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> Plot twist: digital assets cannot be duplicated for free. They require storage and transfer. Digital assets have zero marginal costs. That is to say, yes, st
by Fnoord 7y ago
> Plot twist: digital assets cannot be duplicated for free. They require storage and transfer.
Digital assets have zero marginal costs. That is to say, yes, storage and transfer is not free as in beer, but it is very cheap. Which is why we have that tax to cover losses from copying. Not just in France, also in Germany, The Netherlands, and probably many more countries in EU.
- user5994461 7y agoI can be wrong but I doubt that Germany has anything similar because one way to avoid the tax in France was to buy from Germany. The French tax is pretty high. It could be something like 50€ out of a 150€ hard drive.
- anoncake 7y agoIt's a lot lower in Germany but in principle it does exist.
- pixelpoet 7y agoI'm German and only just heard about this now. I wonder where the money goes, both in theory and practice...
- anoncake 7y agoGEMA
- kaybe 7y agohttps://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauschalabgabe https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauschalabgabe You're paying 10€ per laptop and 3€ per mobile phone. The money is distributed to several organizations (GEMA, VG Wort, VG Bild-Kunst,..). The right to private copying is derived from that. Apparently they're working on an update though, we should keep an eye on it.
- zaarn 7y agoIt goes to GEMA. If you're not signed up for GEMA you don't see a cent, otherwise you get a fraction of a fraction of the money.