The art of spin doctoring
p2pnet.net News- Here’s the full, unexpurgated CRIAA (Canadian Recording Industry Association of America) response to yesterday’s Supreme Court ruling that turned down a bid by the Big Four record labels to milk their customers for even more money.
It’s a painfully convoluted, not to say glaringly obvious, attempt to spin a pig’s ear into a silk purse.
Worse, it may do more to alienate contracted artists than anything else, as Canadian lw professor Michael Geist wrote yesterday.
Read on >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Recording Industry Welcomes Supreme Court Decision on Private Copying
By Graham Henderson
The Canadian Recording Industry Association (CRIA) welcomed today’s Supreme Court of Canada decision on private copying as a positive step in clarifying unauthorized file sharing as an illegal activity.
“For years, those supporting unauthorized file sharing have misleadingly used the existence of the Private Copying Levy to justify illegitimate file sharing,” says CRIA President Graham Henderson. “Today, the Supreme Court says ‘no such luck.’”
By denying leave to appeal the Federal Court of Appeal’s December 2004 decision, the Supreme Court has affirmed that digital audio recorders such as Apple iPods are not subject to the private copying levy because the hard drives embedded in them are “devices” rather than audio recording media. This means that unauthorized file sharing to hard drives of any kind – including those on home computers – is illegal.
The decision follows closely on the introduction of federal legislation that updates Canada’s copyright law, providing certainty for legitimate digital downloading services and bringing Canadian law in line with today’s digital realities.
“The Supreme Court and federal legislators are aligning themselves with the silent majority of Canadians who view file sharing as an illegal activity,” Henderson remarks. “Together, they are bringing certainty to the legal system. With certainty comes trust, and with trust comes investment, laying the groundwork for a robust legal market place. Now, it is just a matter of time.”
Though the decision means that artists will not receive compensation for music obtained through unauthorized file sharing, Henderson points out that the levy has never properly compensated them for this black market activity anyway. The Private copying levy currently provides rights holders with approximately 2.8 cents per “lost sale” for copies made to blank CDs, and nothing for copies made to personal computers or, following today’s decision, to digital audio recorders. At Puretracks or iTunes, rights holders receive 99 cents. Thus a single legal download sale compensates rights holders 50 times as much as the levy would.
“Artists will more than make up for any curtailment of the levy system as a result of increased sales in the legal market place,” Henderson says. “The legal marketplace is far more efficient and compensatory than scraping nickels and dimes through a levy.”
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See:-
milk their customers – Canada rejects iPod levy, p2pnet, July 29, 2005
alienate contracted artists – Big Music fumbles in Canada, p2pnet, July 29, 2005
July 29th, 2005 at 4:56 pm
“The Private copying levy currently provides rights holders with approximately 2.8 cents per “lost sale” for copies made to blank CDs, and nothing for copies made to personal computers or, following today’s decision, to digital audio recorders. At Puretracks or iTunes, rights holders receive 99 cents. Thus a single legal download sale compensates rights holders 50 times as much as the levy would.”
Cause the levy was made for fair compensation and the price at “legal” dl sites was made to screw people. Notice they used right holders and not artists there are well. Does anyone know what the actual breakdown is? I remeber reading somewhere that $0.10 went to the artist and the rest went to the cartel.
July 29th, 2005 at 7:17 pm
The War On Illiteracy – Result: More illiteracy, kids read less, kids speak less fluently
The War On Drugs – Result: You can get drugs easily in ANY neighborhood in the US
The War On Poverty – Result: A shrinking, almost non-existent middle class, a growing poor class, a growing class of the richest & growing income disparity
The War On File-Sharing – Anyone want to predict the result???
July 29th, 2005 at 7:18 pm
The War On Terrorism: going the same way! Terrorism has increased dramatically.
July 29th, 2005 at 9:55 pm
I had to read that a couple of times to understand what they were trying to say.
And to that I say what a load of absolute crap.
July 31st, 2005 at 12:31 am