Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Charges for stolen goods


Over here in Germany, the music industry, the movie industry, and book publishers have put a surcharge on just about everything from printers to USB sticks in order to make up for losses they say they incurred because people increasingly copy music, movies, and books. You pay several euros, for instance, for that memory card in your digital camera. (Not sure how many people use digital cameras to copy material.)

Now, a website has been put up to show you what you pay where. You can also enter the number of items you purchased over the past few years, and the site shows you how much you paid in charges for stolen goods. In my case, it is around 275 euros.

I have always found interesting the claim that copied material would've otherwise been purchased. I wonder how many people copy or download something to see whether they like it and then decide they don't.