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Canadian Copyright Reform Takes Effect
An anonymous reader writes "This morning, the majority of Bill
C-11, Canada's copyright reform bill, took
effect, marking the most significant changes to Canadian
copyright law in decades. Michael Geist summarizes
the changes, which include expanded fair dealing, new protection for
creators of user generated content, consumer exceptions such as time
shifting, format shifting, and backup copies, and a cap on liability
for non-commercial infringement."
Better yet. I live in a contiguous state. How exactly would we go about seceding from this American sinkhole?
come and sue me for that against my fair dealing defence, original content boy.
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
What is a "creator of user generated content"? Should that be "aggregator"?
This is unfortunate. A digital locks rule would not *necessarily* be a bad thing, if it contained a, "as long as it does not supercede the above-listed consumer rights" clause. As it stands, I'm pretty sure this is not the case.
Look, either do away with copyright, or actually do copyright right. Setting a cap on infringement simply means one thing: You can't sell anything to a home user for more than $4999.99 because it's cheaper if they just pirate it instead. That doesn't sound significant right now, but ask yourself, how much did you/your parents/your grandparents pay for a record in 1950? It's not so far fetched that the cap will be a significant problem in the future.
Of course, I'm on the side of "copyright is the problem", so I guess I should be happy with any scraps thrown my way.
What's it like to have a government that works for the people?
I had actually e-mailed my MP directly (a Liberal) and the Minister of Industry Affairs (a Conservative), making it pretty clear about how consumer's rights must be protected.
Looks like the levy on media is there; I guess music downloading will continue being legal in Canada. I'm fine with that.
The digital locks piece is what bothers me, and it's good that a process exists to have the governement re-visit this. So on top of my list will be to copy DVDs so that I can use it my devices. Since format-shifting is permitted then this should be fine on principle.
Michael Geist himself should be commended because he was a solid (constructive) critic and I remember seeing him on CSPAN doing an awesome job explaining the issues to the committee members. He played a BIG part in my opinion to get this bill the way it is.
Wearing pants should always be optional.
A great deal has been made about the expansions to fair dealing in this bill. However, there is a provision that "digital locks" cannot be circumvented, even for the legitimate purposes enumerated in the fair dealing expansions. The logical conclusion of this is that anybody producing any intellectual property can just slap a ROT13 cipher on their work and call it a digital lock. From there, all the new restrictions will apply, and none of the benefits. Anybody who reads the digital locks provision would realize that it's a loophole big enough to fly a 747 through, but based on the Conservative government's repeated refusal to amend that provision, it seems to be a feature, not a defect.
In short, this is a huge loss for the Canadian public, and a huge win for content producers.
we need more of your copyright crap
tally hoe for TPP up next to take more of your rights away
To be fair, I have to say that those fair dealing exemptions are a good thing to be added to the law.
The core problem is that those exemptions can be revoked entirely at the discretion of the content maker who can simply decide to utilize a digital lock.
This is an inherent self-contradiction. If fair dealing was allegedly a reasonable exemption to copyright infringement, then why should a choice that the consumer has no part in making (the decision to utilize a digital lock) change that? Even at best it's irrellevant, and it's a damn-near certainty that most Canadians aren't going to care about this at all when they are engaging in practices that still may qualify as fair dealing, and allegedly could have been completely exempt from copyright infringement, but are suddenly illegal just because of a lock's presence. Consumers may have a choice to not buy such locked content, but by offering legal protection for digital locks, the government has created an added value incentive for publishers to utilize them, and this so-called "choice" that consumer have is restricted by the actual availability of unlocked and alternative content, which in the face of the added value that locks might have for publishers, is only going to get smaller in the future.
People do not obey laws that do not agree with... at least not in the long run, and it is as certain as anything that Canadians will break this restriction at their own convenience, privately or otherwise.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Right. This is not the case. Every single concession given to consumers are provided the absence of digital locks. In other words as soon as a digital lock is applied, every single consumer right goes out the window.
And so yes, Canadians have been fucked over royally by their government (which was just a proxy for the US government) in favour of the copyright lobbies.
And all of this despite the fact that the government ran (a charade of) a "consultation" across the whole country with Canadians asking what they wanted, and even though Canadians told them overwhelming that they did not want a DMCA, that is exactly what they have shoved up the asses of every single Canadian.
And as far as it being a DMCA, it's even worse than the US "model" where at least that model allows for a review every few years of new exceptions that should be made to the digital locks provisions. Canadians get no such reviews and will live with these digital lock rules forever.
Even then, it comes down to 'You have these rights, but only if your hackers are better than our engineers.' While in practice all significently-deployed DRM schemes have been broken, it often takes many months, and even then may require substantial skill on the part of the end user to, for example, solder a chip into a console. It's very bad legal practice to have any kind of consumer right that can only be exercised by first winning a battle of skill with an engineer.
And as far as it being a DMCA, it's even worse than the US "model" where at least that model allows for a review every few years of new exceptions that should be made to the digital locks provisions. Canadians get no such reviews and will live with these digital lock rules forever.
From the Geist's summary:
"The government has established a regulatory process to allow for new digital lock exceptions, which creates the possibility of Canadians seeking new exceptions to at least match some of the U.S. exceptions on DVDs or streaming video"
I think there's four options here:
a) we as consumers push to get these exceptions in place using the process
b) we avoid products with digital locks
c) we come up with a digital -> analog -> digital conversion solution
d) we break the law and risk a max $5,000 fine
Wearing pants should always be optional.
and you get to pay the levy
get that into ya
angry yet?
Canada had a regulatory process to allow satellite TV service into Canada, and satellite radio service into Canada. Both took about 10 years to complete, and were completed simply because in 10 years a Canadian media conglomerate had figured out how to monetize Canadian consumers.
The answer is it will not work because history has shown it doesn't. It's okay, everyone will just keep pirating just like they always did.
I thought you guys were supposed to be the ones on top....
But it sure looks like you're yet another bottom bitch for the USA....
Is there no country with any balls anymore?
Oh well.. I might be screwed. But misery loves company.
Welcome aboard!
Under Canadian law, it is not an infringement to possess digital locks and liability is limited to actual damages in non-commercial cases.
But this is the important part. If you're ripping something for personal purposes, the most they can possibly sue you for is what they can prove they lost. This means that you aren't going to get ten-thousand dollar fines for ripping your BR of Cars so the kids' fingerprints don't get all over the disc. My lawyer has told me to "just eat" a fairly easy $2500 wrong. That means unless you're a commercial offender (i.e. selling for profit) you're going to be just fine.
And even if you own handbrake + a lot of other ripping tools, that in itself is not a crime and it couldn't be used for getting a warrant.
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
Geist says "Under Canadian law, it is not an infringement to possess tools or software that can be used to circumvent digital locks and liability is limited to actual damages in non-commercial cases."
I would take that to mean the bootleg DVD shop has a few things to worry about. As regular Joe citizen, should I rip a DVD to toss on a tablet, a studio could potentially sue me to the limit of proving their online download "product" is different from the DVD and get me for true, actual damages of the cost of that download. I would think commercial infringement carries reasonable penalties already, but adding the lock circumvention - when used for commercial purposes could stiffen things.
"There are some exceptions to the digital lock rules (including for law enforcement, interoperability, encryption research, security, privacy, unlocking cellphones, and persons with perceptual disabilities), but these are drafted in a very restrictive manner."
Hypothetical: Does that make it "legal" to circumvent Apple's iOS locks to jailbreak an iPhone for the purpose of unlocking it, but illegal to jailbreak an iTouch as it cannot be a phone? What if I have a Skype #, or other telephony application with a traditional 10 digital public telephone number on my iPod?
I'm not saying this legislation isn't well intentioned, or even that it is a step in the wrong direction. I just think there is a lot of ambiguity, and much of it will be case by case precedents that get set. The real problem still exists that access to the judicial system isn't for us people who work for a living, and I think I paid for whatever rights my government granted me through taxes already and I shouldn't have to pay for them again by countering dilatory "bleed you dry" tactics of a large-scale rights holder to establish them for good.
new protection for creators of user generated content
So... users? I think you mean hosts of user generated content...
It looks like you're right that it's not a crime to have that software, but it looks to me like 41.1(c) makes it a crime to create those tools or provide them. Also, you might be "import"ing the software (a new crime per this law) when you download/update it.
Interestingly, this law has the same weirdness as US' DMCA: it defines circumvention in terms of doing something without the authority of the copyright owner. But for tools, there never is any specific copyright owner. That creates a two-pronged weakness (just like DCMA) in that
So this law is theoretically solvable the same way as DMCA: everyone, go make a movie, and publish it on CSS-protected DVD. Then sew chaos.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
So... if something has DRM, someone can send it out of Canada, have the DRM removed, and have the DRM-free version sent back to Canada where it will now be subject to the consumer rights statutes?
The big question forms around what is considered a "digital lock" and what is considered "format shifting" -- I like to shift my content from encrypted to world-readable, so that I don't have to worry about key expiration. Is this legal until someone claims that the encryption was actually a lock? Is it even legal after that?
Time to start reading the details I guess....
Until the 'content protecting' algorithm is covered by a patent where you need a $1M licensed tool to encrypt..
guess poor aren't meant to enjoy culture
screw you and your rich jerkoff mentality
Anyone who decodes that devilishly clever code scheme will be guilty of breaking the locks.
All codes are symbol patterns. Just because a code is common does not mean it is not a code.
Rich?!?! Ah, little do you know ...
Do what I do, go to a library. Last I checked that was free. Or break the law or commit civil disobedience.
Do you want pity? Get some manners first. No man, screw you.
tosses snowball
Then sew chaos.
Um, I don't think you said what you thought you said, and I don't see how it can be an innocent typo, considering how far apart the E and O are on a keyboard. "Sew" means repair a cloth. I believe you meant "sow", which is what you do with seeds to make something grow. I.e., "sow the seeds of chaos."
You don't read many books, do you?
Free Martian Whores!
Who said: Blame CANADA???
I think he meant "chaos ensues".
and rip it
I'm actually pretty happy with this. Educational institutions are pretty much exempt and a glaring loophole has been left for them: any infringement on their part is treated as non-commercial, and damages are capped at $5k. This is a good thing, use your imagination.
You're not going to have the recording industry send individuals to the poorhouse with absurd damage claims for file-sharing, like the RIAA does in the states. $5k in damages in hardly worth going after, given how legal fees work in Canada, any suit case would incur a significant net loss, so you're not going to see many of these, if any at all.
Fair use in general is beefed up, which is good, but that being said, copyright infringement is still very much illegal, which is also good. As a contend creator, all I really need to do now, is have some form of digital lock, and I can more or less cut out the middleman, even if it's something as trivial as digital fingerprinting or a serial key unlock. Both content providers and content consumers win with this reform, it's nothing but good.
What, were you expecting them to just scrap all form of copyright protection? Let's be honest here, how many people really break digital locks purely for the sake of making personal backups, and how many who claim they do are actually lying? What this reform says is, go ahead and do it, it's still illegal, but as long as you're not reproducing and redistributing commercially, it isn't financially viable for anyone to call you out on it.
Those who follow chaos don't give a crap about spelling.
Hail Eris!
Hail Discordia!
Not "Hail Spell-checker!"
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
Right. This is not the case. Every single concession given to consumers are provided the absence of digital locks. In other words as soon as a digital lock is applied, every single consumer right goes out the window..
Yeah so... I'm never going to buy anything that has a digital lock as now I can pirate for my personal use and not be worried about a ridiculous fine.
Worst case Ontario they come after me for (up to) $5000, I go to court and represent myself wasting as much of their time as I can asking dumb questions and I have sell my truck to pay for the fine.
It's worth the risk... but I'm not a lawyer so this should be a good laugh...
Now doubt your assertion has merit, however I believe negotiating Canadian content had something to do with the tortoise-like pace.
So the Blind and those with eyesight issues get it up the *ss because everything has it put on by default.
I suppose nobody considered *that*.
Further ignorance, most people don't go near digital locks, they either have or generate keys, or go around the gate.
Hopefully someone from the blind society can point out the consequences.
Those who follow chaos don't give a crap about spelling.
Then they don't give a crap about communication either.
Free Martian Whores!
You understood what he meant, which means he was able to communicate with you. Spelling made no difference, only those with low self esteem trying to impress others with their superiority in spelling correct others spelling mistakes.
So if I get cought with 1000 songs on my computer, but fall under the non-commercial part of the legislation, what does that 5000$ cap mean?
Am I going to have one change of 5000$, or 1000 changes of 5000$ making the penalty 500,0000$?
Lies straight out of the pit of hell? Of course not!
In this thread you spin a yarn against spelling chaos, for words are the seeds of the ideas we communicate. In my defense, I should fairly mention that I am from a friendly flax farming family, simple sons subsisting on seeds we sow so that we may sew, so please give me a break.
*sigh* At least I didn't screw up affect vs effect again. I hate that one.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.