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Archived - Digital Economy - Discussion
Comments for period September 12 - 13, 2009

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Comment

jchalifour [2009-09-13 12:45] Comment ID: 2502

First and foremost, modern Canadian copyright needs to emphatically affirm the characteristics inherent to the digital medium. That is, it must tend strongly toward the liberty to freely reproduce that which is digital.

Creations manifested in a digital medium, similar to ideas themselves, are infinitely reproducible without degradation, and with virtually little effort or expenditure of physical resources. It is a huge disservice that copyright-oriented conversations often address creations manifested in a digital medium as though they're apprehended the same as physical items. A shovel can be stolen (I take it from a store and it's gone), a digital file (like an MP3 or FLAC music file) cannot. The digital file can on the other hand, be duplicated without loss of or degradation to the original. This is hugely significant in all of our attitudes toward addressing the digital economy.

Modern copyright needs to swim with both the lack of limitation and the absence of scarcity that characterize transmission of intellectual works manifested in digital media. A proper Canadian copyright policy should not include anything that enables the implementation of technologies, applications, agreements, or other methods of enforcement limiting or otherwise restricting the nature of the digital medium.

The best economic policy involving the digital medium must embrace limitless reproducibility in ways that are totally alien to physical objects. The sooner Canadian copyright law recognizes this, the sooner Canadians and Canadian businesses will be able to develop and launch modern digital-native business models that lead the global economy.