Slashdot Mirror
Captain Copyright Targets Kids
frank249 writes "The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency has set up a copyright education website called Captain Copyright. There is a section for kids with comic books and a section for teachers for grades 1-3, 3-6 and 6-8. An example of a grade 1 class activity: 'Present the following situation to students: Your friend is downloading a song off the Internet. In comes Captain Copyright. Ask: What do you think Captain Copyright will say?
Encourage students to brainstorm. Then hand out (or read) Line Master: Some Copyright Laws.' In Canadian law it is incorrect to download a song unless you pay for it. They also neglect to mention that Canadians pay a tax on blank media that is meant to compensate artists for downloads."
I can see that copyright law is clearly a priority for early education. Not grammar, or mathematics, but intellectual property and coporate interests. I guess all the top execs of the tobacco companies jumped ship to the recording industry so they can keep practicing their "hook 'em while they're young" campaigns.
Must. Restrain. Laughter. I think even small children are smart enough to realize that "Captain Copyright" is an idiotic idea. Kids don't respect educational cartoon role models in general; I see no reason why "Captain Copyright" will be any different. A generic super-hero with boring powers whose opponents are ordinary people instead of super-villains ... no one is going to find that interesting.
Philosophy.
...but this comic is lame. Look at this page and the previous one. Somebody gets an A just because they didn't use a bootleg version of the textbook? Give me a break.
There is also another page in the copyright comic that seems to confuse one issue (collaborate research and somebody trying to take all of the credit) with copyright law. The comic ended in a cliffhanger after a few pages, but I don't think this comic book is effective at all (not to mention lame), and the comic confuses issues, too.
Over on Boing Boing, they've noticed that the Captain Copyright web page has stolen a couple of sections from Wikipedia without including the required attributions. http://www.boingboing.net/2006/06/02/captain_copyr ight_wi.html
But never mind the hypocracy - what kind of teacher uses materials in class that did not come from an independant source? Don't they have pride in their profession? Ahem - won't somebody think of the children?
~~~~~ BigLig2? You mean there's another one of me?
On their website, under "kids" I looked up the meanings of some words and phrases related to copyright. Guess what's missing from the list. I'll give you a hint, it starts with "Fair" and ends with "use"
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
Copyright jackasses are marketting their kindergarten-level understanding of intellectual property to actual kindergarteners.
Fuck you. My pony is better than your stupid pony.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
copyrights, as well as a trademark, I think this is a bad thing.
...
Look, why won't Captain Copyright teach them about Fair Use, or the fact that colleges, schools, and universities are exempt from many copyright restrictions, or about public copyrights?
Now, having actually travelled across Canada on a Canada Council Grant, as a playwright and author, I know where some of the money paid by the library system goes. I'm not against copyrights, but let's tell the truth, not a distorted pro-corporate version
[fyi, if you try to look me up in the online database, my legal name is much much longer in Canada and has two hyphens]
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Yet another reason to keep your kids out of the public schools.
I think you've misunderstood. "Captain Copyright" is a character on a CRIA website. He has nothing to do with public schools. Actually, I think it's pretty unlikely he'd show up in a public school. We try to leave the special interests and religious education in the private and separate schools.
He said "incorrect." As in, the CRIA thinks it's incorrect and would like you to as well.
look at how people use god and religeon. If you do not see how it is used for control, from countries to families, you are blind, deaf and in denial.
and you should look at how other people, not under the influences you cite, experience God and religion. if you do see how it enriches, sustains, and gives hope, you're just stereotyping, which is merely intellectual laziness.
I am in awe that they have a 1 page PDF that takes up 5 megs, and despite it's title that would lead you to believe it contains Canadian Copyright laws, it actually doesn't reference any laws at all! If everyone downloads the PDF even once, we can Slashdot 'em pretty quickly! http://www.captaincopyright.ca/Teachers/Docs/LMCop yrightLaws.pdf
I am pointing out a simple fact:
religeon is use to control people.
you ever tell your child not to do something because it is againsts gods will?
Every threaten to punish a child if the question a belief?
I see people afraid to question the writing of their religeon out of fear.
I see hypocrasy committed by almost every person at church
I see church groups get together onnhow to get them
I see leader of countries demanding people kill themselvs in the name of religeon.
Enlightenment does not come from religeon. It comes from with in. Saying 'it's gods will' is NOT elightenment.
I have no problem with religeon, just don't blind yourself that people will use it to control you. Mostly into giving them money, but sometimes to get votes.
Hope for what?
I fink hope iwth the race when I see people help each other out, rescue a stranger, send machine outside out solar system. You know, actions people do that rise above the noise. Yeah smoetimes people do bad things, but other people bring it to an end.
I have never seen anyone who wasn't manipulated by there 'belief'. No one.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
If people put as much energy into reaching their goals as they put into religion, perhaps the reality of their lives would be good enough that they don't need fantasy.
Of course, I don't mean to call your religion fantasy. Yours is the right one, and everyone else in the world worships a fantasy. We both agree on that.
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
This is quality work compared to Christian cartoons.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
Going through the "True or False", section myself, I was quite annoyed at the absolute assumption that all "software" was illegal to copy, and this being beaten into children's minds, amongst other falacies.
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Michael Geist (www.michaelgeist.ca) has a great commentary on his legal impressions of the whole thing:
http://michaelgeist.ca/component/option,com_conte
My religion is a work in progress, ever proceeding onward towards the truth. I believe that this process includes debate. Currently I believe something about Jesus dying on account of sin. This sort of makes me Christian, but all the other "Christians" don't believe in the whole debate thing. I also believe that the English translations are all corrupt. I've made some progress learning Greek and Hebrew. Conversely most of those calling themselves Christians consider themselves either too busy or too dumb, or too.. something, to bother learning to read the Bible in the languages the English versions were written from. I find the fact that they haven't been so empowered by their religion a pretty strong indicator that their's isn't the right one. This does not, however mean that no religion drawn in part on the basis of the Bible can't be true. However, if one were to depend on this basis alone, most "Christians" aren't the greatest witnesses, nor are they on much of any factor. I testify to the unsuitability of most "Christians" I have encountered as witnesses despite finding myself clinging to the message of the Bible, and seeking to become the witness that I have found others not to be. Oddly enough, such "Christians" have done nothing to counteract me.
It turns out kids notice that nobody says "I believe germs exist" or "I believe in gravity", but people do say "I believe in God". And so kids are much less sure about God existing. (Nobody gets punished for not believing in atoms.)
I only wish more parents would realize that about their "beliefs", and think about it.
PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
If you could get your head out of your ass long enough to see something beyond file sharing, you'll discover that the site is about copyright infringement!
It's shitty, deceitful, and amoral, but it's not exclusively obsessed with file sharing. Unlike you, apparently.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
So where's Fair Dealing on their list?
They're the same idea, although the parts that aren't quite the same would drive your lawyer nuts.
You're right - it is a fallacy. To be factual, the bully should sell the copies at 25 cents a time, then give the kid back 0.12 cents for each copy sold, retaining all rights over the work for fify years, then after the kid dies, try to alter the law to allow the bully to retain all rights to the work, instead of the work passing to public domain.
That's the way it really works.
Have you ever had to come to terms with true equality which comes about due to the nihilistic implications of atheism? Without an ultimate arbiter of values in the form of God, all value systems have to be re-worked from the ground up to be intellectually honest.
For example, you might help little old ladies cross the street, give money to charity, and fight for a future in which it is possible to live. If there's a God, then all these things are automatically good, because the ultimate arbiter of value declared them to be good. However, without one, you have to define "good", find a reason why these things are "good", and dictate a reason why one ought to do "good" things. In the end, you might find that you're actually an egocentric immoralist who commits to moral actions as a means of self-gratification, because doing good things makes you feel good.
Then you have to deal with the fact that even if you find a "good" value and manage to justify doing "good" things, you're no different from the murderers, thieves and drug dealers at the bottom of the morality food chain. Your ethics don't set you apart in any way, especially since any rational definition of "good" places you in a position where you are less moral than you could be, and likely are a party to unspeakable acts of "bad" simply by living in a modern society.
This is probably why the religious meme is so strong: Not everyone can do the ethical calculus neccessary to live an honest life without God. In a very real sense, by giving people concrete, dogmatic answers, even misguided ones, you give people hope and even a sense of meaning.
It's been a long time.
I've been a hard atheist my whole life and don't buy that we get morals only from religion. We're social animals, it's in our best interests to help other members of our 'tribe'. This is seen in virtually every type of primate.
We're "good" to others because it what works best for helping our species advance.
Trolling is a art,