On the topic of paying less, there's a saying which goes something like this :
"the cheapest price you can get for a thing is to not buy it" [1].
Of course this can't be applied for everything but a lot of people, myself included, tend to buy a lot of gadgets they don't need and don't use.
This is a simple advice but I think it can go a long way to saving money.
[1] if someone has the exact quote, I'll be thankful for it.
The worst enemy of freedom in software is not Microsoft, it's Apple. You're pretty free to develop and distribute software as you want on Windows. On new Apple devices, they control the way the software is distributed, they tax you, they make you obey their rules. Imagine a world with appstore as the main way of distributing software for any kind of devices. This would be hell. This is where Apple is going.
Stop using Apple. Use Linux, or if you can't, use Microsoft.
Also in France we have a tax on CD-R, DVD-R, hard drives, mp3 players which is given to the music companies to compensate their losses from pirating (you pay that tax whether you pirate or not. And still haven't the right to pirate after paying it).
The ISP also give 1% of their income to those companies.
So yes I think taxing the search engines is the logical next step.
Actually he uses a lot of software. There's ableton + several vst plugins like ozone izotope, waves L2, waves GTR : it still costs thousands of dollars...
[1] if someone has the exact quote, I'll be thankful for it.