Slashdot Mirror
Canadian Mint Claims Rights To Words "One Cent"
knorthern knight writes "A weird intersection of copyright/trademark with politics is playing out in Canada. Short background: various Canadian cities and municipalities have launched a publicity/lobbying campaign seeking a fixed take from the GST (Goods and Services Tax, a national Canadian sales tax similar to European VAT). The amount sought is 1 cent for each dollar of the purchase price. This is summarized by the slogan 'One Cent of the GST NOW.' According to a press release, the Royal Canadian Mint (the federal agency that prints Canadian paper currency and stamps Canadian coins) has demanded from the City of Toronto $47,680 in royalties for use of the phrase 'one cent', and the image of the Canadian penny. $10,000 covers the use of the words 'one cent' in the campaign website address (www.onecentnow.ca) and email address (onecentnow@toronto.ca). An additional $10,000 is demanded for the use of these words in the campaign phone number (416-ONE-CENT). The remaining $27,680 covers the use of the image of the Canadian penny in printed materials such as pins and posters." Here's a National Post article on the brouhaha.
Oh shit...
Is that one cent, or point zero one of a cent?
At the bottom of the
But that's just my two cents.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power lost.
There are some days I have to double check myself and make sure I'm not reading the Onion by mistake. Those days seem to be becoming larger in number.
Anyone else think the comments just weren't rendering right before they turned off ABP and saw ads?
I thought the Romans had the cent long before Canada.
The game.
Loonies!
..only in America.
... change the tax to 'two cents', and forward all complaints to the 'Royal Canadian Mint'
The Canadian mint must have been inspired by all the similar antics that happen in America.
Canadians can't stand for this. We have to stamp the crazy out now, before it spreads.
"Live as if you'll die tomorrow." Ridiculous. You could die later today.
I can only assume this is some of our special overzealous brand of business retardation creeping north over the border. You have my apologies on behalf of the handful of us left here who aren't complete tools.
.... Toronto should pay. .... In cash. .... In pennies.
Please hand in your cents, coins and dollar bills.
What, did you actually think you owned those?
Bruhaha? Ha, ha ha! You've got the wrong guy, I spell my name... Nnn... DANGER!
Brought to you by the Department of Redudancy Department.
what's next, someone suing all canadians who say "eh" and "aboot"?
First Bush claims the Northwest Passage is considered an international shipping lane,
Then some dumbass politian sues GOD,
And now this.
The worlds gone crazy.
Crazy.
This is the mint, they deal with TONS of cents EACH AND EVERY DAY, you think 4.768.000 coins is going to scare them? They got machines for that. Oh and processing fees.
If you have any kind of a decent bank, they just take your old jar of coins, empty it in a machine and a little later they got a nice total and the money sorted. if your bank charges you for this, you know you got a bad bank. Granted, it is getting harder to find a good bank, in my youth banks went out of their way to advertise bank accounts to small kids, allowing them to save coins and then deposit them in a savings account. Their way of getting future business I guess. Today if you show up with a ton of cash to put into their accounts so they can make amazing profits on it, they charge you a deposit fee. Ah progress.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
If I recall correctly, FIFA, UEFA and the Olympics guys all tried to trademark extremely generic names like "Deutschland 06" (Germany 06) and "WM 2006" (WM referring to the german "Weltmeisterschaft", en. "World Cup"). Seems to be a growing trend, so trademark your favourite words now!
Will they sue 50 Cent fitty times?
Maybe the US Mint should insist they get paid instead...
Oh, and the Royal Canadian Mint isn't a "Federal Agency". It's a Crown Corporation (status similar to the US Post Office).
- "You have mail" AOL
- "Hall of Fame" National Baseball Hall of Fame
- "Entrepreneur" Entreprenour Media
- "Windows" Microsoft (ruled generic 1993)
- "Memory game" Ravensburger (a website I maintain was involved in that once)
Tradmarking common vocabulary is as questionable as patenting common tasks. The problem is that it is often cheaper to pay off than go through a legal fight. And that encourages the litigators. The good thing is that such battles usually are PR desasters for the companies involved.The penny has no redeeming value in the current economy.
Panic now, beat the rush!
Take that you smug little bastards! You sit up there all pointing and laughing at how insane the IP system has gotten in the US... HAH! Welcome to the new world, not so smug now eh? One Cent...holy crap... And its not even some profit mongering megacorp up there, its your freakin federal agency suing the city. On top of that the irony involved in the fact that the whole thing is about trying to get 'one cent' out of the tax, and the government response is to charge them for asking for it! Aaaahahahahahaa. Now maybe you won't be so damned smug when stupid shit happens here down south of you.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
Didn't Colbert suggested a few weeks ago that US should sue Canada over the use of the world "dollar"?
Cartman: Who's that? Canadian: It's Scott. (He works at the mint.) He's a d1ck.
Just ask the good Jedi how they feel about "Balance" now...
"A penny for your thoughts", quite literally. What's with this obsession with "intellectual property"? I have thought of many, many things. I have used these thoughts to create physical objects from raw maerials, to compose texts, to extend these notions and to combine them, to create new, previously un-thought thoughts. And it never occurred to me that I should pay the people that inspired those mental processes, nor did it occur to me to ask for remuneration for those thoughts I in turn shared with my environment. How can anyone claim ownership of a phrase, a collection of words, a simple idea like this and ask for rent?
This is getting more and more absurd. If you can let people get away with the claim that they "own" the words "one cent", where can we expect them to stop? Is there any reason they could not claim that the word "one", as an essential part of that phrase, is also their property? I'm not trying to be sarcastic here, I'd really like to hear an argument that could apply to "one cent" but not to "one".
-- Language is a virus from outer space.
U.S. and Canadian dollars are about the same right now.
Some of what I say is fact, some is conjecture, the rest I'm just blowing out my ass...you guess.
I've copyrighted the phrase "fucking idiots"
Now I'm goint to sit back and get filthy rich.
Fata viam invenient.
So governments can claim copyrights, trademarks, and get patents? I thought the point of these was for commercial enterprises in the market, which the government is not in (since it can grant itself a monopoly on anything it wants). What's their justification, that without the protection of copyright they wouldn't be able to make a profit...er... they already get taxes by law. They wouldn't be able to finance projects like coining (ha) the phrase "one cent"? I just don't get it.
Betty Joe? Betty Joe Biolofsky? I haven't heard that name since college. Of course, everyone knew you as "Nancy"...
...unless Canadian pennies weigh 9 pounds each.
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
Hmm. I'm Canadian and I haven't heard of this...
Just a correction to the summary: The Canadian Mint doesn't print paper currency.
"The Bank of Canada" prints paper currency.
"The Royal Canadian Mint" only makes coins.
Nope. The Royal Canadian Mint stamps coins only. The Bank of Canada is responsible for paper money, the actual printing of which is performed by Canadian Bank Note Company, Limited and BA International Inc (formerly British American Banknote).
Thanks Bullwinkle, a ruble for your troubles!
No! Not one red cent!
Your sig(k) has been stolen. There is a puff of smoke!
The Canadian mint didn't have a reason to do anything before their cent became a lot more valuable.
I am embarrassed to be Canadian. Clearly this is the first of many stupid things to happen. Next Up: Canadian Election. Do I vote for tweedle Dee or tweedle Dumb.
Windows on a mac is Windows under Supervision. - Frank Soltis(Chief Scientist/Designer of AS400)
"One cent for every dollar of the purchase prize", in my book, is a 1% VAT. Am I right? Because a 1% tax on nearly every item sold is not "just one cent", it's a considerable new tax burden.
At least this is a funny joke, as opposed to the not funny joke that is the president of the US.
Ruby Neural Evolution of Augmenting Topologies
The term One Cent has been used in common english for over a hundred years, as America uses the term on their one cent pieces http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Eagle_cent the image of the Canadian cent design is probably enforceable, but the name 'one cent' is going to far.
"Enjoy what you're doing! If it becomes drudgery, you're doing it wrong!" - Jim Butterfield
If they cannot use the phrase "one cent," what phrase are they supposed to use to accurately describe the amount being sought?
do they have to always represent it numerically? "0.01"? Or would they get sued for that too?
Obviously there must be a common collection of words which can be used to communicate without fear of being sued...I mean really, this is so absurd.
I have dibs on "two cents". Now pay up Canada.
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
everyday i read the front page and bump into **AA shenanigans, patent bullshit, entity X thats apparently screwing me and lawsuits that seem all doomsday.
it would be really nice and refreshing to read down the list one day and feel EXCITED and POSITIVE about technology again.
i realise 'controversial' stuff is all the rage and keeps the forums ticking over in a glorious eternal flame but i miss the days of being dazzled by cool stuff that i just HAD to know about.
it just seems like my favourite page to read everyday leaves me feeling pissed off rather than psyched - does it have to be this way?
Using the USofAn/English style decimal POINTS:
21,646 ton / 4,678,000 coins =
21,646,000 kg / 4,678,000 coins
~~ 4.627 kg / coin
(which would be a quite heavy penny IMHO)
I suspect each Canadian penny weights 4.627 _g_ per coin, so it would be
21.646 ton (21646 kg) per 4678000, ie, _ONE_ 40-tonner truck half-full of pennies.
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
nt
As someone living in Toronto, I'm happy to say that this probably isn't so much an issue of "silly" as it is an issue of "politics."
The issue at hand here is that the City of Toronto is essentially going bankrupt. The reason, the city asserts, is that the federal and then provincial governments have pushed expenses down all the way to the city; a good example is that cities in Ontario are now paying for social services (something the province once did). The Federal government just posted a CA$13 billion surplus, and the province has their own surplus as well; none, both have said, will go to help the City of Toronto with its near half-billion budget deficit.
Of course, the higher levels of government take a huge amount out of Toronto in taxes to subsidize the rest of the country. Torontonians are feeling a bit jaded knowing this now that there's such a huge budget shortfall for the city.
So the City of Toronto has been campaigning for both the province and federal governments to help out. The One Cent campaign was part of this, demanding more money from the higher levels of government. My guess? The demand for royalty payments from the mint is a political ploy from the federal government to slap Toronto on the wrist for, I'm guessing, rocking the boat.
$47,680 Canadian = $50,000 US.
We've secretly replaced Slashdot with new Folgers Crystals - let's see if it notices.
...to "Dollar"?
Stephen Cobert had a humorous bit about the U.S. charging Canada for trademark infringements for the use of the word "Dollar". Of course, he requested that the payment be made to the U.S. in Canadian dollars....
My mom always said, "Jim, you're 1 in a million." Given the current population, there are 7000 of me. God help us all!
I had always thought that 1d refered to its weight, 1 dram. Hence the term "penny dram" I could be wrong though, it's just what I had rattling around my head. I note that Wikipedia agrees with your good self on this matter however.
I didn't know George Bush was running for office in Canada. Who knew?
"My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right." --Senator Carl Schurz (1872)
the world has gone insane. At least I can know point out to my Canadian relatives that America isn't the only country full of stupidity.
Si vis pacem, para bellum! For evil to succeed good men need only do nothing!
Sorry to be pedantic but it is $48,430.68
The campaingn was launched, as TO is broke. The current administration was re-elected by the sheeple of the GTA, even though Mayor Miller, and his cabal of socialists ran up both a huge debt, and a huge defecit in their first term. The Provincial Government of Duhlton McSquinty has already told Miller the Industry Killer to pound salt when he went cap in hand begging for more money, and after some smarter councillors vetoed a HUGE property tax increase, Miller started in on this whine fest. he is basically trying to back-door the Federal Government, and try to shift his own poor administrative skills on to ALL Canadian taxpayers. I would not be surprised if the PMO had a quiet word with the Governor of the Bank of Canada about this. I sure hope the sheeple of the GTA wake up, and realize what a mess their mayor has made.
Sometimes Canada is just plain stupid. Anything owned by the government is, in the end, owned by the people themselves!
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Hey, have they put the (c) copyright symbol on all their coins?
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Just like the USA and many other nations, things get weird and stupid the closer we get to elections. It's all just one huge pissing match between overgrown suit-wearing preschoolers.
This won't accomplish anything useful, but it does garner lots of attention and sets up an opportunity for some political leader to "be a hero". It's all just a game
-Billco, Fnarg.com
...since they're the most informative posts I've spotted so far.
"One Cent" being on the currency. 2 cents not. Hence they should start registering "my-two-cents.ca" and the like, and change their demand from one cent per dolar to two cents per dollar.....
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
It might be fair if the one cent coin wasn't an integral part of your environment that every single person, government, corporation, or any other entity in Canada must deal with. The mint's value in the image is in facillitating trade. It's not intellectual property, it's currency which has its own special protections. If it wasn't currency, no one, including the City of Toronto, would care to communicate about it. If it's intellectual property, then there should be another source for legal tender currency & they can be absolved of that responsibility to society so they can tend to their intellectual property. Impeding communication & education about the basic constructs used to function in a society chips away at that society's foundation. If you can't see that, you're losing sight of the forest for the fake trees.
Actually, I think the CAD is slightly ahead at the moment.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Send a letter like the following to the royal Candian mint:
....
Dear sir;
My business sells services based on open source software internationally. Open source is a revolutionary means of developing software which has grown greatly in the past decade. I am sure you have heard of Linux, Apache, and other open source programs.
One of the distinguising features of open source is that you do not have to pay for license fees. That is right, Nobody has to pay even ONE CENT for the right to install and use the software. That is right-- you can make your pennies go further by not having to pay ONE CENT for license fees!
Please feel free to contact us so we can discuss what we can do for you. We will be sending this sales letter out to every governmental office (including every courthouse) across Canada.
Best Wishes,
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
He shrugged, "Sorry. It's in my geek nature to radiate trivia when it's least useful."
Know and love yourself, I guess. But, FUCK!
-FL
It's the "penny" campaign, the website will be at www.onepennynow.ca, the phone number will be 416-66PENNY, and we'll show a picture of a blank, copper-coloured disk with a poor, hand-drawn scrawl of Liz on one side and a poplar leaf on the other (i.e. a parody).
Hopefully the level of stupid currently occupied by the Canadian public will still allow somebody in office to be publicly humiliated and fired for implementing this insane penny ruse.
I think things might be a bit better if every now and again the public would haul a politician out of office to be thrown into the nearest lake for the crime of evil and greed. The only problem is that a significant portion of the populace is too stupid and greedy themselves to know which politicians need throwing. I would happily tell them, but nobody attends my soap box seminars.
-FL
They aren't insured by the FDIC because they are insured by the National Credit Union Administration. The NCUA and the FDIC are both backed by the US government. In general, Credit Unions tend to pay out more interest and charge less interest than banks, but have fewer ATMs, services, and other options than banks. Credit Unions also tend to be localized: your local credit unions (which, apparently, are not some of the better ones) may not have branches in any other cities, much less other states. Banks and credit unions vary so wildly that it's hard to say one is better- certainly a bad bank is worse than the average credit union, and a bad credit union is worse than the average bank.
Thank you all for voting conservative. Americanization forms to the right.
I have mod points and I am not afraid to use them.
Because everything's gone wrong
since Canada came along
with their beady eyes and flapping heads -
they're just trash!
And when they charge you with their hockey sticks or whatever, just remind them that this is the US© and
"it cain't happen herez!"
[cheap flag graphic]
What happens if I have already eaten (ie: incurred a debt to the restaurant) and then the only way that I can pay my bill is via the hundred dollar bill I have in my wallet?
*Yawn*
You're just so incredibly witty, a literary genius to be sure. Where _do_ you come up with this stuff?
blah blah blah