France Debates Downloads, With Teenager as Top Expert - New York Times

In response to Aziz, who claims that the internet is a public commons in which those of limited means should freely be able to absorb culture, yes, you are right. To an extent. To claim further that you have the right to violate copyright because of this "nature" of the internet is...wrong.
In his defense, this kid believes that internet service providers should be paying into a general fund which reimburses artists for the relative "popularity" of their songs (implying the artists and record labels would receive a fraction of what they currently stand to make from a service like Itunes or from selling a CD) but that too is a mistaken notion brought on by none other than ridiculous French Socialist culture. Why should those who choose to pay for legal, agreed to means (i assume that Itunes and other song stores are in effect borderless and if it can be accessed in the USA then there is no technological limitation to it being accessed in France) be forced to subsidize those who are proposing to "pay" artists and record labels for their work through a means that not even the artist wants? I elaborate. I have partially borrowed this argument from a fairly eloquent defense of itunes in suing the pants off of the makers of a company that would port itunes usage to Linux: You cannot pay for something unless the receiver has agreed to a specific method of payment.
You cannot get on a bus by throwing two quarters at the driver and declare the right to board the bus; you have in effect, failed to pay for the item regardless of your having reliquished the money because it is not in the form the bus company accepts. Most buses have signs posted stating the driver cannot deposit the fare for you. Similarly for most items in most stores, you cannot simply give the owner of the store something of approximate value of the item you want and walk out of the store with your good. Those are both examples of unacceptable forms of payment.
Similarly, this teenager is proposing the nationwide institution of what would be considered an unacceptable payment form. Knowing the stupidity of the state legislature and the even more pronounced pigheadedness of the idiotic French people, this method will prevail in France and as bald-faced retribution I hope artists refuse to play their concerts in France. What a brilliant thing to do would be is to throw this rat in jail or sue him for punitive damages equivalent to what he has not paid for.