It seems there is some political will for change to the existing framework, but many are not happy with the latest proposal to write the Cartels a blank cheque.
http://torrentfreak.com/holland-considers-banning-drm-legalizing-filesharing/Last year the Dutch tried to tax all MP3 players, but that proposal didn’t make it into law. But not to worry, they have other brilliant ideas. Earlier this week, Dutch politicians suggested that it might be a good idea to tax Internet traffic, and use this money to compensate the music industry. This, under the condition that DRM is abandoned, and people can’t be charged for downloads.
Recently Dutch Record Companies decided to no longer use copy protection on CDs because the costs didn’t outweigh the benefits. Politicians are now looking for alternative ways to compensate the Music Industry.
Martijn van Dam, a member of one of the bigger political parties in The Netherlands said, “Taxing Internet traffic is great way to compensate the Music Industry for the loss in sales by illegal filesharing”. He added that a prerequisite would be that DRM and copy protection should be abandoned. The battle against piracy is lost according to Van Dam, he says that the Music Industry has to accept that their products will be traded over the internet.
The idea of a collective tax on all users wouldn't be so bad if it was to be a reasonable amount spread across all, but with many fearing that the media cartels would set the price to something approaching a medium chunk of a subscribers bill many are in revolt at the idea before its even started.
It would be nice to see this given a trail run to see the level of revenue obtained and how it would offset even the fraudulent figures often handed out from the likes of the MPAA and RIAA Cartel organisations.
It surprises me that they are allowed to deceive political committees in the US and never be called to account for the validity of their claims, still if you have bought off the committee with "donations" I'm sure no one is going to ask anything awkward.
