[pp.int.general] [Vrijschrift-Kern] no copyright levy for printers: decided by German Supreme Court

[Jan Wildeboer]

Reinier Bakels wrote:

> I guess Germany is a forerunner in levies, and such developments are really frightening, even though the printer decision was OK.

Yes. Today our wonderful GEMA celebrates its 100th birthday. GEMA(music) 
and VG Wort(literature) managed quite well to get us levies on:

- CD-R(W), DVD-R(W)
- Cassette tapes
- Photocopying machines
- Fax machines
- Scanners
- Multifunction printer/Scanner/fax
- etc.

However, the good thing about the levy is that wrt machines it is a 
one-shot thing. You buy the machine and the levy is included and after 
that you are free (in the natural borders of private copy use) to use 
the machine for as many copies as you want.

It is not an ideal system, but it has limited the claims of giant 
copyright infringement that needs compensation quite effectively in the 
past.

HTH

Jan (living in germany)