Internet 'tax'

So, the music industry is thinking about giving up on chasing people who illegally download music and putting a 'tax' on Internet charges instead? Great. Why should I pay because some crackhead teenager after his Britney fix can't be arsed to buy a CD? I don't see the government saying "OK guys, we'll get rid of speed cameras and just charge all motorists equally to get the fines".

Downloading illegally shared music is illegal, and the people who do it are criminals (as the law stands). Whether they think this should be the case or not, people who download this stuff know it is illegal and should therefore be prepared to face the consequences. I don't see why they should be let off just because they are hard to catch and everyone else made to pay for them.

The way to change the music industry is not to download stuff illegally shared on P2P networks. The way to do it is to embrace the emerging legal downloads on sites like Magnatune. If all record companies adopted this approach then illegal downloading would cease to be a problem. Of course they don't like this idea as it would eat into their profit margins, but in the end we would all be better off (especially less popular artists).

Some countries (Canada?) have a tax on every blank CD sold. Some of the money goes to the big record labels on the assumption that people will be copying music. The presumption of guilt has seemingly gone unquestioned. Most blank CDs are not used for copying music, as most people who work in IT will tell you. Who are the record labels to think that they can make the law? If this new Internet tax proposal gets anywhere it will show just how much in the pockets of big business our government really is.