France Lawmakers Endorse File-Sharing

Okay - this is weird.

The French parliament were all set to vote on a proposal indicating that individiuals caught pirating copy-protected material would face enormous fines and jail terms.But then, at the eleventh hour, the legislation was amended to legalize file sharing by anyone who paid a monthly royalties duty estimated at $8.50.

(Read the full story here ...The final vote is not expected until after 17th Jan)

But still - this means the government is paying musicians. How will we know who's popular? How will teenagers know what to buy? Maybe in the absence of "how much money they make", we'll have to find some other metric of success, like, "are they any good?"