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US Says Canadian Copyright As Bad As China's, Russia's
An anonymous reader writes "The US is blaming Canada in a new
report that claims that Canadian copyright and intellectual
property laws are as bad as those found in China and Russia. Michael Geist notes
that Canadian officials have dismissed these findings in the past,
arguing it 'does not recognize the Special 301 process due to its
lacking of reliable and objective analysis.'" (Read more about the annual Special 301 report.)
We've been 'called out' several times. Legislation has been drafted similar to the US and has caused an uproar every time, causing it to be delayed/withdrawn. It looks to me like a show for the Americans to keep them 'happy,' as it were. Just enough to tell them, "we're trying." As long as they keep trying to pass these laws, we'll keep kicking up didos.
Unfortunately, although once a great trading republic, the United States is now a military empire,
WRONG. THe USA has pretty much always been a military empire. Many of our nation's first military actions were to go bomb some town south of our borders to force them to sell to United Fruit Company, which became Chiquita, which became Bonita — and which is still up to illegal tricks to keep their stranglehold on the banana industry in particular.
We are an independent nation, and don't react well to being told what we ought to do by our bankrupt southern neighbours.
You seem to do as you're told the majority of the time.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Indeed, just look at the recent case where MacLean' Magazine (Canada's version of Time) got taken to the human rights commission for hate speech.
Watching that unfold really opened my eyes to just how draconian some of our hate speech laws are. The human rights commission has their own rules, and run a kangaroo court worthy of Stalin.
MacLean's only got out of it because they have such a large readership. A huge part of the Canadian population was watching the proceedings and the human rights commission had to let MacLean's go. Otherwise the public would have demanded their closure. But from what I have read a few smaller companies and individuals have been taken to the cleaners by these guys.
I am generally pretty happy with the laws here in Canada, but there are a few things that make you wonder what kind of clowns are running this country.
On a happier note, the Canadian RIAA pushed for those stupid levees on our CDs to compensate for piracy. They made a good buck on that scam too. But now the tables have finally turned. We already have a system for compensating them for piracy. They can lobby all they want but the legal precedent is in place. Generally judges are less corrupt then politicians, so we do stand a chance.
You don't think that perhaps its possible to legally download music because the artists released their music for FREE to and allow you to download their music LEGALLY?
a significant cross-section of the law is still defined in an unwritten common law
All countries whose legal systems derive from the British system are in this position; the US is no exception. The US system also has the issue that the common law varies from state to state and courts may or may not decide to accept precedents set outside of their jurisdiction as they see fit, which makes the entire thing even harder to deal with.
O RLY?.
What he should have said, of course, is that in the US it was made quasi-illegal by government-backed witchhunts investigating people's private political opinions without lawful authority and pressuring large proportions of the population into withdrawing any form of cooperation with anyone found to be involved in the communist party, thus effectively substantially limiting the free speech of anyone who wished to express communist thoughts and effectively decimating the membership of the organisation whose web site you link to.
While this is not technically making it "illegal" it is the closest thing a government can do that isn't actually making it illegal, and the fact that they stopped doing it is not adequate compensation for the fact that it was done, and that the process effectively ended the possibility of left-wing politics gaining a real foothold in America for fifty years. The damage has not been undone entirely yet.
For a list of Canadian Bands
Please see below for some Canadian bands you may not have heard of from the 90's (and earlier) to check out on youtube. Listening to a song from one of their first 2 albums is a good place to start.
*Bands you'll probably like*
*90's*
I Mother Earth
The Tea Party
The Tragically Hip
Age of Electric
Sam Roberts Band
Big Wreck
Moist
Our Lady Peace
*Older*
Rush The Guess Who - "American Woman"
Bachman-Turner Overdrive
Neil Young & Crazy Horse
*Bands you may like*
Barenaked Ladies
Big Sugar
Blue Rodeo
The Crash Test Dummies
Econoline Crush
54-40
Finger Eleven
The Gandharvas
Gob
Jeff Healey Band
Killjoys
Matthew Good Band
Prozzak
Sloan
Spirit of the West
Treble Charger
Wide Mouth Mason
Zuckerbaby
Hope you enjoy some of the talent we have here up north.
Regards,
Chris
Ensuing Silence - A Canadian Band I played in. Check out the solo in "Believe It"
www.myspace.com/ensuingsilence
Canadian Music is actually pretty wonderful. The only problem with Canadian music is that the bad acts make it big for some reason (like nickelback, avril etc etc) while really solid acts like Feist, Broken Social Scene, The Stills, Crystal Castles (it's easy to continue) have difficulty making it mainstream. I like all these bands so its hard for me to see how people couldn't, but give Radio 2 a listen, they're doing great things to promote the Canadian music scene (when they're not playing classical) tl;dr: Canadian music is awesome, but bad is popular and good is still indie
You're joking, right, AC? There are as many good artists in Canada (i'd argue more) as there are in the US. However, they aren't as buried in the quagmire of cookie cutter RIAA crap and American Idol rejects as the really good US artists are. But, you wouldn't know that listening to Rick Dee's weekly top 40, would you?
I won't bother naming names, since tastes vary, but I don't count Celine Dion or Nickelback in the mix.
While I agree with you on America's messed up copyright laws, the problem apparently is that a lot of commercially bootlegged products make it into the US through Canada. The Canadian government essentially permits this, for example, if you drive across the border with a truck full of DVDs, the Canadian customs agents can't stop you without getting a warrant. If I were the Canadian government, I would consider allowing this until the US agrees to a more reasonable copyright, say 20 years.
20 years? How about, until the author dies. I'm getting pretty sick and tired of people like you telling me what I can and can not do with my music. Yeah, I want to give it away for free, does not mean that 20 years from now, you can use my music as the backing song to a commercial espousing views I don't believe in. It does not mean in 20 years you can take my work, remix it to something you like more, and claim it as your own. I'm sick and fucking tired of extremists who are either trying to screw over the audience, or screw over the creator.
I don't believe in DRM, I don't believe in gouging fans. Like I said, I'd rather give away my music for free and release limited edition albums for collectors. But I don't want to see my music taken away from me so long as I'm alive. And even after death, what then? Stop pushing for limited copyright lengths, you sound just as selfish as the record labels you're trying to fight against and it doesn't really inspire the artists to hear that you expect them to give up their hard work in the near future.
I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
I'm getting pretty sick of people like you claiming you own music. Once you let it out the door, it ain't yours any more. If you don't want it duplicated, covered, used in a commercial, etc. then KEEP IT TO YOURSELF. I'm not missing your creativity right now.
Anyone can parody it, even now. That's right: they can use your own music and turn it around to mock you. And it's totally legal.
I don't have much sympathy for people who want complete artistic control of their music into perpetuity. Stealing bits of music is an old artistic tradition, as old as music. Bach did it, so did Berlioz and Liszt. In fact you've probably done it yourself: as Picasso said, good artists copy, great artists steal.
Copyright was established to promote the arts and science, not to satisfy control freaks. 20 years protection is more than enough time.
Qxe4
You wouldn't think so... But strangely enough Marc Emery got hauled off to jail for breaking a U.S. law on Canadian soil where there is no law against his actions. Thanks for setting that precedent Stephen Harper.