A few years back, we noted that a Canadian court had ruled that the “private copying levy” (better known as “you must be a criminal tax”) for blank media such as CDs and DVDs could not be extended to iPods. However, the Canadian Copyright Board seemed to think that such a decision didn’t preclude it from going back and adding the levy to iPods at a later date — and this year it tried to do so, sending the whole issue back to court again. Once again, the courts have said that the Copyright Board is wrong and it cannot put the levy on iPods. Apparently, it took all of about 24 hours to make this decision, pointing out that much of this stuff was covered in the earlier decision a few years back. It’s worth noting, by the way, that the recording industry probably wasn’t on the side you’d expect in this case. It was so afraid that a private copying levy would “legalize” file sharing, that it came out against the proposal as well. Now it can keep on suing people. Of course, it makes you wonder how it feels about the private copying levy that is still used on blank CDs and DVDs, which seem even less likely to be used for private copying purposes than an iPod.
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