Sarkozy wants to fight illegal downloads
Pascale Paoli Lebailly ©RapidTVNews | 10-01-2010
Presenting his 2010 wishes to the creative community, French president Nicolas Sarkozy has endorsed the idea of the creation of a dedicated "music card" for web-users, and to help fight illicit downloads.
This proposal, along with that of a "Google tax" (see our separate story on this) was part of recent report from the Zelnik mission on copyrights and Internet.
To limit the downfall of the physical music market and boost the takeoff of digital legal offers, Sarkozy hopes that such a "music card" would encourage youngsters to pay for what they listen to.
This card, which could be launched by this summer, would allow a fixed amount of online purchases and would be partly subsidized by French state.
Another proposal from the Zelnik report, that will be more controversial among creators, is to impose a one-year delay during which producers will "negotiate rights and make their music files available to all platforms". Talking about the fact that international search engines and web portals like Google pay taxes in the country where they're headquartered while they generate revenues abroad, Sarkozy defended the proposed "Google Tax". For him, it is a prejudicial "escape of fiscal revenues" that "alters the competition game".
© Rapid TV News 2010
