Macenstein

Posted by Dr. Macenstein

A committee appointed by Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs has rejected a proposal by the country’s recording industry to impose a tax on portable media players, including Apple’s iPod. The measure sought to add a 2%-5% tax on the sale of the music players that would go directly to the recording industry to help offset perceived losses due to file sharing.

In the past the committee had been made up of lobbyists for the record companies, but due to a recent public backlash, the latest committee members were chosen from an apparently more impartial group consisting of university professors and copyright lawyers.

Source: NY Times