Proposal in Brazil to Legalize Non-Commercial File-Sharing and Monetize P2P

SEPTEMBER 2, 2010

Pedro Paranaguá points me to a proposal for monetizing P2P file-sharing in Brazil.

The proposal has been submitted as part of Brazil’s open public consultation to review its copyright law. As he summarizes it for non-Portugese speakers like myself (though Google translate did not do a bad job!):

Basically, non-commercial file sharing will be authorized – should the proposal be accepted and passed into law. Each broadband user will pay a R$3 (or US$1.71) fee together with her/his monthly Internet Service Provider (ISP) bill. The ISP will collect the fees and distribute it to a collecting society comprised of authors’ associations that will then distribute the collected fees to authors, composers, and so on in the proportion that the works are downloaded.