[Mikkel Paulson]

Honestly, I am a firm believer in compromise on just about anything, but I can't think of any circumstances under which I'd support any kind surcharge on the internet to compensate for its supposed damaging effect on musicians. I thought part of our platform was that file sharing did not have a significant negative effect on creatives.

[Jay Frank]

Also, the levy is something that the WGC (Writer Guild of Canada) and the SAC (Songwriter Association of Canada) have asked. This could also help us gain a tremendous foothold with artistic organizations in Canada and make the frame seem even more Made in the USA.

We would of course take it out of the control of the CRIA and put it under the control of the government. And we'll make sure artists are paid in a timely manner. The government is already excellent at collecting money so that won't be a problem.

This is called "Favor-Trading" or "Buying Votes".
Should be illegal - it's what lobbyists do.

J

[Nuitari]

Honestly, I am a firm believer in compromise on just about anything, but I can't think of any circumstances under which I'd support any kind surcharge on the internet to compensate for its supposed damaging effect on musicians. I thought part of our platform was that file sharing did not have a significant negative effect on creatives.

Yes we know that.
The problem is that getting the message out isn't as easy as Concerned Citizen make it sound.

And one way or the other, the artists are good at making noise over issues. It could mean the difference between being supported by it or being drowned by it.

And instead of saying "to compensate" we could say "to encourage the development of Canadian Arts & Culture in a sustainable manner"

This is called "Favor-Trading" or "Buying Votes".
Should be illegal - it's what lobbyists do.

And about 100% of political parties out there...

The thing I dont like about levies is they presuppose that everyone is guilty of something. I have a stack of probably 50 DVD R/RWs on my desk and all of them have Linux ISOs on them. How much money have I been ripped off of because they presumed I was doing something with them that I was not?

0$ exactly. DVDs aren't subject to the levy.

It may be hard but redirecting the frame is possible but you do not try to reflect but deflect. All you need to do is get the public asking questions. 'Why isnt the levy money distribution public knowledge?' 'How exactly do these companies come up with their numbers for 'piracy'?' 'How come studies and surveys that suggest Pirates BUY MORE than your average consumer are being ignored or discredited?' You can always question the funding of any survey/study which a majority of it comes from the government or content provider industries. There needs to be more transparency in these surveys/studies...the problem is they fund things that will only agree with them so those researching are pushed in the direction with funding as the carrot and the stick.

Sadly that way of changing the frame is going to take eons. I'd be more hopeful if people were asking "Where is my tax money going" and that the government gives a good answer. Yet still very few ask and even less listen.

It would be much easier in this case to go with something that simply contradicts their frame.
They've head a very big head start in establishing their frame.

[Mikkel Paulson]

And about 100% of political parties out there...

Give or take 0%.

[Concerned Citizen]

0$ exactly. DVDs aren't subject to the levy.

Right, I thought there was a levy on it, seems there was a proposal in 2003-2004 to make it $2.27 each. Along with just about doubling every other levy in existence. It just goes to show if you give them an inch they'll try to take a mile.

Source: http://neil.eton.ca/copylevy.shtml#what_amount

Original Levy in 1999-2000 was $0.233 for most audio cassettes the proposal for the ones over 90 minutes was to jack it up to $1.00! Likewise CD-R/RW was $5.2 and was proposed for $0.50, and resulted in a change to $0.21 (a change of approximately 4 times the original).

These changes are not in line with general inflation rates, thus they should have to be justified otherwise they are just gouging the consumer.

[Mikkel Paulson]

they are just gouging the consumer.

Nah, I think you got it in one.

[btrower]

If I didn't know better, I would say this is being promoted by someone determined to kill off the Party.

There is *no way* this should be voted on at the next meeting. The very *best* you could hope for is that it would be (as it should be) soundly defeated. The worst case scenario is that it is adopted and you can basically kiss goodbye to the party.

Who seriously thinks that one of the *platform* rallying cries for a *brand new political party* should be a very poorly considered *NEW TAX* on the very thing we are attempting to liberate?

This is not like shooting ourselves in the foot. It is like shooting ourselves directly in the heart.

The levy on CDs is a cynical and stupid political thing. I use more than the average number of CDs and DVDs. I have perhaps one time backed up my own music on to a single CD as a test. I am all for voting that out of existence and I think most would agree. However, even *that* I would not think about putting into a party platform yet.

So little research has been done on the enormous task of dealing with all of this stuff, it is *extremely* premature to consider things as specific as a tax on ISPs.

Even voting on something this dumb would, in my opinion, do the party a bit of an injury. In the unlikely event some wacky artifact of process ended up with this thing getting into the platform, we would have a *HUGE* problem. We have plenty of *real* work to deal with. We would have to stop and fix that (or just have the Party implode) when we have work to do.

I have decades of experience with all things 'network'. This is *such* a non-starter, I can't believe it is even up for discussion.

I work on the Internet all day long and have for many years. I don't download  music. Neither, to my knowledge, do any of my clients. We send EMail, manage cloud services, participate in social networks, maintain and use websites, etc. Beyond being a dumb idea, placing a tax on my Internet connection and the connections of my customers is unfair. We *intend* the money we pay to ISPs to be used on delivering network infrastructure. What use anyone is making of that infrastructure is nobody's business but their own. Where would you draw the line? Paper? [That has been tried, by the way -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stamp_Act_1765]  Should we tax speech in case people utter something copyrighted, like sing 'Happy Birthday' without a license?

Kill this fast and with extreme prejudice before someone starts the rumor that (someone) wants to *TAX THE INTERNET*. Even if this were a good idea by some tortured logic, it would be a *monstrous* public relations gaffe.

There are debatable ideas that might not be entirely popular. However, this is one idea that is not even reasonably debatable.

[Jay Frank]

+ Karma for u BT.
Even though your post was still TL - I DID READ.


Thank you for your support in defeating this
I dislike fighting with Frenchie - but I'm not really willing to give much on the ISP Levy idea.
It's ALL BAD.

Jay

[Nuitari]

One of the big problems is that publishers and the government are pushing this negative frame of pirates being freeloaders, which we aren't. We can't easily redirect this frame without looking like a bunch of 5 year olds (no it's you the freeloader), and the public at large still (sadly) equates CD sales as artist revenue.

If you guys are so much better at writing strategy, then please, start writing a better way to counter what i've outlined above.

PPUK sucked so much at it that anti file sharer opinion went up in the UK after the last election and the battle around the Digital Economy Act.

[Concerned Citizen]

Just remember... Dion was doing good in the polls until he mentioned two words... CARBON TAX.

I agree with bt, we should scrap this idea ASAP. Canadians hate more taxes. The best way to lose an election is to talk tax.

Instead I would focus on cutting out of control spending and reducing government waste. The windfalls from such actions would then be reinvested into creative arts and music education across the country.

In effect this would be achieving multiple goals at once, making government accountable for spending and waste and providing arts and music education to the next generation of creative minds.

[Mikkel Paulson]

I'm willing to accept that we need to temper our platform in order to make it more palatable to the general public, which may be less revolutionary than we are. However, I would prefer to slightly lengthen and broaden our proposed copyright law (say 25 years and only advocate broadening fair use rather than legalizing all non-commercial use) rather than introduce measures like this to try to excuse our beliefs. "What about the artists?" "Oh... uhh... new tax!"

This new tax, as CCitizen says, is what would cost us an election.

Edit: If there are no objections, I'd like to move on the 19th that votes on these platform points be deferred until after the Directors election. If it goes to a vote in its present form, it will be defeated by a large majority. If you want to have any hope of having the idea adopted, I suggest waiting until it is more refined.

[Ayes]

Yeah, don't ever tell people you want to vote for you that you are planning on taking some of their money.

[CraigNobbs]

I move that we drop the adding of a levy/tax from the agenda altogether and that it never be raised in its current or like form until such time where the majority of the PPoC membership calls to add it to our modus operandi.

[Concerned Citizen]

I think we should make repealing the existing blank media levy part of the platform either now or at some point in the future. People hate their money being pissed away for no good purpose. It's basically a 'tax' on blank media to support a failed business model.

[Mikkel Paulson]

Now that I would support.