RIAA loses battle to tax Canadian MP3 players
By Barb Dybwad 
posted Jul 29th 2005 7:00AM
posted Jul 29th 2005 7:00AM
Yeah, Canada's Federal Court of Appeal had already ruled against the special copyright tax on digital audio players that the RIAA lobbied to adopt in that country, meant to compensate for the expected losses to the music industry from copyright infringement. Of course, the RIAA kept beating a dead tax via the Canadian Private Copying Collective's continuing appeals. However, today the Canadian Supreme Court has refused to hear any further arguments in the case whatsoever — meaning the RIAA walks away steaming mad (and still clueless), and Canadians can continue to purchase products that don't pre-emptively tax them for being potential criminals.
Ok, so I've already paid that tax. As far as I'm concerned, it gives me unfettered rights to download and "pirate" music. I've paid for it, so I should have the right to do that. If not, then I would like to know exactly what it was I paid for, and be reimbersed.
Point of clarity...Since its Canada it would be CRIA (Canadian Recording Industry Association) and not RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America). And, it was the CPCC (Canadian Private Copying Collective) that has been collecting this. Not that any of that matters, but i'm anal that way...
Woot! :D This means that when my iPod runs out of juice, I can still buy a new one at the saem price! :D:D
To demand your Tax cash back from the Canadian Private Copying Collective email them here: inquiries@cpcc.ca.
They will reply to you.
Last year I emailed them about the tax they replied they were taking the case to the Supreme Court and if they fail they would have to set up a system to return the money back to anyone who had to pay the tax.
It's good news, but we Canadians are still paying a tax on all CD-Rs and cassettes. At least they now don't have their grubby paws on CF and SD cards.
It should be noted that in exchange for the Digital Media Levy that applies to CDs, we got Bill C-43 Sections 68 and 80, which explicitly made the copying of music completely legal. In fact, it even goes so far as to make legal the copying of music you don't actually own (since you are, in essence, paying for it anyway).
Not surprisingly, the recording industry's reaction to this is to try copy protect audio CDs, thus violating the spirit of the agreement.
If they do manage to copy protect music, the levy will have to be reduced, as that will have to be included in the formula they use to compute the levy, the next time the levy amount is reviewed.
The Canada Copyright Board has been very pro-consumer in its decisions so far compared to the US's approach.
Oh great now it makes me a pirate. They make me a pirate for buying CDs and copying them on my ipod. I am very angry at that, I bought CDs only to put them on my ipod because I thought I was being honest this way, so now I won't buy any more more CDs since it makes me a pirate. Their loss. You bet I will get my money back for the ipods I bought.