Arrived in my inbox about an hour ago:

The Government of Canada has introduced Bill C-61, An Act to Amend the Copyright Act. The proposed legislation is a made-in-Canada approach that balances the needs of Canadian consumers and copyright owners, promoting culture, innovation and competition in the digital age.

What does Bill C-61 mean to Canadians?

Specifically, it includes measures that would:

• expressly allow you to record TV shows for later viewing; copy legally purchased music onto other devices, such as MP3 players or cell phones; make back-up copies of legally purchased books, newspapers, videocassettes and photographs onto devices you own; and limit the “statutory damages” a court could award for all private use copyright infringements;

• implement new rights and protections for copyright holders, tailored to the Internet, to encourage participation in the online economy, as well as stronger legal remedies to address Internet piracy;

• clarify the roles and responsibilities of Internet Service Providers related to the copyright content flowing over their network facilities; and

• provide photographers with the same rights as other creators.

What Bill C-61 does not do:

• it would not empower border agents to seize your iPod or laptop at border crossings, contrary to recent public speculation

What this Bill is not:

• it is not a mirror image of U.S. copyright laws. Our Bill is made-in-Canada with different exceptions for educators, consumers and others and brings us into line with more than 60 countries including Japan, France, Germany and Australia

Bill C-61 was introduced in the Commons on June 12, 2008 by Industry Minister Jim Prentice and Heritage Minister Josée Verner.

For more information, please visit the Copyright Reform Process website at www.ic.gc.ca/epic/site/crp-prda.nsf/en/home

Thank you for sharing your views on this important matter.
The Honourable Jim Prentice, P.C., Q.C., M.P.
Minister of Industry

The Honourable Josée Verner, P.C., M.P.
Minister of Canadian Heritage, Status of Women
and Official Languages and Minister for
La Francophonie

While it is nice to (finally) see some communication to the public about this bill, I’m afraid I have to call bull$#!t on the talking points. Allow me to address a few of the more egregious:

…expressly allow you to record TV shows for later viewing; copy legally purchased music onto other devices, such as MP3 players or cell phones; make back-up copies of legally purchased books, newspapers, videocassettes and photographs onto devices you own; and limit the “statutory damages” a court could award for all private use copyright infringements;

To minimize the impact of my own ignorance, I offer this response from one far more qualified than I:

[None] of these provisions come close to meeting the concerns of the many groups that have spoken out on copyright over the past six months. Moreover, the Prentice Canadian DMCA is still likely to render Canadians infringers where they seek to use these new exceptions in the digital realm. For example, last week there were reports that NBC inserted copy-controls into some of their television programming that rendered Windows Vista Media Center users unable to record television shows. Under the Prentice plan, users that seek to circumvent the digital lock to record the television show (as he will claim they can) will still violate the law. The same is true for copy-controlled CDs - try circumventing the copy-controls to shift the music onto your iPod and you’re violating the law even with a device-shifting provision.

That’s Dr. Michael Geist, Law Professor at the University of Ottawa and Canada Research Chair of Internet and E-commerce Law, and one of the most outspoken critics of Bill C-61 and other industry-biased legislation. What I read into this is that even though Minister Prentice is paying lip service to the concerns of us “everyday” Canadians (whom I assume he is depending on being too lazy and/or stupid to realize what he’s doing), we are still having our rights sold off to foreign commercial interests. In essence, this bill simply promises to enforce whatever rules the major US studios feel like inflicting upon us.

it would not empower border agents to seize your iPod or laptop at border crossings, contrary to recent public speculation

Of course not… that’s the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA, the other US-led, rights-trampling, behind-closed-doors, bought-and-paid-for legislation that Prentice is shilling. Only ACTA operates on a global scale. Frankly, it frightens me even more than C-61.

The rest of that email is an exercise in vague double-speak and attempted spin. I’ve seen a few comments online from people saying this bill is dead in the water already, and only being thrown out on the table as a PR move for Minister Prentice to show his supporters/puppeteers that he’s trying to do their bidding, if only he didn’t keep running into that annoying inconvenience of “the people” (why can’t they just shut up and let him do whatever he wants so he can make lots of money for his friends at Warner Brothers??).

God I hope so.

Tags: Canada, Copyright, Law, Politics