France's Latest Plan: Tax Google, Microsoft And Yahoo To Fund Record Labels
from the you-can't-make-this-stuff-up dept
If you thought France had already gone off the deep end with its plan to kick file sharers off the internet, now comes the news of a government report that suggests a new plan: tax successful big internet companies, like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft and use that money to fund the “music and publishing” sectors (which basically means the record labels). We’ve been pointing out how all of these attempts to bolster copyright laws have really been about propping up businesses that haven’t been able to adapt, but is there any more blatant example of this than taxing the companies that have figured out how to use the internet to fund those that haven’t?? This is entitlement culture in the extreme.
Apparently Nicolas Sarkozy will get “the last word” on whether or not to adopt this policy, which means that it’s pretty likely. Sarkozy — who has a long history of copyright infringement by his own party — seems to believe that stronger copyright means defending French culture, when it really just means handouts to a few failing businesses who haven’t wanted to adapt.
Update: Really good point made by Andrew F in the comments:
The Zelnick Report says the tax would kick in anytime an online ad or sponsored link is clicked in France. One of the most controversial items in the report is that it calls for a company to be taxed regardless of where it is based.
If that’s legal, it’s rather frightening. Nearly any website with ads could be taxed if visited by the French. Just wait for sites to start setting up IP filtering that blocks all French users.
Filed Under: france, nicolas sarkozy, record labels, tax
Companies: google, microsoft, yahoo
Comments on “France's Latest Plan: Tax Google, Microsoft And Yahoo To Fund Record Labels”
Where the company's based
You should have mentioned this tidbit:
If that’s legal, it’s rather frightening. Nearly any website with ads could be taxed if visited by the French. Just wait for sites to start setting up IP filtering that blocks all French users.
Re: Where the company's based
“Just wait for sites to start setting up IP filtering that blocks all French users.”
Hey, they got Minitel, they’ll be fine.
Re: Where the company's based
I agree with your point, but doesn’t the report advocate charging the ad networks, rather than the sites hosting them (presumably because they’re easier targets)? (Haven’t read the original as my French isn’t up to much.)
If this does come to pass and I were a big cheese at Google, I’d get together with my fellow rounds of Roquefort at Yahoo and Microsoft and block France for a day. See who blinks first.
Re: Where the company's based
Just wait for sites to start setting up IP filtering that blocks all French users.
What, wait for them to do the impossible? That might take a while.
Re: Re: Where the company's based
It’s actually pretty easy to filter out French IP addresses. Granted, if a French user really wanted to access an external website, it’d be easy enough to use a proxy, but for accounting purposes, anonymous users being routed through Switzerland don’t count as French.
Re: Re: Re: Where the company's based
It’s actually pretty easy to filter out French IP addresses.
You seem to be making the mistake that many non-technical people make of thinking that IP addresses correspond to unique users. Addresses are not users.
Granted, if a French user really wanted to access an external website, it’d be easy enough to use a proxy, but for accounting purposes, anonymous users being routed through Switzerland don’t count as French.
Only if you use fictional “accounting”. And if you’re going to use fiction then anything’s possible, isn’t it?
Re: Re: Re:2 Where the company's based
“You seem to be making the mistake that many non-technical people make of thinking that IP addresses correspond to unique users. Addresses are not users.”
If he’s talking about proxies, assume he gets that.
Re: Re: Re:3 Where the company's based
If he’s talking about proxies,…
Some people have a habit of talking about things they don’t know much about.
…assume he gets that.
Considering that he was proposing blocking addresses as a means of blocking users, such an assumption would seem unwarranted. Or do you also believe that addresses correspond to users?
Re: Re: Re:4 Where the company's based
Actually…you don’t seem to have any idea what you’re talking about. When the OP said “French users”, he actually meant “French IPs”. Or did you think sites were going to block individual users throughout the world based on their French accent?
Re: Re: Re:5 Where the company's based
Actually…you don’t seem to have any idea what you’re talking about. When the OP said “French users”, he actually meant “French IPs”.
Actually…you don’t seem to have any idea what you’re talking about. He distinctly wrote “users”. And IP addresses are not beings bound by law in any sense of the word so that interpretation wouldn’t make any sense either. What are you smoking?
Or did you think sites were going to block individual users throughout the world based on their French accent?
I meant what I wrote, that he thought that IP addresses correspond to individuals. You seem to unable to read, severely confused or trolling.
Re: Re: Re:6 Where the company's based
It seems you don’t really know what you are talking about..
“I meant what I wrote, that he thought that IP addresses correspond to individuals. You seem to unable to read, severely confused or trolling.”
He said ban all French users. The ISP’s are allocated IP address ranges so to ban all users in France, all you would have to do is block those IP ranges. and Tada, every “User” of the website on a French ISP cant access the site.
Re: Re: Re:7 Where the company's based
It seems you don’t really know what you are talking about..
Heh, it’s really funny watching the technically ignorant, such as yourself, pretend to be otherwise.
He said ban all French users. The ISP’s are allocated IP address ranges so to ban all users in France, all you would have to do is block those IP ranges. and Tada, every “User” of the website on a French ISP cant access the site.
OK genius, in my case I can connect to a website from an IP address in any one of several countries of my choosing. So just what nationality does that make me?
Re: Where the company's based
I don’t see the logic of blocking French users altogether.
Sure, big content will steal some of the ad revenues (and this is *stealing* in the literal sense), but sites will still get a large part of it.
Unless, sites decide to boycott France or something to stop other countries from following suit!
Re: Re: Where the company's based
Depends on the site — if the majority of my advertising is targeted at Americans, it make sense to filter out the handful of French users who visit my site just to avoid the hassle of having to hire a French accountant to figure out how much of that tiny piece of revenue I owe the government.
Re: Re: Re: Where the company's based
That’s a very good point.
Re: Where the company's based
If I were an American, running a web site in America, with no other connection to France other than the internet being accessible in France, and I got a tax bill in the mail from France, I’d give it all the consideration it deserves: I’d chuckle and throw it in the trash.
Let them come after me for the money if they think they can.
I don’t suddenly becomes subject to taxation in 160+ countries just because I put up a web site on the net.
Re: Re: Where the company's based
“Let them come after me for the money if they think they can.”
The best I remember, the US and France have a criminal extradition treaty between themselves. And I seem to also remember the FBI talking about working with other countries to clamp down on international financial crime. Criminal tax evasion would seem to fit that bill on both counts.
“I don’t suddenly becomes subject to taxation in 160+ countries just because I put up a web site on the net.”
You aren’t immune from the law just because you break it “on the net”. Do you really expect the US to become a haven and shelter for international tax cheats? Isn’t that what the US accuses some other countries of?
Re: Re: Re: Where the company's based
> The best I remember, the US and France have a criminal
> extradition treaty between themselves.
Like I said, let them come after me if they think they can. I’m not subject to French law just because I have a site up on the internet.
As a federal agent myself, I find the idea that the US is going to start shipping its citizens to France by the thousands for not paying some trumped-up tax laughable.
What a money-maker that would be for any country that finds itself in a financial crisis and in need of some dough. Maybe Nigeria is hurting financially, so they just tax everyone in the world $250,000 for every web site that’s accessible in Nigeria.
Would *you* pay that? Would you even seriously consider it? Of course not. And neither will the US government tell its citizens, “you better pay up to Nigeria or we’ll ship you over there for trial.”
> You aren’t immune from the law just because you break it “on the net”.
But I’m not breaking any law. You don’t seem to understand that FRANCE HAS NO JURISDICTION OVER ME. I’m not a French citizen, nor am I in France. That doesn’t change just because I put up a web site. They don’t get to suddenly impose taxes on the entire world any more than the US can pass a law against internet gambling and start arresting people worldwide for not obeying it. The people in Belize are not subject to US jurisdiction and can gamble on the internet as much as they want to.
Talk about taxation without representation… we fought a war over that once upon a time.
Re: Re: Re:2 Where the company's based
As a federal agent myself,…
blah blah blah…
You don’t seem to understand that FRANCE HAS NO JURISDICTION OVER ME. I’m not a French citizen, nor am I in France.
Uh huh, like you guys wouldn’t expect the US to have any jurisdiction over, say, a British citizen who has never been to the US or for Britain to extradite him to the US either, would you? I suppose that would be “laughable” too, wouldn’t it? Or are you saying that those things can only happen to citizens of other countries because US citizens are “special”? Well, you know what they say: what goes around comes around. I can well imagine other countries wanting the US to extradite people for internet crimes as well now.
Re: Re: Re:3 Where the company's based
> like you guys wouldn’t expect the US to have any jurisdiction
> over, say, a British citizen who has never been to the US or for
> Britain to extradite him to the US either, would you?
I didn’t agree with that, either. I think it’s a shame the British government doesn’t have more respect for its own citizens than to buckle to pressure from some other country. They should have told the US to go pound sand.
That being said, I don’t see the US similarly buckling to other countries any time soon.
> Or are you saying that those things can only happen to citizens
> of other countries because US citizens are “special”?
No, not because US citizens are special, but because other countries find it politically expedient to please the US at the expense of their own citizens.
> I can well imagine other countries wanting the US to extradite
> people for internet crimes as well now.
They can expect all they want. Whether it will actually happen is another question entirely, especially when those “crimes” are only crimes in the foreign jurisdiction. For example, it’s a crime in Germany to glorify or display Nazi symbols, but it’s protected speech in America. Good luck to Germany getting an American extradited to stand trial for putting up a web site full of swastikas. American citizens don’t lose their 1st Amendment free speech rights merely because they choose the internet as their medium of expression.
Re: Re: Re:2 Where the company's based
“Talk about taxation without representation… we fought a war over that once upon a time.”
Did we loose? Because when I travel to other areas in the US I still have to pay the sales tax in those areas even though I don’t get to vote there.
Re: Re: Re:3 Where the company's based
> Because when I travel to other areas in the US I still have to
> pay the sales tax in those areas even though I don’t get to vote
> there.
You don’t have to go there, either. Stay home if it bothers you so much.
Re: Re: Re:4 Where the company's based
You don’t have to go there, either. Stay home if it bothers you so much.
Still, it’s taxation without representation, isn’t it? You sound like a British gov’t agent / loyalist telling an off an American colonist (don’t go there if it bothers you so much). And I can well imagine a colonist telling the agent / loyalist what I’m about to tell you: FU!
Yep, it led to a war alright. Against people like you, it seems.
Re: Re: Re:5 Where the company's based
> Still, it’s taxation without representation, isn’t it?
No, because you have a choice not to patronize that state. The taxes are in place and known to you before you travel there and if you choose to do so anyway, that’s on you.
Your analogy to the British colonies fails because those people weren’t just visiting– that’s where they lived– and the taxes were being imposed on them after the fact by royal decree. Every few months new taxes were coming down the pike.
And as a practical matter, your approach could not work in any reasonable way, as it would require citizens to carry around proof of residency everywhere they go and that still wouldn’t address people who move from one state to another. According to you, if I move from Texas to California, I should be exempt from all California taxes– sales, property, income, etc.– from the time I arrive until the whenever the next election occurs, because I had no say in electing the people who were in office when I arrived.
It’s ridiculous on its face, but if it makes you feel better to think of yourself as the modern-day equivalent of an aggrieved revolutionary patriot because Montana makes you pay an extra five cents for a soda as you drive through on vacation… well, whatever gets you through the night, chief.
Re: Re: Re:6 Where the company's based
No, because you have a choice not to patronize that state.
Yeah, kind of like the colonists had a choice not to go to the colonies either, huh?
your approach could not work in any reasonable way,
You’re starting to sound a lot like TAM defending SOCAN, ASCAP, et al. Gee, it’s just too hard to figure out who should pay and who shouldn’t, so just make everyone pay! Yeah, that’s the ticket!
According to you, if I move from Texas to California, I should be exempt from all California taxes– sales, property, income, etc.– from the time I arrive until the whenever the next election occurs, because I had no say in electing the people who were in office when I arrived.
Strange, I’ve re-read what I wrote several times and I can’t see where I wrote that. Maybe you have a virus on your computer corrupting the display. Or maybe you’re making stuff up. Eligibility to vote is what counts, regardless if you exercised it or your chosen representative won.
It’s ridiculous on its face,…
So said the King’s tax man.
…but if it makes you feel better to think of yourself as the modern-day equivalent of an aggrieved revolutionary patriot because Montana makes you pay an extra five cents for a soda…
Or tea. Who could object to that?
…well, whatever gets you through the night, chief.
Like a little tea party, chief?
Re: Re: Re:7 Where the company's based
> Strange, I’ve re-read what I wrote several times and I can’t see where
> I wrote that.
That’s not surprising, given the level of intellect you’ve displayed in this thread.
> Like a little tea party, chief?
Bring it on, big man.
umm
Freedom fries anyone?
just think where it could go from here!
While we are at it, why not add a special drinking tax.
Every time somebody drinks from a glass they should be taxed. After all, are’nt the glass manufacturers profiting off drink manufacturers and utilities suppliers who get the water to the taps?
And what about school student/people using pens and pencils, text books? They might actually able to make some money using these tools so tax ’em I say
We’ve been pointing out how all of these attempts to bolster copyright laws have really been about propping up businesses that haven’t been able to adapt, but is there any more blatant example of this than taxing the companies that have figured out how to use the internet to fund those that haven’t??
I think the bolded statement is incorrect. The businesses in question (namely the record companies) actually have been able to adapt; however, they have been unwilling to do so. Just about any business can adapt to any situation or any market, it’s a matter of whether the executives and the major shareholders are willing to allow it to do so.
Blame Cana-…
oh wait, that’s not right….
(change that letter, carry the one…)
Blame France!
Re: Re:
Blame France — the original Blame Canada! (unless you count “Blame the Jews”, which is probably the oldest)
and the french govt can can hire people
to click the ads.
Re: and the french govt can can hire people
Why pay people, just get a bunch of those bobbing birds to press the left mouse button over and over a la “King-Size Homer”.
I just wrote about this here this week.
When copyright holders are faced with competition, they merely have their government granted monopolies extended to eliminate the competition.
I wrote about how when player piano rolls were determined to be perfectly legal and not copyright infringment, the copyright industry simply had Congress extend its monopoly to include player piano rolls. That was easier than competing.
Now France is arbitrarily extending government granted monopolies to include revenue which has no relationship or basis to copyright. To me that’s criminal.
Hiring people makes sense.
It would reduce the unemployment and increase tax revenues.
What’s left would be spent on wine to help that industry.
Hmm...
Interesting. This is literally quite fascist.
Re: Hmm...
Well, we are talking about the French.
Atlas Shrugged
Re: Re:
“Atlas Shrugged”
Umm, you’re aware Ayn Rand was quite a supporter of government-granted monopolies, aren’t you?
Re: the link
link to Atlas Shrugged
Why are you linking to some place that wants me to BUY the book? The author is long dead, don’t you have some kind of public domain source?
both ways ?????
i thought when i first read it this makes file sharing in france legal as they cant have it both ways kick people off then tax the companies most use mm fewer people less tax.
Encourgment of encryption and proxies
Sometimes I think you take things a little too literally, as in block all french IPs.
Instead what I think you will find is that the ‘people’ in france will want to see some adds. (For all the add blockers out there, there are plunty of people that then go out looking for product from places like amazon.) Alls that will happen is if they can’t take a frech IP, the french will just start to encrypt all traffic to and from their computer and use proxies to do all their internet traffic.
So the french will still head to google.com… over an encrypted link that shunts to a proxy outside france.
Silver lining to this cloud
If France pulls this off, expect the tech companies to become a strong unified voice against the arguments the media companies are making.
And that voice might be helpful.
Optimism
Perhaps this will get some sort of reasonable and well thought out (and well promoted/funded) response by Google or Microsoft about how silly this plan is? And perhaps that reasonable and well thought out response will draw light to these sorts of laws/problems in general?
I mean it shouldn’t even take an alliance of these companies to fight this, it is the French we’re talking about right?
Re: Optimism
As Churchill once said (after the invasion of the USSR) “If Hitler invaded Hell, I would make at least a favourable reference to the devil in the House of Commons.”
“France’s Latest Plan: Tax Google, … Yahoo To Fund Record Labels”
Why should perfectly legitimate businesses be taxed to fund criminals?
Funding for record lables
Everyone hates new taxes…..however, raising capital in this market truly is not happening. I am currently raising capital for a new record lable. With over twenty years experience in finance, most, if not all markets, welcome agressive measures to loosen up the investment markets.
Re: Funding for record lables
I am afraid I don’t understand this strange new form of sarcasm you are speaking, as I don’t see that anyone can possibly be that ignorant and unaware.
How about a surrender tax?
Funding for record lables
Everyone hates new taxes…..however, raising capital in this market truly is not happening. I am currently raising capital for a new record lable. With over twenty years experience in finance, most, if not all industries, welcome agressive measures to loosen up the investment markets.
Re: Funding for record lables
So basically it’s ok to steal from the hard working poor and give to the lazy unworking rich is what you’re saying.
Re: Funding for record lables
That’s just an absurd statement. You don’t raise capital by implementing a tax. You raise capital by finding investors willing to fund your venture. If you aren’t able to find investors, either you’re not good at presenting your business plan, or you have a bad business plan. In either case, to take tax payers money for your record lable is just wasting tax payers money since investors had the good sense to not give you money directly.
Taxes don’t make an investment market. Investments do. Creating a tax on one market to give to another isn’t an “agressive measure.” It’s socialism.
I find it hard to believe you have “over twenty years experience in finance” yet are completely ignorant on basic economics. Is your financial experience comprised of mismanaging a hedge fund? Do you work at AIG?
Calm down guys, he’s not gonna do it…
kind of typical
It worries me that I am so rarely surprised by the stupid ideas coming out of some governments.
France in particular has a long history of cutting off its nose to spite its face. They were terribly snobbish about the French language and created the Academy Francais to protect it and its place in French culture. They insisted on set rules, grammar etc. This made the language somewhat limited as it could not adapt and failure to adapt meant it was left behind.
English by contrast stole words from everywhere which helped in its spread around the world. Which is why English has been the lingua franca for quite a while now 😉
At the end of the day France isn’t that big a market and the precedent set if they get away with this would be enormously damaging. I hope the big Tech companies band together and block the whole silly country and see how long before the screams of rage erupt from the French people.
Of course France would probably go running to the EU and force them to fine anyone who did this.
And what do the above companies say? They must surely disagree with this plan, and we all know they also have some serious lobbying power.
Who Cares
Who cares what France does? Let them try and tax companies from other countries and see what happens. A whole lot of nothing I suspect. They’re only hurting themselves to subsidize a dying industry segment. C’est la vie.
didn't the canadians pay a cd tax
on blank cds to support the artists?
Re: didn't the canadians pay a cd tax
Yes. The CRIA has collected around $600 million from Canadian consumers since the levy went into effect. The CRIA may also owe artists over $6 billion.
It’s great work, if you can get it.
If The French Govt is that hard up for cash, maybe they should just increase the tax rate on their White Flag Factories. (They likely have quite a few of them).
record industry lifer
note mike that the author, patrick zelnick, is a record industry lifer:
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Zelnik
briefly translated: ’73-80 w/polydor, ’80-’97 virgin france, ’97-present naive (which has a 5% market share of disks sold in france).
as well, his brief from the gov’t has been under attack since the day it was announced last year:
http://www.lemonde.fr/technologies/article/2010/01/07/le-rapport-zelnik-prone-une-taxe-google_1288659_651865.html
but wait, there’s more!! coming soon is another such recommendation concerning e-books. get this, led by the same chick who was in charge of the 3-strikes nonsense:
http://www.lepoint.fr/actualites-technologie-internet/2009-12-01/gouvernement-christine-albanel-revient-pour-une-mission-sur-le-livre-numerique/1387/0/400527
it’s an effing train-wreck over there.
cme and force me to pay taxes YOU FUCKTARD
i feel like tellign every frenchmen to visit a site with my add on it and not sell a damn product or nothing and hten have this idiot try and tell me i have to pay taxes
ya its illegal its called money laundering in Canada
and effectively he will force the isps in Canada to BAN ALL FRENCH ISPS
hey fucktard part 2
remember that berlin wall…..
i would say to the french people against this start playing PINK FLOYD
tear down the wall.
tear down the wall.
CANT wait for the french prez to tell businesses in Canada they owe him taxes HAHA what a fuckin complete wanknut
this has got to be the most insane stupid backwards OMG STUPID MAN whose ever been allowed to run a a country
period
listen people iuts really easy to ban france
you can even do it locally on your own computer then they cant even come to it
hosts files ?
and you know those class B and class C ranges and all those lovely ovh server seedboxes from France POOF and there goes a TON more money then the ads would ever make YUP this is gonna be grand , i am beginning to think maybe the twit doesn’t realize the damage hes doing and on our front he in the end will expedite the destruction of french culture
1st link on google
goto drop down link go down a little ways its not perfect alphabetical and select France
ty google
Thanks to you to point this out for international ppls.
I’m french, and pissed off at our government “giving” lessons to the wole world, and being unable to follow the laws it want to pass.
This government is just get “lobbied” by the big major, and is -basically- making laws -by the richs- for the richs.
Thanks again for your hard work
PS : wouldn’t it be cool to have techdirt translate in french? A lot of ppl would be interested in over here (i might have missed the option, but i ask the question anyway ^^)
Re: Re:
This government is just get “lobbied” by the big major, and is -basically- making laws -by the richs- for the richs.
The days of the French revolution are long gone. Enjoy your cake.
The French are complete MORONS!!!
come together…read now …over …France!!!!
crazzzzzyyy
French are really crazy !!!! And theire president is crazzzyyyy !!!
crazzzzzyyy
French are really crazy !!!! And theire president is crazzzyyyy !!!
Businesseshome
I recently came across your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don’t know what to say except that I have enjoyed reading. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often.
Lucy
http://businesseshome.net
Complétement idiot
My only comment about this tax:
Encore une idée complètement idiote de notre minable président Sarkozy ! Ridicule ! Stupide ! J’ai honte !
I would say personaly that our leaders, “intellectual” simply don’t undertand what is internet, its philosophy.
They simply see that has 2.0 version of “Le Minitel”
There are excellent conferences of Benjamin Bayart
http://www.fdn.fr/minitel.avi
In French… Sorry