I'm OK with this concept of flat fees in principle, but most implementations (like blank-media tax) have a bad side effect. They assume that only media companies produce items of interest. We need to make the means for individual creation and DISTRIBUTION is left open and available.

IMHO the biggest problem with the 1992 DHRA bill was it's built-in assumption (through mandated SCM copy-protection) that individuals never create their own works of art. To this day every time I want to create an audio recording I have to use something other than DHRA effected equipment (such as DAT).

As an aside, that is why the Fritz law is not going to go anywhere (or if it does, why it won't last). While only a few people create audio recordings on a regular basis, almost everyone I know creates lots of photographs every year. The CDBTPA (or bills like it) mistakenly try to treat every photograph and word document like they were big studio movie creations. This co-mingling of media creation really shows the true breadth of what the publishers are paying Fritz to get -- control over mass distribution.

What his proposal/prediction amounts to is a "P2P tax". Everyone would be taxed according to the amount of possibly copyrighted data they exchange. These taxes would be used to finance the artists, who would be paid based on a random sampling of how much their works are shared.

If encryption technology makes it impossible to tell what data people are sharing, as appears likely, then everyone will be presumed to be sharing copyrighted data all the time (just like the blank tape tax is charged assuming that everyone will use blank tapes to record copyrighted data). So all that is needed is simple metering of data from ISP to customer. The user would be taxed based on this amount.

I agree that it's a plausible future outcome, if DRM software doesn't work. A content tax on all data streams is not particularly attractive, but I guess it's better than having no content at all.