Former Chrysalis and Dedicated executive Doug D'Arcy has issued a statement to clarify his position on the idea of an iPod tax. As previously reported, the idea of the 'tax' is that a levy is added to the cost of MP3 players which would be passed on to the record labels to compensate them for lost royalties caused by the making of digital copies of their music. The topic has been discussed in various media in the last week following the news that such a system may well be about to the introduced in Holland.
The scheme is not supported by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry because they fear that telling consumers they are making a copyright contribution to the record labels when they buy their MP3 player essentially legitimises the illegal sharing of music online. In a report on the proposal in Scottish newspaper the Sunday Herald, D'Arcy was quoted as lending his support to the scheme. However in a subsequent statement he stresses that does not actually put him in opposition to the IFPI. The iPod tax, he says, would compensate labels for consumers who make multiple copies of a track for their own consumption. It would not cover, and therefore not legitimise, the sharing of that track with other people.
D'Arcy: "The growth of digital media has made it easy for people to copy music that they have bought and own. As a result music fans are increasingly making back-up copies of their music for home uses, such as for their computer, car stereo or for a friend. Strictly speaking, a home copying/fair use right does not actually exist in the UK. So a token levy on MP3 players would be a practical and sensible way of compensating for this kind of 'seepage' - similar to how blank tape levies work in various countries. Importantly, it could be used to support UK music at the grassroots as well as boosting UK music internationally. I certainly do not believe that such a levy should be introduced as a counterbalance to music piracy (which is illegal), as has been reported. I have also made no estimates as to how such a levy may be priced and have no idea what the figures reported are based on."
Of course charging an iPod tax on that basis is also controversial. There's a strong argument that if record labels are in the business of selling licences to allow consumers to listen to their content, which they seem to say they are, then it's hard to see why a customer shouldn't listen to that music in whatever form is most convenient to them, providing they do so for personal consumption. If that involves making copies of a track so it can be enjoyed on different players, then that's no business of the record label. Certainly that's what consumer rights groups would be sure to argue.
Of course that line of argument throws up another interesting question. If when I bought an album on vinyl back in the eighties I was actually buying a licence to listen to the music, shouldn't I get the cassette, CD, mini-disk and MP3 release of the same album at cost price, because I already own the licence? See, copyright discussions can be interesting.