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Canadian Minister Promises to Fix Copyright Law
Mashiki writes "In Canada, we can download Mp3's and their assorted goodness without too much of a hassle, recently the CRIA and their friends lost the court case. Well, it would appear that the new Federal Heritage Minister Helene Scherre, has spoken and those words were: 'As minister of Canadian Heritage, I will, as quickly as possible, make changes to our copyright law.'"
So does that mean the CD-R Tax disappears?
/not canadian
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Even for Canadians.
My faith in human (read: political) nature has been restored!
Those who can, do. Those who can't, write technology blogs.
That a federal election isn't that far off... And slogans like "Helene Scherre wants to put your kids in prison" look great on T-shirts and the news...
Between governments and the people. Already countries have to compete for the best citizens. Eventually they will realize this means making laws people _like_ as well. I'll postpone my departure to Canada until the dust has settled.
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Fair enough. Some people download music, some people don't. But consider his quote:
/.'ers comment that the music industry is holding onto a failing business. We don't need them anymore. Despite being wrapped up in the industry by being the winner of a [cheap knock-off] American Idol* contest, he sees the Industry's role as "a new way to survive," as opposed to some criminal challenge that they must overcome.
"I think it's a challenge for the industry, to try and find a new way to survive."
This lends creedence to many a
My hats off to him, especially given his previous quote, "Whether people download or not, as long as they're listening to music."
* Yes, I'm a Canadian. Paul Martin has yet to earn my respect.
I wonder what she means by "Fix" when talking to the recording industry. I have a feeling that it would coincide perfectly with "break" to everyone else.
The real criminals don't break laws; They write them.
This is just one minister. Whether or not she can pass any bills is up for debate. The bottom line is that we pay levies now to download music, and the music industry shouldn't be able to make us pay levies and buy music. They can't screw us twice without someone noticing. Recently someone noticed too.
Hi there
Canadian Idol winner Ryan Malcolm expressed skepticism, and suggested the Canadian music biz find a way to live with file-sharers.
"Whether people download or not, as long as they're listening to music," he said.
"I think it's a challenge for the industry, to try and find a new way to survive."
Wow I've never heard that from someone outside of slashdot, now we just need american idol singers to say that, and maybe nsync and britney spears, then MAYBE (doubtfull) people would listen.
What really kills me is that Bill Mahr (I think he's really funny and I love his show on HBO) calls downloading music stealing just like tons and tons of other people. It isn't stealing, you can't steal something by copying it, I wish more people would understand that. It's copyright infringment, not stealing.
We will, as quickly as possible, remove minister Helene Scherre from office.
(/me dreams of being Canadian just for a while)
Ceci n'est pas une signature
So in what world is putting a file that you do _NOT_ own the copyright on, and have not actually obtained permission from the copyright holder to copy for purposes beyond fair use, in a publicly shared folder for others to obtain _not_ a violation of the copyright act?
Downloading copyrighted materials may be perfectly legal in Canada (albeit unethical IMO, since one is aiding another in violating copyright), but it makes no sense to even _BEGIN_ to tolerate uploading whenever and wherever you can positively ascertain that it is occurring.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
There is no doubt that the singers and other supporting personnel do need to make money from their talents. For this to happen, people have to buy their music. But when people share music collections on P2P services, the artistes are, without doubt, robbed of their fruits of labour.
However, at the same time, it must be noted that more c90% of proceedings from CD sales go to the record labels. P2P sharing hits more the big record labels than the actual artistes.
A P2P system where the artistes get paid per song downloaded would be an ideal solution.
Canadian Idol winner Ryan Malcolm expressed skepticism, and suggested the Canadian music biz find a way to live with file-sharers.
"Whether people download or not, as long as they're listening to music," he said.
"I think it's a challenge for the industry, to try and find a new way to survive."
The vast majority of artistes vehemently support electronic means of music distribution over the CD method. They have been ripped off by record labels for too long. Sadly, the United States of America, has now become United Corporations of America, and all laws dealing with P2P file sharing has been enacted according to the dictates of the rich record labels and their lobby groups. The wishes of the artistes are hardly ever taken into consideration. It'll be a sad day indeed if the much more socially progressive nation of Canada follows in the footsteps of her corporacratic Southern Neighbour.
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The court decision inspired panic in the Canadian music industry; industry spokesmen were predicting the collapse of copyright control would cause severe financial hardship for people making their living from music.
If only the people making their living weren't suffering at the hands of labels and record companies/associations already, I might even agree with the people on this side (the CRIA) of the fence.
We all know that artists who don't make enough drama or news to get endorsements, major deals and huge publicity, already have a difficult time making their money from their music alone.
Green's Law of Debate: Anything is possible if you don't know what you're talking about.
The key part of the Canadian ruling was that sharing files is perfectly legal. They didn't say distributing was.
Basically, if you leave a copy machine in a room full of copyrighted books, no copyright violation has been comitted. Now, that copy machine could certainly be used in infriging ways, and it can also be used in a few ways that are okay under fair use. But if the machine just sits there and nobody uses it at all... then there's no way there's any infinging use could have happened.
Translated to the digital world, a server that is offering files up for download can't infringe any copyright until somebody actually accesses the files to make an illegal copy. And this brings up a Catch 22 for the "copyright police"... see, in order to actually prove that there was a download they either have to either intercept a download in progress (good luck doing that...) or they have to initiate a download themselves, but whoops... if the copyright owner tries to download their own work, they can't possibly infringe on themselves!
So, basically, there's a problem in the law that's driving the "copyright police" crazy... short of the copyright pirate confessing, how are they gonna prove that an actual violation took place?
Buy off a minister to change the laws for you.
Just think, our very own Senator! Cash value 1/100 of senate...
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
Her email address: Scherrer.H@parl.gc.ca
& u=/washpost/ 20040330/tc_washpost/a34300_2004mar29
Paul Martin's email: Martin.P@parl.gc.ca
Honourable Ms. Scherrer;
I have heard your recent comments about seeking to change the Copyright Act.
I would urge you to consider very carefully what steps are taken in any changes to this act. As the act stands, Canadians pay a levy on
recordable media, money from which specifically goes to the music industry in compensation for supposed lost revenues.
As such if the law is changed, I would also expect any media levies to be immediately lifted, as the proper method for handling any cases
of copyright infringement would then fall to the music industry and the legal system of Canada, and not to a discriminatory levy applied
to the majority of law-abiding citizens.
Beyond this, the issue of whether revenues are lost at all is entirely debatable, as you can see in this story from the Washington Post
citing a study done by two university researchers specializing in economics:
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story
I realize that I am not of your riding, but I have been a Liberal voter for many years now, even though I live in Calgary, Alberta. I
am probably one of the few Liberal voters here.
However, this issue of copyright is a very important one to me because those countries that address the issue properly stand to be at the
fore-front of the information economy. Limiting information flow to prop up business models that simply are no longer feasible is not the
way to go about this. While I do not support the policies of the Conservatives, your actions on this issue will certainly be enough to
determine whether I decide to place my vote in a party other than the Liberals in the coming election.
I do not feel that I am alone.
Thank you for your time.
Name & Address Stuff
That Jesus Christ guy is getting some terrible lag... it took him 3 days to respawn! -NJ CoolBreeze
Yeah, and the irony is stealing is closer to what the Corporates are doing, because they are reducing the public's access to stuff - either by extending copyright periods (retroactively even) and reducing/removing "fair use".
When you copy something the owner still has full access to the original.
But when you extend a copyright on something that would have entered public domain, the public loses what would have been rightful access to it.
So who are the real thieves?
Pity too many people are too ignorant to see that - they have been intentionally brainwashed by the Corporates - with deceptive terms and phrases like Intellectual Property, Piracy, Copying=Theft.
I've written to my local newspaper regarding this, and they did print it (but naturally the industries concerned have a stronger lobby and voice than I do), maybe more people should write in and educate the rest.
Let's put it all on the table if we're going to deal with this problem seriously and take a good, hard look at how musicians are compensated from both ends -- producers and consumers.
I have a feeling a lot of record companies would tone down the rhetoric or employ frantic hand waving if their business practices were exposed to some scrutiny. I do not understand why artists haven't brought up the issue of royalties before the Internet and I'd wager the total value of royalties "lost" to file sharing pales in comparison to the amount record companies extort.
Personally, I do not download music from Kazaa and the like, but I have used Puretracks. If services like Puretracks or iTunes existed years ago we might not be in the mess we are now.
http://cb-cda.gc.ca/news/c20032004fs-e.html
I hate it immensely when governments LOOSE court cases, and then cry poor baby, and then change the laws, like fuck the law, i mean if they loose, they really can 'force' it so they can win. Part of the court ruling should be that the govt cant then go back and 'fix' the laws. Why have laws, lets have a dictatorship since basically the govt does what it wants to a large extent, until they get voted out but the boys already have their big business deals and friends in high places...
It happens everytime btw, not just about (C) crap, but even minor laws or small so called 'loop holes'.
Rise up!! Revolution be cometh 2012.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Copyright Goon: Your honor, we want the ISP to turn over the name of the user who has IP adress 14.34.23.29 because they are sharing "Our Song", which is our copyrighted material on the Internet.
Judge: Okay, how do you know that a computer 14.34.23.29 is committing copyright infingement against your copyrighted material.
Copyright Goon: They're offering our material up for sharing over the StealTheirMusic protocol for anybody to download.
Judge: Okay, can you prove that anybody actually downloaded that material?
Copyright Goon: Yes, because we downloaded "Our Song" from that server.
Judge: Uhm... that's not an unauthorized copy being made if you downloaded your own song. You started the download, you authorized the copy being made.
Copyright Goon: Uhm... okay. Can we search the guys computer to see if there's transfer logs that prove he transfered "Our Song" to somebody else?
Judge: No. You've gotta show that there's been an infigement first. You can't go blindly fishing like that.
Copyright Goon: Can you make the ISP let us get a trace on that IP's outbound traffic so we can look for a transfer?
Judge: No. That's still fishing.
Copyright Goon: But we're sure they're stealing "Our Song" out there. Our sales are down!
Judge: Come back when you've got some proof...
_nfotxn
The recording industry should not make artists sign over their copyrights. If the music execs purport to protect the poor artists, then they should do business with these artists without requiring that they sign over anything.
The music execs should stop promoting all the garbage music that they promote. This is the real cause of declining music sales. If the music execs would promote quality music instead of this garbage, they would most likely see increased sales. But instead of doing business wisely and increasing profits through smart management and marketing, they prefer to litigate.
The music execs should stop overcharging for CDs. This is probably the second cause of declining music sales. People simply don't want to pay $20 for an album, and one that contains 1 or 2 good songs and 8 filler tracks to take up space. If the music execs would lower music prices instead of raising them and then wondering why sales decline, they would most likely see increased sales. But instead of doing business wisely and increasing profits through smart management and marketing, they prefer to litigate.
The music execs should pay the artists the larger portion of the pie when it comes to music revenue. If the sale of a fifteen dollar album currently earns the artists about two cents, then that is a very sad situation, and it means that the music execs are the ones screwing the artists over, not those downloading MP3 tracks. The music execs should pay roughly 95% of the profits to the artists, and keep the 5% as their fees. Not the other way around. But instead of doing business wisely and increasing profits through smart management and marketing, they prefer to litigate.
In other words, the pirates are the music execs. But they use P2P users as their scapegoat, blaming them for a reduction in music sales, when the evidence is highly questionable at best, and is probably nonexistant.
MUSIC EXECS: *Y*O*U* ARE THE PIRATES!
I think that those who compared the sharing with installing a photocopier in the library are on to something. The trick questions is: what is distribution? IMHO, we should re-evaluate what consitutes a "distribution", given that it became so cheap an simple with the advent of the Internet.
Just like people noted before, when I share a file on a p2p network, I'm not really distributing it. Every downloader had to 1. get a computer 2. get an Internet connection 3. get a p2p client 4. find the file 5. initiate the downloading. Understandably, there's an illusion of a distribution here, because a p2p network beats any library by its size, and all of them put together by its content, but I am still willing to argue that downloaders do more for the "distributing" than the sharers.
Sharing was made possible by a technology that could not be envisioned when the copyright law was created, and we won't get far by suing people who engage in it. A legal change is what we desperatly need: a kind of a copyright law that would allow artists to get paid, while all people are able to share the information in an unrestricted manner, for non-commercial purposes. I'm am of opinion that art will survive even if we go all the way and declare information free, but heck, I'll settle for a voluntary collective licensing scheme too.
Having said all that, the minister seems to be moving in just the opposite direction, but after I've seen RIAA, I'm not surprised anymore...
I respect "copyright" in the original sense; something about promoting the sciences and useful arts, remember?
I do not respect the disgusting perversion of copyright that greatly restricts new art based on the old (How many of Walt's classic movies are an entirely new storyline and NOT based on fairy tales, legends, or other earlier works? Steamboat Bill Jr, anyone?). Most art, and perhaps all science, builds on what has been done before. To quote Einstein; "If I have seen further than other men, it is only because I have stood on the shoulders of giants"
I do not respect the "Mickey Mouse Protection Act" (Sonny Bono, etc), a 'copyright' extended so far that any work you see created in your lifetime will not enter the public domain until long after you die.
And I do not respect the DMCA, a disgusting perversion of 'copyright' that restricts what has traditionally been 'unregulated' use. Not just fair use, but 'unregulated use' completely unrelated to the act of 'copying' in any traditional sense. Studying and understanding something that I legitimately bought, or even using something that I OWN in unconventional ways.
I know what I believe in. There's no contradiction here.
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...the copy is made on-demand. Is it made by the sharer, or the downloader?
Sharing a file in itself makes no copies. So, there's no copyright violation until an actual copy is made. And when a copy is made, one of the two parties is making the illegal copy, the question is which one.
Yes, it is made on the sharer's machine. But you may again argue that this is like making it on the library's photocopier. What the court seems to have found is that it is the downloader that is initiating the copy, and thus the downloader that is guilty of copyright infringement.
That, combined with the legality of making a copy for private use, means it looks like Canadians are home free. At the moment, neither sharer nor downloader can be prosecuted for copyright infringement. Something tells me that'll change. Quickly.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Please, take the extra 30 secs, hit Print buy an envelope and send your comments to:
Hon. Helene Scherrer
Member of Parliment
House of Commons
Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 0A6
(Contact Page)
No postage required. (If your letter prominately states that it is going to an MP, no postage is required)
I work in a Canadian government office, and an e-mail is treated exactly like a paper letter. In fact, the Heritage Minister's web site says that explicitly.
. cf m
http://www.pch.gc.ca/pc-ch/min/contacts/index_e
Sending an e-mail ensures that the minister will get feedback quickly after her comments, letting her know that there's a fire to put out.
Frankly, I don't see any new law happening before the next election, so the easiest solution is to vote the Liberals out. But be sure to let them know your intent anyway. I sent my e-mail off last night.
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