<html><head><style type="text/css"><!-- DIV {margin:0px;} --></style></head><body><div style="font-family:verdana,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:10pt"><div style="font-family: verdana,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">----- Mensaje original ----<br>De: Reinier Bakels <r.bakels@planet.nl><br>Enviado: sábado, 12 de abril, 2008 16:27:05<br>> <font style="font-family: verdana,helvetica,sans-serif; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);" color="#0000ff" face="Comic Sans MS" size="2">Germans are precise. They
have a separate statute for societies that collect copyright fees ("Gesetz über
die<br>> Wahrnehmung von Urheberrechten und verwandten Schutzrechten", in short:
"Urheberrechtswahnehmungsgesetz"). It<br>> says: (emphasis added)</font><div style="font-family: verdana,helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">
<div><font size="2">> Translated: Redistribution
must follow fixed rules, and further works and achievements of
<u>cultural</u> importance. Aha,<br>> culture is more important than money!
But then collective rights organisations actually make cultural policy. Which<br>> imho is way to important to leave to such organisations. In particular because
their main "customers" probably are<br>> Schlagersänger of great monetary, but
limited cultural value. Or is this about Biergarten culture? Who knows.
Such<br>> questions must be answered on a different level! I am still looking for a
decision or article that explains that this is<br>> against the Constitution. Germans
are very strict about their constitution (Dutch are not, for reasons I won't try
to<br>> explain here).<br><br>The question is that using & redistributing levies for a different criteria than the one which consists in giving the money to the rightholders of the privately copied works -definition of private copying levies given by the own EC, and the one which is stated in national IP laws like Spanish IP Law-, make levies not being levies anymore, but something different -taxes managed by Member States, etc-.<br><br>If it's all about taxes, it belongs to fiscal policy and maybe would come to be slightly out of our scope; however, if we keep talking about levies, anything that means:<br><br>- forcing people who don't privately copy copyrighted works to become debtors and pay levies<br>- giving money to rightholders of non privately copied works; or between two works which would have been privately copied the same amount of times, giving more money to the rightholder of the bestselling one<br>- finding out who privately copies
and which works have been privately copied in a way not observant with civil rights and liberties<br><br>anything that means any of those three cases -even all of them- becomes not acceptable. Even if RMOs have their own Statute; even if part of the collected levies is destined to social and/or cultural payments. Regards<br><br><br> Carlos
Ayala<br> ( Aiarakoa )<br><br> Partido Pirata National Board's Chairman<br><br>P.S.: We need a meeting to close the draft reaching a definitive
text, and to translate that definitive text to as many <span style="font-style: italic;">pirate </span>languages as possible. Which date would be best for you?<br></font></div>
</div></div></div><br>
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