The controversy rages on fair compensation and to increases in the price of Apple products. We try to make things clear
Would you rather buy an iPhone 5S to 709 Euros or 732.78? Even if it were to sell the SIAE?
So the question is misplaced, but maybe not. The controversy for fair compensation, as expected, turn on, and consumers are paying the consequences. Do not the producers, as argued a month ago in a tweet Dario Franceschini, the Minister of Culture, who signed the decree on updating rates for the compensation for private copying rights.
Apple did not think much to raise the prices of its iPhone 5S 16 GB has been an increase of 3.78 euro, 4.76 to 32 GB (for a total of 843.76), the 64 € 5.25 GB (954.25). The increases relate to, always in proportion, the other iPhone and iPad (from 291.56 to 873.03 of the Mini 16 GB 128 GB Air Cellular). But even the computer, the MacBook (11-inch del'Air from 933.03 to 2033.03 of the Pro Retina 15) to the Mac Mini, iMac to Mac Pro
Apple has done well? Given that Tim Cook and company can do what they want, and users will then decide whether to follow them or not, certainly the move for a company that does not attract sympathy square smartphone on the market for almost a thousand euro (and sells them in large quantities ), who has just revealed yet another stellar quarter revenue and that, like other web giants and IT, uses all possible tricks to avoid paying the taxes they should on Italian soil. In addition, come to say, these figures are not very "clean" to be shown on the list, something which in Cupertino take much.
Probably three euro and seventy-eight more on 729 make no difference to a buyer, but the increase has unleashed the first consequences: the SIAE (public authority not exactly seen as 'likeable') has declared its readiness to sell aa in Italy "iPhone at French prices. "The purpose? Demonstrate "the impropriety of Apple" and "unjustified depredation."
The institution has publicly complained about the reaction of Apple(
cell phone cases), which he added on his website an explanation on the price apparently not correct, or 'copyright fee'.
The Italian Society of Authors Publishers, chaired by Gino Paoli, issued a statement in which he explains that "notes with regret of the price of the Apple devices, which shows once again how the American company with the sole objective to increase their profits through discrimination of Italian consumers compared to those in other European countries where, despite the presence of a private copying highest, prices remain significantly lower. "
Hence the decision to fight "the unjustified depredation" reserving the right to sell the iPhone on Italian soil "in French prices" to encourage consumers. And the invitation to consumer associations to take the group to "protect consumers and the Italian culture of our country."
It's a move of communication quite effectively, that of SIAE, but is more in the line of provocation than in reality: how are they going to sell Melafonino?
But the real question is: why such a reaction? The issue is complex and also relates to the current policy. Majority and the opposition they kill to defend or attack the decree. The same Franceschini called "retaliatory" the increase applied by Apple and tweeted the cost of the iPhone 5S 16 GB of France and Germany, comparing them with the rates for private copy of those countries and therefore the prices that applied in Cupertino Italy. Closes thinking contradicting what he had said in the first tweet ("Apple does cp pay only its Italian customers").
In the middle there is also the webtax or something (finally) at European level regulating the fees related to the digital economy. Of course, the risk is that in the eyes of the consumer, the SIAE steps to that which, once pressed to raise the tax, now is scandalized because the prices go up.
