A computer is not a TV, but an iPhone is a copier!
Sunshine at last! The Supreme Administrative Court announces that Radiotjänst may not charge TV fees on computers. I don't know if this was expected, but it is certainly a correct ruling. "If a burdensome obligation of this kind is to be introduced, it should require clear legal support. Such clear statutory support is lacking," the court reasons. Clear legal support, that wording is worth remembering.
It's pouring rain! Södertörn District Court announces on the same day, in the case between TeliaSonera and Copyswede, that iPhone phones are "particularly suitable" for private copying. The District Court has read a lot of preparatory work, EU judgments and taken part in Copyswede's biased market research. Based on these, they have concluded that the legal concept of "specially adapted" should in fact be interpreted as "possibly "...
This was also the interpretation given by three judges some years ago in an arbitration between the UMA and Copyswede concerning the cassette tape levy on USB sticks and external hard disks. The consequence of that ruling was that local sales of hard disks plummeted (consumers started buying non-taxed disks abroad instead) and squeezed retailers' margins even further in an already highly competitive market.
Imposing a cassette tape tax (i.e. a fee for the possibility of theoretically making your own copy of a music or movie file using a particular product) on multipurpose products such as smartphones, laptops, tablets and universal media products is a dated way of charging for culture, as any normally up-to-date media consumer realizes. All media consumption trends, not least in film and music (whose rights holders Copyswede represents), indicate that we will soon have essentially abandoned consumption through the purchase and multiplication of copies in favor of various forms of service offerings (where one does not own the right to copy, or where the rights holder has already been compensated for this by contract).
Unfortunately, Swedish courts have a rather sad track record in copyright cases of this kind. They find it desperately difficult to justify rulings in a way that shows they understand both technology and how culture is actually disseminated and consumed today. It is particularly unfortunate that the courts are advocating fees on products that are largely used to consume (already paid for) music and movies. This makes modern media consumption more expensive (rights holders are paid twice for the same consumption), in order to compensate rights holders for something that consumers are essentially no longer engaged in.
Rarely has it been so clear that we need copyright reform.
Especially those of us who consider ourselves friends of a functional copyright are concerned about how Sweden is falling further and further behind more progressive countries such as the UK or the US. There is a clear link between growth and copyright. When was the last time these words were mentioned together in the Swedish debate?
To make matters worse, there are young politicians who apparently understand the media market better than our courts. And that regardless of party color. So maybe there is a ray of light among the clouds in the copyright sky.