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Canadian Supreme Court To Define ISP Role
Ubergrendle writes "The CBC is reporting that the Canadian Supreme Court is hearing a case regarding copyright royalties and the responsibilities of ISPs both here and abroad. From the article: 'The people who represent Canadian artists say everyone who has a hand in transmitting recorded music is liable. "Creative people should be compensated for the use and exploitation of their music," said Paul Spurgeon, general counsel for the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada. "We're obviously in a struggle right now trying to figure out the best techniques to ensure that they are compensated appropriately.'" This follows on the heels of the Canadian music industry asking that this case be heard. Given the trade relations, this case should have consequences far outside of Canada proper.
thats the case here in sweden.
It wasn't a comment in response to an article, it was the article itself.
Read:
Canadian Copyright Act
In particular, sections 80 thru 82 make it clear that we are already paying for the right to make private copies.
Its proper name is the Supreme Court of Canada.
/. doesn't want to keep the circonflexe over the 'e' in Supreme when I hit 'Preview'. what-ever.]
Tsk, tsk.
If you're going to be an asshat, at least get your facts straight.
"Supreme Court of Canada" is NOT its "proper" name. It is ONE of its coequal names. The other, of course, being "Cour supreme du Canada". There's that whole official bilingualism thing going on up here, doncha know?
[NB. Dumb-ass
I will point out that in the early eighties, software copy places did exactly that: Took advantage of a fuzzy area of the law ("evaluation copies") to make a buck. They lasted for a year or two until the software companies put pressure on, and then they were raided and royally busted.
A CD Copee Shoppe might last a year, but I'd keep all the profits off-shore somewhere like the Grand Caymans.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
More interestingly, they're ignoring the fact that most caches are of web pages, while most music is (AFAIK) transferred by P2P, which is (I believe) rarely, if ever cached.
If the music industry wins this case, ISPs would have the option of turning off their caches or paying a royalty of as high as to 10% of their income.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
No, but Michael Geist is, and he's also the Canadian research chair in Internet and e-commerce law, and he seems to think there is a good legal argument for saying it is legal.
But more to the point, the parent article here is not about the legality of downloading songs in Canada. It's about payment of royalties. In my own words, as I understand it, other broadcasters (radio, TV, etc.) have to play royalties to artists when they broadcast a copyrighted work. This case is trying to determine if ISPs, or anybody else, can be classified as "broadcasters" with respect to internet file trading for the purposes of collecting royalties.
In a sense, it's the other side of the coin from the downloading question. The Canadian Copyright Act appears to make downloading legal, but it seems quite clear that uploading (distributing) is not legal. While the levy on CD-R's legitimizes downloading in the Copyright Act, making ISPs (or somebody else) pay royalties for "broadcasting" may very well legitimize the distribution end of online sharing. After all, if you charge royalties to an ISP for songs that are distributed through it, you are creating a de facto license for the songs to be distributed through it. Might not be as clear cut as the CD-R levy, but I think it has legal merit.