(Updated) Canadians: Your Digital Rights Are About To Be Revoked. Read and Sign!
by Eric March on June 4, 2008 at 7:27 pm 
The Harper government has sunk to a new low. Now, since he has taken office, Harper and his goons have been fairly vanilla as world leaders go. But proposed new amendments to the Canadian Copyright Act, secretly crafted in back-room dealings and carefully shielded from the prying eyes of the Canadian people, and apparently inspired by (but going much further than) the Digital Millennium Copyright Act in the USA (17 USC [PDF link]) , could cripple your digital rights, affecting the enjoyment of iPod and iPhone lovers across the country.
The bill, which is slated to be introduced to tomorrow, could introduce a slew of new amendments, each more ridiculous than the other:
- A $500 per-infringement fine if you are found guilty of IP theft — which is more than the average per-item charge levied by the RIAA in the USA.
- ISPs would be required by law to turn over the IP addresses of users suspected of infringement, flinging the doors wide open for the CRIA. Until now, most ISPs have consistently denied the CIRA access to their logs on privacy grounds. Remember, we already pay a levy on blank media to help offset the cost of infringement, and don’t expect it to be rescinded if this bill passes.
- Copying of lawfully purchased CDs to digital media players would constitute infringement.
- Copying recorded television shows to personal media players for the purpose of time-shifting would constitute infringement if they are flagged as copy-protected by broadcasters. (You may recall the brouhaha recently of a US broadcaster that broadcast a few television shows flagged as copy protected, and the Vista machines that prevented them from being recorded because they paid attention to the copy-protection flag when they weren’t supposed to. Same deal here, only the law would side with the broadcasters, not the consumers.)
- Unlocking cell phones would be made illegal. Your jailbroken iPod Touch? Your unlocked and activated iPhone? NOT YOURS.
- Hardware or software designed to circumvent copy protection, even for personal archival or unlocking purposes, would be illegal. No CD or DVD backups or backup software, no mod chips, no virtual drive software that includes copy protection emulation, nothing.
And likely more. Supposedly, the bill has been drafted due to pressure from US organizations (RIAA, MPAA, etc.) to bring our copyright laws more in line with those of the United States, yet none of this was allowed to be vetted by the Canadian people.
Now, the Tories have a minority government, so there is a half decent chance that this bill will never be ratified by parliament, but it is a chance I do not want to take, nor do any other Canadians, who are incensed at our government’s presumptuousness and blatant disregard for the opinions and ideas of the very people these amendments will effect.
So what can do you about it? Write! Write to Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Write to Industry Minister Jim Prentice. Write to Heritage Minister Josée Verner. Voice your displeasure. Tell them that this is not the way to approach the protection of intellectual property. You needn’t write them all individually, though. Fortunately, a new coalition, the Canadian Coalition for Electronic Rights, has been formed to take the government to task for this travesty, and they have provided a helpful form letter you can read and sign and have it automatically sent to the aforementioned ministers. This isn’t a useless petition — these letters are sent straight to the inboxes of the individuals in question. Simply click on the link I have provided here, fill in your particulars at the bottom, and click Send.
Don’t let the government take away your freedoms. Let them know that your rights to use the devices and the media you have lawfully purchased or otherwise obtained the way you choose are inalienable. Tell them that they need to truly rethink their approach to copyright protection and craft a much more fair and balanced bill that doesn’t heavily favour Big Media at the expense of your personal liberties and freedoms. Even if the bill may not have a great chance of being passed, we need to send the message that we will not stand for such draconian, autocratic measures passed before parliament without so much as a by-your-leave from the Canadian people. Sign and send the letter. The digital future of Canada may depend on you.
UPDATE 8:29PM: Sympatico MSN Tech news have posted an article stating that this bit of legislation has been put off until next week while industry minister Jim Prentice tries to further tweak the balance of individual rights against those of the industry. Even given this week reprieve, not much is likely to change — at least, not much that the consumer would appreciate; even minor concessions by the government would still amount to meaningless gestures. This is a bill that needs pretty sweeping changes in order to really pay any deference to the concept of fairness. Furthermore, parliament will break for summer holidays around the middle of the month, and while ACTRA are pushing to rush this thing through, the chances are more likely that it will die on the table before anything is resolved before break.
As an aside, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has classified Canada on a par with the likes of China and Russia when it comes to copyright infringement. I’m just going to go ahead and classify WIPO as an organization that needs to bite me. WIPO’s “standards” are set so heavily against the individual that they aren’t even in the same hemisphere as fair. WIPO needs to retool its standards in order to give the individual back some of the rights they ought to have, and as far as I’m concerned, while IP certainly needs to be protected, we Canadians ought to be the ones to set the bar for fair and balanced legislation — and that’s not going to happen with the bill the way it is. Again, let the government know this loud and clear. Let’s show WIPO, the RIAA, the MPAA, ACTRA and the rest how we roll up here in the Great White.
(Sources: The National Post; Canadian Coalition for Electronic Rights; The Globe and Mail)
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June 4th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
Which is why I am proud to be an American. haha
June 4th, 2008 at 10:42 pm
Not nice to see big business directing politics. I know it’s happened since the dawn of the modern age, but still.
It’s such a backwards approach. Make the average consumer the criminal while the real pirates continue on their merry ways.
When will the big organisations realise this is a battle that CANNOT be won.
June 4th, 2008 at 11:11 pm
That is one of the things that bugs me the most about this kind of jack-booted legislation. It paints the people as guilty until proven innocent. You paid for that song? That movie? That piece of software? Prove it or we’ll hand you your ass. This is completely contrary to the way every other criminal law works in North America and most of the rest of the world, where your guilt must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt or you walk. And every last ounce of it is big business pushing the legislation through by pimping grossly inflated numbers representing “losses” to piracy, the overwhelming majority of which never had the potential to be sales in the first place. But that can’t be proven so they’re fair game.
The US constitution had the foresight to separate church and state so that religion couldn’t meddle in the affairs of the state. I propose a new amendment: The separation of corporation and state. Leave the wheedling snakes in three-piece Armanis out of anything to do with state, provincial, or federal policy, because if you ask me, letting businesses meddle with the political process is far worse than anything religion could ever do.
So sayeth the devout athiest.
June 5th, 2008 at 5:14 am
This is insane. This has been coming for a LONG time. There’s been rumours of a Canadian DMCA for at least five years.
This is despicable. Any law that makes criminals out of a huge number of people is an unjust law, and this act will CLEARLY make criminals of thousands of people.
I’ve sent my letter. Wish it gave you the option to customize it as a bunch of generic form letters aren’t going to do a lot.
June 5th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
Pathetic.
Signed it myself as well.
June 5th, 2008 at 11:40 pm
Ridiculous!
Jailbreaking??? Illegal???
Goverments just want more and more power don’t they?
I’ve lost all hope in the world…:P
I signed it!
June 6th, 2008 at 12:21 am
What the hell….seriously….
doesn’t point 3 mean we can’t copy songs on to MP3 players….so then that leaves the question….what the hell would be the point of MP3s in Canada D: ?!
June 6th, 2008 at 6:52 am
@J:
The RIAA/CRIA expects you to buy them again from iTunes and the like. No joke, unfortunately.
June 6th, 2008 at 11:18 am
J
As i understand it if it is flagged as coyp right you can’t caopy ity to a mp3 player.Meaning you could not download from bit torrent type services.But you would be able to download from sites like apple.
June 6th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
Eric: The RIAA is in for some serious disappointment. I already stopped buying physical CD’s eight years ago because of them. (Made TWO exceptions last year with Nine Inch Nails.)
So glad Trent Reznor is done with labels now. I can support my favourite artist without supporting that corrupt, despicable organization.
June 6th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
Incidentally, don’t make a distinction between the CRIA/RIAA. They are one and the same. A year or two back a bunch of Canadian artists came out and said “They don’t speak for us.”
This is about Harper, Prentice etc… whoring Canadian legislation to American conglomerates and nothing more. My wife read something that called Prentice as “traitor to the Canadian people” yesterday. I think Harper should be on that list.
I remember what society used to do to traitors…
June 6th, 2008 at 6:27 pm
Funny (as in funny-sad) thing is, Prentice is regarded as the PM-in-training. Good Lord, I hope not. I’m amazed that guy is able to form coherent sentences around all the industry dicks in his mouth. I know quite a few Canadian artists have basically disassociated themselves with the CRIA, and there are quite a few consumer advocacy groups that are chastising Prentice, ACTRA and the CRIA as well. There’s even a huge business coalition who are pressing for more fair and balanced copyrights, which include biggies like Rogers, Bell, Google, and so on. (I’m surprised Bell is in there, seeing as how they’ve been so willing to bend over for the CRIA when they ask for IP addresses.)
I actually haven’t bought physical CDs in years either. I’d like to say it’s because of a stand against the RIAA, but in reality it’s just because it’s easier and cheaper to buy online.
I also love how WIPO says that we’re just as bad as Russia and China when it comes to IP laws. That’s a perfect example of “what they don’t say” spin, because Russia, China and ourselves are in good company with 70% of the rest of the world who aren’t under WIPO’s thumb.
Digital media is where everything is heading. Physical media is dying out. Record labels are being forced to face their own mortality, and they don’t like it. Neither do artists, who are beginning to realize that the global market won’t long need agencies like the Big Four to make a living from their craft. Trent is the only one of the label jumpers that I like though.
Either way, I hope this comes back to bite Prentice in the ass. The man hasn’t listened to a single word from the Canadian people or consumer groups, hasn’t been returning phone calls, and has basically been trying to push this thing through and to hell with everyone else as long as Big Media is happy. This is Canada, damnit. We don’t cotton to that kinda crap.
June 6th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
Well there is hope it’ll bite him on the ass. During the election it came up that one MP who had been pushing for fixing copyright was being bankrolled by the CRIA. This got out, and she lost.
There was a recent meeting about copyright and Canada. I can’t remember the guys name but he has this whole presentation pointing out how Canada’s copyright laws are actually better for IP owners than the US laws. When the media companies found out he’d been invited to this thing, they threw their toys out the pram and had him disinvited. I WISH I could remember his name but it’s probably on Digg, Slashdot etc… Unless I’ve lost complete track of time it was just a couple of months ago.
Trent is the wave of the future. I gladly handed over the money for the digital download of “Ghosts”. And was prepared to pay again for “The Slip”. I LOVE that my money is going straight to Trent. I’d rather pay him $10 directly, than pay say $5 for a CD knowing those thieving bastards at the RIAA are getting a chunk of it.
June 12th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
[...] June 12, 2008 in Uncategorized Tags: digital rights, revoked, RIAA Yesterday a bill was introduced to the Canadian government that would criminize Canadians who illegal download music and would forceablly make isp give out our information to the equivilant of the RIAA in Canada which is the MPAA I believe: Here is a more indepth look at the situation and details on what it means, how it affects us users. Article by Eric March from http://www.touchpodium.com/2008/06/04/canadians-your-digital-rights-are-about-to-be-revoked-read-and... [...]
June 22nd, 2008 at 9:36 pm
lunacy