Lets talk about the SGAE | alo's web site

Lets talk about the SGAE

In this entry I would like to talk about the SGAE. It is the Spanish society of authors and editors, basically a group of people that has set a kind of tax on media devices like blank CDs or DVDs. In my opinion it is something like the Mafia, but permitted by the spanish goverment. People pay a tax to this organization with every blank media, so if you want to record a CD with vacation pictures, burn a backup DVD, or copy the last bleeding edge Linux distro, you pay them to finance their organization that tries to support the old media bussiness. Isn't it completely crazy?

The last grand idea of these guys was to try to impose a license to access the Internet. No, I'm not kidding you. They have.
From their point of view, you shouldn't be allowed to use the Internet if you don't have that license. Maybe they also want to make you pass an exam of something.. and of course, we shouldn't forget the main aim of this: to impose another tax on you.

Until now, it might be that people thought SGAE makes sense (of course, not me!), but I really cannot imagine anybody that would agree since their last proposal. It has clearly shown the only aim of the organization: to collect your money. It doesn't matter if you are using the media for personal purposes, it doesn't matter that P2P networks are legal (there is a "personal copy" law that allows you to copy whatever you want if you don't earn money with it). They seem to have no scruples. With that law, you couldn't read the online paper, write a mail to your girlfriend, chat with your friends, or commit your last patch to the repository.. you couldn't do anything because you have to pay that tax beforehand. Do you know why? You could also use your Internet connection to download some films with bit torrent, so you have to pay for the crime (it is NOT!!) before committing it.