The European Levy Business

The International Herald Tribune runs an article that gives a nice, short insight into the current European levy business, which one could fairly call it considering the enormous added summs collecting societies are generating from consumers. This business is only to expand, for example by the Dutch collecting society Stichting Thuiskopie:

Hester Wijminga, the lead negotiator for Stichting Thuiskopie, said her group in April proposed a levy of €3.28 per gigabyte on MP3 players, which would add a fee of nearly $250 on a 60-gigabyte iPod. Wijminga said industry representatives rejected the proposal, and negotiators are set to meet again June 15.

Some earlier posts on levies in Europe:

CoCo: French Go Dutch: Levies for the Gigabyte
CoCo: Head EC Copyright Unit Pro-DRM, Criticizes Collective Rights Management
CoCo: German PC Levy