iPod Tax

According to an article on Slashdot (one of the required blogs), a Canadian Copyright group wants a tax to placed on iPods. This would mean a $75 dollar tax on devices over 30 GB! The tax would be smaller for devices with less memory, but is not limited to iPods. Items such as memory cards would also be taxed.

According to the Canadian Copyright group, the purpose is to compensate artist for "illegally" copied or transfered music. Although this has become a big issue for recording artists and labels in the digital age, a tax is not the way to solve the problem. First, not everyone who owns an iPod is "illegally" copying and transferring music. In fact, many of the features in place on iTunes, for example, make it difficult to do so. The recording industry should, in fact, be thanking Apple for the iPod instead of attempting to tax their product. Many iPod users, myself included, listen to music much more frequently upon owning an iPod. Since I listen to more music, I buy more music. Lastly, if anything, this tax would likely worsen the problem. People may believe that illegally copying or transferring music is justified having paid a tax on their newly purchased iPod.

Doesn't copyright law indicate legality in making copies of copyrighted material for personal use? (Such as burning a purchased CD so one copy can be used in the car.) I hope that this tax does not become a reality.