Copyright Consultations
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Archived - Booth, Grady
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- How do Canada's copyright laws affect you? How should existing laws be modernized?
- Based on Canadian values and interests, how should copyright changes be made in order to withstand the test of time
- What sorts of copyright changes do you believe would best foster innovation and creativity in Canada?
- What sorts of copyright changes do you believe would best foster competition and investment in Canada?
- What kinds of changes would best position Canada as a leader in the global, digital economy?
1. Canada's copyright laws can greatly affect the future of my country, of my children's country and should be modernized. This means that it should account for modern technology, not that it should be reinforced to combat modern technology. A modern copyright law recognizes that modern technology is the technology to copy and to share those copies and so copy restrictions are no longer feasible, or desirable. On the other hand, modern technology is also the technology to create and to share, and with this great explosion of creativity there is no longer any need for copy restrictions to provide incentives to create. The Internet itself is an incentive to create which can now replace copy restrictions. A modern country is one which forces itself early to adapt to this new reality of no copy restrictions.
2. Abolish copyright and we will be ahead of our time. Canadian values? The government has no business in the communications (bedrooms) of the nation.
3. Abolish copyright and we will be ahead of our time. New creative opportunities will emerge.
4. Abolish copyright and we will be ahead of our time. New business opportunities will emerge.
5. If I like a film, documentary, book, article, or song, I will copy it to my library. When I find that someone I know would be particularly interested in something I will send them a copy. That is fair use, and a most valuable new technology. I already get most of my media that way, on the recommendation of friends, even if those "friends" are diggers or slashdotters. What may not be fair use, people who host vast repositories of "free" pirated material, I have no use for anyway because I don't go out looking for "free" media: if I had a title in mind it would be because somebody would have recommended it to me, in which case they would have just sent me the media, too. Anything less than this scenario is just a temporary state where we can't fit a film in an email, or keep all of our films on our hard drive, or it takes too long. But not in the future it won't. We can lead the world with this and bring great wealth to our country and our children. Abolish copyright and we will be ahead of our time.
Grady Booth
