more on EU to tax e-mail, text messages? | Tech News on ZDNet

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Bob Frankston <Bob2-19-0501 () bobf frankston com>
Date: May 27, 2006 12:04:12 PM EDT
To: dave () farber net, ip () v2 listbox com
Subject: RE: [IP] EU to tax e-mail, text messages? | Tech News on ZDNet

It would be useful for someone to ask him how he plans to tax email  
or even the definition of email.



But there’s a precedent – the Stamp Act. It tried to tax all  
communication by taxing paper.



The issue is not so much the misunderstanding but the degree to which  
these misunderstandings goes unchecked and unchallenged. Shouldn’t  
the press do more than transcribing such statements? At very least  
shouldn’t they be asking for clarification. Maybe this is indeed  
overblown and is not going to go anywhere. What is the status of that  
working group?



I can understand the idea of taxing SMS – after all, the carriers’  
purpose in life is billing so you can’t send an SMS without  
generating a billable event. But outside the world of carriers  
billability is not the primarily purpose of life.



I see a parallel with the Smithsonian withdrawing itself from the  
public. It’s not the 30 year exclusivity as much as the inability to  
understand a world in which we aren’t forced to go through  
intermediaries because we are able to create the solutions ourselves.  
Today we can find our own paths through the infrastructure instead of  
relying on services from those who insist on carrying messages on our  
behalf whether or not we want them to.



I presume these efforts are no different from the challenge of coming  
to terms with other new technologies – the auto-mobile, tele-graph  
or, for that matter, the wheel.



From: David Farber [mailto:dave () farber net]
Sent: Saturday, May 27, 2006 07:44
To: ip () v2 listbox com
Subject: [IP] EU to tax e-mail, text messages? | Tech News on ZDNet





http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9588_22-6077464.html?tag=zdnn.alert



European Union lawmakers are investigating a proposed tax on e-mails  
and mobile phone text messages as a way to fund the 25-member bloc in  
the future.

A European Parliament working group is reviewing the idea, tabled by  
Alain Lamassoure, a prominent French MEP and member of the center- 
right European People's Party, the assembly's largest group.

Lamassoure, a member of Jacques Chirac's UMP party, is proposing to  
add a tax of about 1.5 cents on text or SMS messages and a 0.00001  
cent levy on every e-mail sent.



snip

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