how to play and make music.
I am not against government spending, so long as there is real measurable value in that spending.
Re:I guess that means (Score:4, Interesting)
Hey, let's give people a government-enforced ownership and monopoly over a thing, and then subsidize purchases of it.
If you want to let people download for free, weaken copyright somehow, you idiots. Demand that to have a copyright, you have to give the government X free copies of it or something, and the government can give those out.
This is just stupid.
Re:I guess that means (Score:3, Interesting)
If I was a teenager, I would have bought as many €25 cards I could afford and sold them on ebay for €( 25+x% profit ) to adults wanting to save on their purchases. This scheme is doomed to fail quick.
Re:I guess that means (Score:3, Interesting)
...and as a grown up, I will be selling music in France-- "Buy my song for €50 and get €25 cash-back!"
Re:I guess that means (Score:3, Interesting)
The $1 iphone apps proves this really well in real life. There are literally many millionaires made because nobody hesitates to pay $1
Re:I guess that means (Score:3, Interesting)
Arguably, yes. And now we have the choice of buying the one song that's worth a damn for a buck, rather than $10-15 for a single song we like and 8-10 others that are pure crap.
So now, you can buy the individual song you like for 99 cents - even my *favorite* albums, I'd be hard pressed to say I love "every song on this album," so why focus on trying to help the record companies continue selling albums?
Re:There is more music than you can listen to (Score:3, Interesting)
Its valid except...
High quality entertainment has completely saturated me. There is now more high quality entertainment than I can consume.
Which means high quality entertainment is now a commodity to me. And I suspect I'm not the only one.
Re:I guess that means (Score:2, Interesting)
No need for an increase, prices here are already through the roof.
The "major" French online retailer (at least the one that's heavily pushing for all those shenanigans) is "Fnac Music", their normal pricing is 10 euros for an album and 1.3 euros for a single (recent) song.
When you factor in the fact that one euro is 1.41 dollars you get 14.1 dollars for an album and *1.83* dollars for a song.
So they had their 50% increase even before opening !
And they still wonder why no one's buying their crap...it has to be teh 3vil pir4tes