Copyright Consultations
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Archived - Begus, Barry
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- Do not allow anti-circumvention legislation to override the copyright balance. The U.S. Digital Millennium Copyright Act is not the only way to implement the WIPO Internet treaties. We can follow our own Bill C-60 by limiting anti-circumvention rules to circumvention for the purposes of infringement.
- Do not ban technologies that can be used to circumvent. Assuming it is recognized that there are many legitimate reasons to circumvent a digital lock, then the distribution of the tools (ie. software) used to circumvent is also legitimate.There is no international legal requirement to ban their distribution.
- Do not harm the public domain with copyright term extension. While some countries have extended the term of copyright beyond the Berne Convention requirement of life of the author plus 50 years, there is no compelling reason — either from an economic, creativity, or innovation perspective — to extend the term. Indeed, there are strong arguments that harming the public domain would have the opposite effect.
- Do not establish a three-strikes and you're out system that removes Internet access based on unproven allegations of infringement. Attempts at three-strikes systems have struck out in virtually every country where they have been raised. Internet access is far too important to establish a system that would cut off access based on unproven allegations of infringement.
- Do not permit international treaty negotiations to pre-determine domestic reforms. Canada is an active participant in the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement negotiations, which will shortly address Internet-related issues.Those provisions could have a significant impact on the domestic reform process.Canada should not let ACTA dictate the future of Canadian copyright law. There is much more to say about each of these issues as well as many that do not fit nicely into this framework.I plan on writing about all of this during the consultation and encourage as many Canadians as possible to get educated and to Speak Out on Copyright.
regards,
barry begus
