Private Copy Levies technically make piracy legal.  Now do you want them?

Oh yeah, and the money is paid out to the highest earners first and foremost (lining the pockets of McCartney & Bono before any underpaid musicians).  Still want them?!

I have to ditto what "realist" said..

Canada implemented EXACTLY what is talked about in this article..

At first it made sense, (and seemed to be a fair solution) but pretty quickly technology made it antiquated and somewhat silly..

EG: charging a levy for "audio recording CDRs" but not for "data CDRs".. WTF? by the time they corrected that stupidity people had already moved on to SD cards and built in memory, etc etc.. (I have more examples but I wont bore you)

basically.. the law makers CAN NOT keep up with the changes.. and it ends up creating more problems then it solves..

in the digital age we CAN NOT monetize the physical medium.. The sooner the music industry realizes that the CD is dying (and any variants of it), the sooner we can hopefully find a real solution..

simple solution, add $4 a month to every internet bill, send it straight to their respective countries artist royalties agency. too easy.

$4 is not enough.. Just add $40/mo to every Internet bill, start a collection society for ALL content (not just music) and totally legalize filesharing.

there's 240 000 000 internet users in the states alone, at $4 a month, $11520000000/year, plenty once you add all other counties

totally agree with you though

Simple solution to you, perhaps. But a terrible idea. The internet is simply a communications network made up of millions of routers, switches, servers, miles of copper, miles of glass, etc. Taxing people to use the internet and giving it to copyright holders, because someone may use it for piracy would be like taxing people to drive on roads and giving the money to victims of property theft, because someone may use them to get away after they rob a house. It doesn't make any sense.

merely a small fee that compensates, open to hear a better idea though

But you have absolutely no right to be compensated for someone simply subscribing to an ISP connection. As I have said, the internet is just another network. In truth it functions similarly to the road network we have built in this country. So people use the internet to steal music. Who cares. People use roads to steal steal physcial CDs. So people buy music off stores on the internet. People use roads to buy music from stores too. The internet is simply a network. We use it to access resources. Artists are not entitled to make a dime off the internet simply because of what it *could* or *is* used for.

if the inernet is the same as roads, and there is road tax, a levy for music/movies is feasable/acceptable

It is by no means acceptable.

 But a road tax goes directly to maintaining the roads. If you want to introduce an internet tax to benefit developing broadband infrastructure and the like, that might be a reasonable conversation to have. We don't collect tolls on highways and give them to people who are victims of hit-and-run accidents..

Also it isnt a tax, its a fee for copyrighted music if you so choose to source it from the internet

It's a poor solution because, if you can opt out of it, pirates will.

If you can't opt out of it, its a tax ...

In which case, people like me that don't listen to music will have a real issue with it.

The bottom line is, you will NEVER make money off pirates.

They already know they are stealing from you, and don't care you have a living to make.  If you find a bullet proof way to make them pay for your music, they just won't listen to it.  Prosecute them, fine them, whatever...but don't delude yourself into thinking you'll make money off them.

They have already decided they don't care enough about you or your music to fund new works.

you dont listen to music?

the fees go to the artist, not the government, therefore it is not a tax

No, I don't listen to music

I also find it rather telling that you resort to debating terms, rather then the merits of the arguement.  As I said, I feel your plan would be either ineffective, or onerous to people that have no interest in music.   You haven't said anything to change that perception.

I find it rather telling, that you poo poo an idea, as simplistic and basic as it is, without suggesting an alternative idea. if this were in place, maybe it could apply to plans over a certain data size. do you watch pay tv? do you watch every channel? your paying for them regardless. If you choose not to listen to music, thats up to you, but it would be part of the package

I don't claim to have a solution - you do.  However, your 'solution' seems to be 'force every internet user to pay for it whether they use it or not'.  Needless to say, I'm underwhelmed

Hey - you use Firefox right? Maybe we should add a tax to your internet bill for open source developement.  If you choose not to use firefox, thats up to you, but it would be part of the package.

(and no, I don't watch pay tv - I don't buy bundled services)

I did amend it to plans over a certain data limit, then you have the choice, not forced into anything

Taxes are revenues collected by a government so yes it is a tax. Not saying taxes are inherently bad, but lets not try and bullshit words here.

in the original article yes, that is a tax, with my idea, and thats all it really is, the government has no involvement in the process, so no it isnt a tax in that situation

@ Ambient haze studios "simple solution, add $4 a month to every internet bill"

The idea has been proposed before.. but it has a few problems..

1.) how much? $4 would not cover the losses that would happen..

2.) As per the levy I mentioned above in Canada, once that was implemented the public quickly started to believe they were given a license to copy & steal at will.. and the supreme court backed it up (kinda), making Canada almost a haven for the pirates.. If something like this (across the board levy) happened it would very quickly wipe out ALL paid anything (from Itunes, to CD's, to things like Spotify)

3.) who gets the money? This would just reinforce that the only tracking of what is popular (usage) is terrestrial radio.. so the Bon jovis of the world would get paid.. the long tail? the non-top-40? ...not so much..

4.) Labels still have a death grip on CD's and 'unit sales'.. They are NOT going to give that up willingly..

I'm not saying its a "bad" idea.. but the logistics of trying to implement it in our current state of upheavel makes it almost impossible. There is simply not enough people that would back it.. 

The biggest problem would be that it would be ruled unconsitutional if the government tried to push it through as a law. Without a doubt. And ISPs would never go along with something like this voluntarily.