Other cities & states may follow soon .... http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news...Charged-300-for-Their-Thoughts-101302694.html
This is very disturbing, very, very disturbing. We must fight this and nip it in the bud. We cannot have corporate media control our lives more than it already does.
LOL, this will not work, unless they precisely define what a blog is. Facebook is also a blog. Lol everyone with facebook has to pay $300???
No. They consider Facebook as 1 blog! So FaceBook would just pay 300 for the entire operation. It is little bloggers that are silenced.
They can ask the question on city tax forms. If you deny you have a blog, you may be prosecuted for cheating city taxes and fees.
$300. tax and fee for blogging? Is this for real? How do they plan on executing this? I think this is so absurd. Wouldn't this violate people's right of expression?
According to the original article, the city sent out notices requiring the fee from those people who had indicated in their tax return that they had received revenue from their blogs: http://citypaper.net/articles/2010/08/19/blogging-business-privilege-tax-philadelphia The claim that it is a tax on blogging even if it makes 'no money' is obviously exaggerated just to get people all excited. The licence applies only if people make money, even if it is a tiny amount. The situation can easily be interpreted as an attack on freedom of expression (its not like the cactual press is free from taxation), but really it is just sloppy bureaucracy trying to steal a few extra pennies. Nonetheless, there should clearly be an exemption for 'businesses' that make less money than the cost of the license. Although, I admire the spirit of the guy who said "I don't think blogs should be taxed unless they are making an immense profit." If only 'immense profits' was the threshold for paying tax...
thats blatantly unfair. this woman hosted her blog with wordpress servers. so having a facebook account is basically the same thing.