Archived - Quebec — Round Table and Public Hearings on Copyright

Date: August 24, 2009  3:00 p.m.

Location:
Salon Heritage
100, Quai Saint-Andre
Quebec City, Quebec

Principals: See participant list

Subject
Canadian Heritage and Official Languages Minister James Moore hosts a round table on copyright.

Download: Audio Recording (MP3, 39.0 MB)

Transcript

James Moore: (Translator speaking) So good afternoon everyone, my name is James Moore, the Minister for Heritage Canada and Official Languages. I'm very glad to be with you today to talk about a very, very complex issue, but nevertheless a very important issue for our economy, for cultural communities, students, everyone.

So copyright is a very important issue that our government has decided to hold roundtables around the country, to hold a discussion, a detailed discussion with Canadians who are interested, interested in our contemporary laws to see if they reflect the needs of the creative communities and the possibilities because we want a real commitment with the public.

When we want, we decided when we were re-elected last October we decided to have a commitment with Canadians to have a real discussion on copyrights, we've already held some roundtables around the country and we're still continuing. We started in Vancouver then went to Calgary, Ottawa, Winnipeg, we're going to have a roundtable in Peterborough, Halifax, Montreal, Toronto. And we really want to engage with people around the country, not only with roundtables but online engagements with our web sites. We've already had, I think it's more than one thousand people who recorded their comments on our website. (James Moore speaking). All Canadians have access to the copyright debate in this country, that they all feel the opportunity to fully engage in the debate and participate in this.

(Translator speaking). For discussion today we're not all, all discussion will be recorded and put on our website, translation will also be online so it will be in French and English. We are recording as well this discussion. So the audio of our discussion will also be online so that all Canadians will be able to understand your point of view here in Quebec City as well as hear your opinion on copyrights and what direction we should take when we will draft our new bill.

So the rules, just a few short rules here for our discussion, we've only got 90 minutes amongst ourselves. So the math comes out to about 5 to 8 minutes, or 5 to 10 minutes each and I don't want to talk myself very much. I may just have a few questions about your presentations, maybe not. So it's really up to you to express your point of view so that I'll be able to understand it, so that my team will understand it, so that myself and Mr. Clement, I mean we're working together as Heritage Minister and Industry Minister, and it's the civil servants of Deirdra McCracken(ph) is here from my office at Heritage and we're working together to be sure, make sure that the discussions will be balanced between cultural communities and in terms of our economy for the future.

So what else did I want to say? Was that about it? Oh yes, and there is simultaneous interpretation. We have receivers, I can speak both French or English, use the language you're most comfortable with. After today there will be three weeks of consultations and we really had great participation from all Canadians. The comments are constructive and the debate is at a level that we can all be proud of. So I'm very anxious to hear your point of view so now you have the floor.

Barbara Motzney: Oh yes, you want to talk to the rules of order. Well two comments. First as the minister mentioned feel free to use language of your choice. For interpretation English is on channel 1 and French on channel 2. And with my kitchen timer I'm going to keep you on track for time. So after 5 minutes it's going to beep. And I'll start waving wildly 3 or 4 minutes before, or at 3 or 4 minutes and then it will start beeping at 5 minutes. And lets start with Jean Grégoire.

James Moore: So early on or at the start, state your name, your organization, the organization you represent so that everyone on the web will be able to understand who you're expressing yourself for.

Jean Grégoire: (Translator speaking) My name is Jean Grégoire, Chairman of the University Students Association of Quebec. We organize all students from regional universities. We have 120,000 member students out of the 260,000 university students of Quebec. So at the FEUQ we know that all the actors that deal with copyrights, librarians, artists, students, both consumers and producers have different point of view regarding the use and application of a copyright law.

We believe that those positions eventually can co-exist. In universities you have many of these various actors who are affected day in, day out, on copyright laws, by copyright laws. That's why we consider that it's important to have a balance between the users, producers and society in general in a new law.

Now on the student side we have two main principles. First, students who need ongoing access to protected works to have quality education. And also researchers who need to trade information, consult protected documents but they're also creators of content, research papers, thesis, memoranda that must be protected and they must receive their due for those.

So FEUQ has a position and made suggestions to improve the law. A few possibilities or suggestions, first in terms of a fair use, in our opinion suscential(ph) in a new law to broaden the notion of fair use. Right now it mentions specifically that the use for private use or research is not against the law. In teaching it must refer to various works that aren't necessarily covered by management societies like (Inaudible) Quebec or where the use of these work is done to teach of add value. So teaching should be included in the use of fair use.

On that side we'd like to mention and highlight very clearly the fact that in terms of the Federation of Quebec Students, the notion of fair doesn't necessarily mean unlimited use or free. It means a freedom of academic use that might mean royalties for the rights holders. Also in the case of exceptions for teaching establishments it would be necessary to include students in the involved or stakeholders.

To date there are some grey areas that don't allow us to identify students in the exceptions. And we feel that students are key players in teaching establishments. On the prior proposals for C-61, the prior Bill we have some notes. And the last Bill students and researchers were, who quickly became criminals, there was too much, too many restrictions. And that does not help the advancement of knowledge.

We consider that since Quebec and Canada are trying to develop a knowledge that it is competitive in R&D, that creates skilled labour, the criminalization or fines in the academic framework we conceive that some actions are reprehensible, but penalties should not apply to students who use copyrighted works in academic frameworks, not for personal use but academic use.

So with this in mind and the academic framework there are some very strict rules and universities notably in terms of copyright infringement, and even if those rules don't turn the users into criminals, these rules are strict enough to penalize the users at fault and who usurp copyrights and it can even destroy academic careers. So its very serious when you're talking about illegal copying.

We want a law adapted to reality. Many actors, including the FEUQ agree that the existing law is not adapted to our existing environment very much in (Inaudible) technology. Students and researchers should have the opportunity of choosing appropriate support for their data and have access to their data for the internet.

In other words everything is around, turns around an academic exception that can identify learning and teaching experiences that will not go against copyright laws in cooperation with other actors that takes into account that quality learning requires the consultation of documents. Thank you.

James Moore: (Translator speaking) Thank you very much. So could you slow down a bit for the next few speakers. I have the same tendency, I used to be a television announcer and but with interpretation it's a bit difficult for the interpreter so please talk slowly, thank you for your comments. Hélène.

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Hélène Messier: (Translator speaking) So good afternoon. I'm delighted to participate in this roundtable. My name is Hélène Messier and I'm the director general of a collective management society called COPIBEC.

We are willing to pay for our computers, our iPhones, our iPods. We're willing to pay more for high speed internet links, but we would like to have access to free work without any constraints, claiming that that will not impact negatively on the income of creators and producers. This claim is illogical.

The government must to ensure to measure the impact of modifications we'll propose and to bear in mind that free access can only destroy a country. It's not because a practice has been established and repressed, the practices of some consumers that that practice is fair and deserves to be confirmed.

We're here about the importance of keeping a balance between access to work and support to creation. But between the requests of libraries to send digital files to users, the educational institutions who want free access to web resources, consumers who want to share files as they wish, internet service suppliers who don't want to inherit responsibilities due to violations on a network, we need to find a balance.

There are other solutions then to remove rights to holders to ensure to works, one of them is collective management. Like other collective management societies, COPIBEC (inaudible) the users of works and the rights holders. It's offered for 11 years. Why census for the reproduction on paper or digital format of extracts from work, or books, papers and newspapers. It represents more than 18,000 authors, visual art artists and Quebec auditors. And through reciprocity agreements with management, societies from different countries it offers the world at a click.

More than 350 licenses has already been agreed to with the government, education, universities and so on. Public libraries and private companies. COPIBEC receives $13.5 million in royalties per year, 13% of these amounts allow the management of it's operations and the rest is distributed to editors and authors in equal share usually based on the 275,000 reports and declarations that it receives from users.

This system exists in Quebec since 1982 and works quite well because it adapts itself to users needs. For example COPIBEC has concluded some licenses with colleges to foster their reproduction and distribution, digital distribution for remote teaching. It's signed with Bibliotèques et Archives nationales du Québec (ph) in (Inaudible) Quebec so that that institution can digitize and offer for free on it's web portal thousands of newspaper articles and periodicals published between 1914 and 1970 and that cooperation is ongoing to give access to other works.

These examples illustrate that there are alternatives that are proven for the adoption of new exceptions after the broadening of fair dealing. They are implemented in the respect of the creators rights. These, lets not forget it, are often entrepreneurs who take financial risks in their work and for whom copyright revenues are their only source of income. The editors, publishers who make these works accessible to the public have a right to return on investment, otherwise they would not have any incentive to offer to the public works created and produced in Canada.

Many stakeholders suggest to liberalize the copyright law by authorizing without restriction all uses of works done for non commercial purposes, notably for education. But this does not take into account that these uses, these non commercial uses are the majority of uses by works.

If reproducing a few pages can't seem for a student a very simple gesture, when you add them they are significant. In universities in Quebec the works reproduced in class notes represent more than 90 million copies. Broadening existing exceptions without having fair compensation would be disastrous for the rights holders. Notably in some sectors of education for which the school market represents the only existing market.

Fostering collective management allows us to maintain a balance between access to works and respect of the rights holders rights. The management society receives a few cents for these few actions of reproduction and then is able to return important amounts to the rights holders. This contributes to the creation of new Canadian rights and truly development of a national cultural industry.

James Moore: (Translator speaking) No questions, that was an excellent presentation. If we have a little time left after everyone has had a chance to speak then I would like to hear some discussion between you because I know that there are some persons who aren't in agreement with other things expressed around the table, so we would like to allow for some debate.

Raymond Legault: (Translator speaking) Good day Mr. Moore. I am Raymond Legault. I'm the president of the Union des artistes, the Union of Artists which is a professional syndicate representing about 12,000 artists working across Canada. I'm also managing a collective society for 2,000 people who are interpreting artists.

We have joined you to advise you of our opinion regarding the need to change the copyright act in a number of areas. The first point that we will insist on is the absolute need to extend the regimen of private copy to all new technology, allowing for private copying of music including iPod's and MP3 technology. Even though the copyright act should be technological neutral, the private copy regime only allows for collecting royalties on the old audio supports, not the new technology.

When the private copy regime was adopted in '87 it was clearly recognized, the private copies of music were valuable. And that given this, the owners of copyright should receive something for this. And music copies have the same values. Copies used are replacing the old types of supports and the new technology should be covered by the regimens as the old technology was, refusing to move in this direction is really to prevent authors from taking advantage of, advantages that they negotiated in the 1990's, early 1990's.

So they are requires that this not only be applied to the music sector but also copper audio visual sectors as well in order to allow for compensating royalties for television and film copies as well. So the Union of Artists, the Union des artistes claims that all rights that are linked to the international copyright act, the WPPT material for phonographs and other such supports also be integrated into the law.

And we also insist on the need for reproduction rights that are very clear. And the union requires that all these exclusive rights be applied to all current works and the presentations that are not covered under the public act at present. Such that artists may indeed apply these rights to current diffusions and to past diffusions.

Moreover, there's a section of the copyright to the effect that the holder of a copyright act cannot exercise their rights over an element that they have offered the use of in a film should be eliminated. This creates confusion for authors involved in audiovisual work and it's very complex for musical artists whose material is often used in other videos. Why should these artists lose their rights over various works and shows. These are indeed to be performances of their works, but linked to images.

In general we insist on the moral right over all use of performances and that this should apply on all uses of performances. This moral right must not be something that can be ceded or renounced.

It is also important to avoid ceding rights or dropping rights for material and technologies that haven't yet been invented. The catch all crosses should be prohibited or clearly delineated.

Secondly, fair remuneration. 61, 68.1 of the act allows the diffuser to not pay royalty on the first one and a half million dollars of receipts of money gained. And this is unjust because it's only for (Inaudible) and productions whereas for other types of musical reproduction there are no such exemptions.

Finally the peer to peer pirating and hacking, much is said about it but there are very few solutions have been proposed so far. So setting up minimal penalties to counter illegal hacking and illegal downloading is not a solution. We should see to it that more effects are available to counter this and simply very expensive lawsuits.

Moreover we have to work on the call concept, the notice and take down systems. Some feel that this, the system should be legitimate but our artists are not ready to allow the legalization of this unrealistic situations with no possibility of taking acts to counter these situations.

The internet sort of providers make great profit on the illegal use of the broadbands that they are, they are diffusing. The more it is used, the more money we have to make. We have to invert this. (Inaudible) has reflected on the new modes of funding, cultural, industry during the world copyright summit. He mentioned the true improvement of ISP's in the fight against hacking and their eventual financial contribution to copyright holders to compensate them for loss of royalties.

Without necessarily rendering legal, the illegitimate activities that would nevertheless be useful for ISP's to get actively involved in the fight against hacking because as they do, then they won't, they will be balancing out the royalty issue and eventually this would move things in the right direction.

Currently there's a type of ecology if I could put it that way, the system of ballots in the system that doesn't allow for copyright holders to truly get the royalties when there are illegal downloading of their systems, of their material. There is nevertheless some sort of a balance that has occurred in the current technologies that allows for a certain amount of royalties to get through and I think the law should take advantage of this natural balance that is occurring and make sure it covers the new technologies.

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Alain Lauzon: (Translator speaking) I'm Alain Lauzon and I'm the director general of the SODRAC in Canada. The authors, composers of Canada. Allow me to thank you for giving us a chance to express our thoughts in this consultation and at this roundtable.

SODRAC is a collective management society which manages the right to reproduce musical works of Canadian and foreign origin as well as visual arts, artists and we basically organize the use of our, the repertorie that we own when royalties are paid.

The copyright act is essential for creators, it's also essential for our cultural and it contributes in a very important way to our economy. Copyright acts for the persons I represent really ensures that creators are able to make a living. All creators contribute to innovation in our culture and on the internet as well. But they have been deeply affected by the new technologies.

Consumers have all taken advantage of the situation economically. The ISPs as well, but not necessarily the artists. And we are convinced that the reform of the copyright act should take into account the next points which may to some extent be repetition of the prior speakers.

We are interested in the concept of space and time format transfers. These approaches deprive authors of their royalties and don't take the whole situation into account. During the last review of the Act in 1997 Canada brought in the exclusion of private copy. And by doing so the consumer saw a legalization of all copying for their private purposes on the international level. The private copy regime is recognized in a number of countries. This private copying regime is adopted often in countries though that have never brought into effect any concept of copyright in their law.

For example people say I bought this CD, it's mine, I can do what I want with it. I can privately copy it, I shouldn't have to pay for it twice. Well we have to leave it up to the commission to do it's work because we will have to decide what value to give to the royalties that are due.

We ask that the private copying regime apply more broadly, currently it applies solely to audio works as my colleague has already mentioned. We feel that the private copying regimes should also apply to audiovisual works. As for the responsibilities of the ISP's, we favour bringing into law the application of the technology, protection aspect which the consumer has had some bad experience of, but that's not what we're speaking of.

It has been shown that the sharing of protected files is, should be forbidden. The application of loss of this effect are insufficient everywhere in the world. The law has to contribute to economic development by favouring innovation and creativity in Canada, by ensuring that this creativity does not only profit those who diffuse the work but of those who create it as well.

We must consider fairness. Creators don't want to see large legal suits and legal wrangling. Nevertheless the whole issue of peer to peer sharing is becoming a major issue. Very often consumers aren't even aware that they're committing illegal act. Thus we feel that the new act should recognize the responsibilities of those who provide access to and facilitate the improper sharing of works and the copyright act is substantial and should not be reduced by new technologies and the types of peer to peer sharing that actually becomes a challenge to the privacy of individuals.

We're not in favour of a broadening of the use of fair use or the introduction of new exceptions. New exceptions merely nibbles away at the copyright act. Let me point out that private management is the privileged means that authors have now taken to present their issues. For example we have negotiated various educational uses of works that allow creators to be remunerated.

To conclude I would like to add a point regarding the basic rights official artists. All creators has the right to be remunerated for the creation of their works throughout their lifetime thus we feel that this requires the involvement of the Canadian commission and that the law should be modified accordingly.

So what should be in the Bill? The resale rights when there is a sale. A sale of the works that they have created.

Christian Bédard: (Translator speaking) So my name is Christian Bédard, director general of the group of visual rights arts, artists. I represent the Canadian artists front, so a group of visual artists in Quebec. So together we represent 20 to 25,000 artists throughout Canada.

Script writers, painters, writers, we feel that based on Statistics Canada's numbers, artists make about 61% less then the average Canadian workers. And since 2001 we feel that the average income has gone down by about 30%. The adoption of the four following recommendations by the government would greatly improve life standards of all these artists in Canada and in Quebec from visual artists.

First of all we recommend integration in the copyright law, the resale rights. The resale rights or artist resale rights gives the artist the right to obtain a percentage of the sale price of his works during secondary sales. In other words those occurring after the original sale of the work to an original purchaser. The purchaser when he resells it can expect a profit. That would be true for all our resellers when they resell the work. The artist who continued his creative work and trying to improve his reputation therefore the work of his, the value of his work will never take advantage of that. This is an injustice that has been corrected by many countries with resale rights on works of arts. This resale right was introduced in 1920 in France for the first time. Now 54 countries have resale right laws. Many European countries, notably Great Britain and Ireland have included it in their laws.

All Canadian artists and Quebec artists would take advantage of this resale right. Among them, those that would take most advantage of it would be native artists. Many artists, especially those of northern communities live in poverty. But the value of their works increase in value on the international market. If a British artist sells his work in France, that artist can take advantage of the resale right because it was adopted by both countries.

However if the work of a Quebec or Canadian artist is sold in France or resold in France or Great Britain, this artist will not receive any royalties because there is no resale right in Canada. That's why we ask that we modify the copyright like to include our resale right that cannot be ceded, that would give the original artist an economic interest in the resales of his works.

Second, we ask a strengthening of the application of the exposition right. During a review in '88, parliament included the exhibition right. He can receive royalties when it is exhibited in public place not for resale. But this new right did not give the anticipated results. Many museums and exhibitors throughout the country do not always respect of this condition, especially when they are dealing with permanent collections.

Moreover when the law was modified in '88 to introduce the exhibition right, the legislator excluded works produced before June 7, '88. This has had an effect and has still for effect to keep elderly artists from getting income they sorely need. This is why we ask that the law be modified to include all non public works. And we ask that all museums and exhibitors funded by public funds must respect exhibition rights and remunerate artists.

And fourth, we ask that we protect copyrights for photographs, engraving and portrait works. Now is the person who makes the request who becomes the copywriter, but it is the artist who created the original work. This is unfair and requires a modification of the law in our opinion.

Finally, to conclude, we request increased protection on the reproduction of works for whatever method or support. The Supreme Court decision rendered in 2002 by a very close majority of four against three in Théberge contre Gallérie d'art du petit Champlain (ph) versus Gary (Inaudible) in Quebec City made visual artists in a more precarious position in terms of moral and economic rights.

It would be simply fair to give full protection to artists when their works are reproduced by whatever system or support. That's why we recommend that the law be modified so that the transfer of an image whether in part or in whole to another support no matter which process be included in the copyright law. Thank you Mr. Minister. These improvements to the law would help all visual artists of Quebec and Canada.

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Aline Côté: (Translator speaking) Well I didn't think I'd have to read a text. So I'll be ad libbing at some point. So I represent the book publishers of French Canada. There's another group with the 12 or so editors, publishers out of Quebec. But we have about 130 member publishers.

The situation for publishers is very peculiar because we felt protected because we looked at people in movies or cinema were being pirated. But so we thought we were protected but technology proved us wrong. The situation right now is that payment models and all the problems that were seen by our colleagues from other communities are coming to us now. The situation for the last six months has developed so that we now understand better where the payment models are going and how they'll affect us, who is going to pirate us most. We realize that eBooks are more and more popular and we realize that copying, illegal copying is more and more prevalent.

We were real, Google by digitizing our books, by keeping their rights through an agreement that remains to be seen gave, and Amazon produced Kindle(ph) to support for, with Kindel Two (ph) and we have Sony Reader that has just produced two other competing formats. And one of these situations that surprised us most was to lose the possibility of setting the price of our own books.

So now it's a bit like in music there are private agreements in batches. We sell 100,000 books through agreements with people who make an offer. And then we put then on eSupport and it's going to be iPods lets say. And the consequences of that are peculiar. Because the works that may cost between $10 and $150,000 to produce in the case of school books, $100,000 even, it's ridiculous to say all of that, and up on a $9.95 reader. We thought that Sony Reader would compensate for that on their pricing model and this morning they announced that they would set a price of about the price of Amazon.

One of the effects of all of that is that very soon we're going to see a loss of value of books the same way the other industries like music have seen a decrease in the value of their content. And as Mrs. Messier said earlier, there's a shift of cost of purchasing cost done on software update costs or online costs. We always say that it's free. But finally it's just that other people will be making the money with the content that we will put online at great expense to ourselves.

So it hurts control diversity. The, we are losing value due to the shift in consumer habits. And what we observed is that it's false access and it's falsely free. False access because we also realize that there was a call for Rogers and Bell with regards to content discrimination on the band available throughput.

So it will be my work that will be accessible everywhere in the world. That's a false idea. We have to stop considering that what we need is a balance between the two. What we see is that we have the same problem with formats. If we decide that digital is just a format, we end up allowing and C-61 also allowed it, people could take the book, change it's format. But it's a prerogative that's already included in international rules for producing works under ISP.

And if I have a work, hard cover work, you'll see that in big markets it can be hard cover, have an ISBN, six months later it might be a paperback or another format. We would like to be able to keep our prerogative to produce an eBook in the same model. It's another format and we need to develop a maximum of income for ourselves and our rights holders, our authors by being careful to express this ability, this, for our market by maintaining our e format as being outright a prerogative similar to the other paper works.

It's, England is now aligning itself with Adobe and when we had the French law, and for us it became essential considering that copyrights is a recognized value in our laws and international law, that it supports a very fragile industry that generates knowledge communication, that it founds our cultural diversity where Canada's a champion internationally when we're talking about defending that right.

Publishers and member of now recommended a new Canadian law will receive a triple mission of encouraging legal offering and the publishers are really up to date here. We did our homework, we had to technologize ourselves very quickly. We created an aggregator, now we have thousands of works available under electronic format. Not with a poor quality, scans, with scan by Google written on it, no. These are works that we're going to realize with the required quality to represent the moral right that authors give us.

We have this mandate to create good works including eBooks and we want to be able to do them, identifying them, put traceability measures on them that would allow us to eventually allow pirates. And we want to have everyone be informed of the rules about protected works. This assumes that there would be no law without the promotion of information and training of the whole digital chain. Whether it's the government. When comes the time to draft a law on transportation or driving licenses, the law, the government does it very quickly. It should be the same thing for books and libraries.

Collective management society should do it even more quickly. The whole chain should get involved and you need to make sure that ISP's or broadband suppliers be informed because they're also part of the revenue chain.

I'm sorry for speaking so quickly. I always have too many things to say. So our reflection went to formats, but it's the only way to predict the quality of our works and the responsibilization(ph) of the actors in the chain assumes that you'll ask that the ISP's identify those who are defrauding and they made measures similar to those that France and England are implementing.

When we think that sanctions in France are 30,000 Euros, Great Britain has 50,000 pounds, and we have something like 500 to a couple of thousand dollars. I think we need to ask ourselves about how serious we want our law to be when we're talking about protecting our authors.

James Moore: (Translator speaking) You have exceeded.

Aline Côté: (Translator speaking) I'm sorry, I didn't even hear the beep. I didn't even hear it. But if we're champions at the international level in terms of cultural diversity, we have to do it well here. We need to protect our authors well.

James Moore: (Translator speaking) Well this is the biggest question about (Inaudible) government programming. There's, there's news coming in the pipeline.

Aline Côté: (Translator speaking) You're saying that with a smile, that's encouraging.

James Moore: (Translator speaking) Five years for arts programming, that's good news.

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Aline Côté: (Translator speaking) But what I'm interested in, the Kindle Two(ph) that's coming, and the new technology because I don't have an impression that there are very many people buying Kindle in Canada. Well it's increasing and we're seeing something that we haven't measured the impacts yet. They see it in the music industry and it's going to reach us very quickly.

By selling in batches, work by thousands for support and reproducing for readers, one of the effective devaluation is that it's going to become such a mass market that not only will Quebec culture not have a big wait in international culture, but Canadian culture won't interest the product offers because such low pricing, one of the effects is that I'm not even authorized to say this, it's from my personal comments, I believe that one of the effects of that is that in the end there's going to be content discrimination due to the fact that we won't be able to generate sufficient works to create financial interest for those who would produce or publish or them.

You have to be very careful about that. It's not only Quebec culture that's at stake, Canadian culture will also be affected by these broad movements. And already Canadian music doesn't interest very many internet publishers. There's, the margins are too small. So this is one of the effects that we'll have to look into very closely. Thank you.

Alexia Roussos: (Translator speaking). Hello. Thank you for inviting the Society of Producers of Film and Television in Quebec, the APFTQ to speak to you. I am an attorney, Alexia Roussos (ph) and I represent this group, 130 independent producers in TV and film. The vast majority of Quebec film and TV producers, producing in both English and French.

In 2008 the global volume was $5 million in Canada which are the indirect and direct source of 132,000 part and full time jobs. We're very happy to be involved in this very important period of technological change. All industrialized countries are looking for new methods to protect right holders involved in producing content.

At the outset we ask you to ensure that the very status of audio visual producer be clarified, particularly in the digital world the producer is the main door to the content and the main intermediary for our interactions with our collaborators, or those who work with him or her.

It's important that the Copyright Act protect the producer of all audio visual works. A new balance is needed for the, all of the new digital productions, the new players, intermediaries have appeared to give access to content for a number of years. They have been taking advantage of content for business purposes. The consumer has never paid more than they have today to access content but very little of what they pay actually gets back or trickles back down to the creators. This makes no sense.

The, in fact most of the limits are really imposed by the new intermediaries, not by the law. An example, a device will read content in a specific format that's not readable on other devices. For example the use of the broadband at certain high use points is limited by various broadcasters. And this all has an effect on the royalties that eventually make their way back to the auditors, given that a lot of the sharing of the material on these broadbands is illegal.

It would be important to ensure that the law effectively ensures that right holders be compensated and that the limit, that limits the imposed on the intermediaries, or at least that their activities be specified and moderated. Especially companies offering devices and contents that their revenues be organized in some special way. Often they have funded upstream by financial sources of a traditional nature and this would be one place to intervene.

Geo fencing is also a new issue, technical protection measures, TPM's and the DRM's must also be rendered illegal and their content carefully followed. The material and the use of the material and the royalties paid for the use of the materials should be technologically neutral. The regime has, certain regimes have, regimes have made it possible to handle these issues of DRM and TPM and should be used better in the future.

Moreover mobile phones for example should pay royalties for the use of material which one of the drivers of greater use of their devices. A notice to, a notice and notice solution should be privileged and the law should be simplified and organized by use rather than by rights, what consumers want is great access without paying more than they are paying now with fair royalty rights. And what the industry wants is recognition of a proper royalty and a fairness as well.

And this is, can all be well integrated if we take into account proper royalty management as well as consumer wishes.

Diane Lamarre: (Translator speaking) Good afternoon, I'm Diane Lamarre and I'm the director of the Association of Professionals of Musical Production Specialists, APEM. We represent producers as well as the authors that produce the works represented. We feel that the Canadian copyright act should be revised in order to ensure that all persons involved be justly remunerated for their involvement in creating works of art.

The new technology have revolutionized the way people produce music, this we all know. It has really extended the space through which any work can be broadcast. Who really benefits though from this technological revolution? Of course the amateurs and listeners now have a great selection of musical works of all nature and from all over the planet.

We can also think of the artists who now by clicking on a mouse can offer their works to a vast market. However on the economic level it's clear to see that the main beneficiaries of this revolution are neither the consumers nor the artists, but rather the producers of digital support systems and internet businesses.

40 billion songs, 85% of songs heard around the world in the last few years have been hacked, have been downloaded illegally. And a great number of systems allowing for this hacking, allowing for this downloading are sold to users. So this new economic structure is quite imbalanced. The failure of the broadband or the support system is much greater than what is actually transacted or shared on it. And we are convinced that internet service providers are a key, a lynchpin in the solution to be found.

They should be rendered responsible in a direct way to, for the economic fight against this illegal downloading by specifying in the Copyright Act means to directly address this issue.

Now let me turn to the private copying regime with regard to music. Many people feel that they have, when they buy or download a song they have a right to privately copy it on their iPod and of course people feel that their children shouldn't be criminalized for having done this. However these people are not necessarily aware that lets say for a record the royalties that are paid to the authors for the sale of a CD are based on the sale of one single copy of the piece, not dollars but pennies. In such a context how is it logically possible to justify that an author or editor who receives only a tiny fraction, either the quarter or the half of the tiny element of a penny for the reproduction of a copy should then not even get any of this when that same piece is copied and recopied in a private fashion.

How can such editors or authors earn their living if their work is spread out over a number of technological platforms without their ever receiving any compensation. It's the accumulation of these tiny amounts that really is the lifeblood and puts bread on the table of authors. The expectation of a song even if it's minimal has to be counted in to the royalties paid to the artist.

So we're most aware of the practices that consumers have developed. They wish to benefit from the CD that they have legally bought. So we think that the Copyright Act set up in Canada in '97 that was aimed to address this issue, at the time we were speaking of cassettes and CD's must now be broadened and should cover all digital support systems.

Given the new technology we feel that's essential that the Canadian copyright legislation be redrafted to render it technologically neutral so that the new technology will not pose such a threat to the very spirit of the law. To complete this Mr. Minister, allow me to mention the correct balance between the rights of rights holders of copyright and the users need to access works.

I've worked in this area for a number of years, believe me, and I have trouble finding a correct balance. I need for example gas to get to work and I would like the government to favour me in it's law, of course. That being said we all have to pay for the services and products that we intend to use.

Those who contribute to the creation of musical works gives their lives for this, just as do any authors or professionals, any other workers in our society. They also pay taxes and must live in the real world. A number of artists of course are very successful and are known around the world, all very well. Just like in private business of course though it's normal and fully acceptable in a society like ours that creators be able to really benefit from the results of their work.

But that's hardly the case for most of them. We have trouble imagining exploiting workers in any other sector in Canada, just because consumers need to access to their product. That being said if I couldn't put gas in my car I couldn't drive my car. And an iPod without any music in it is not worth owning.

All this being taken into account, we're confident the Canadian government will shortly take all measures needed to re-establish proper balance in this sector and will ensure that Canada live up to the standard of an international country and join the remainder of the industrialized countries in the new attitude in regard to copyright law. And we will send in a written copy of this before the 13^th of September.

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Lyette Bouchard: (Translator speaking) Good morning, good afternoon, I'm Lyette Bouchard, I'm director general of the ADISQ and director general of SOPROQ (Inaudible). We want to thank you Mr. Minister for the invitation to participate in this roundtable. And we want to repeat our interest and our desire to participate in the consultation process underway.

First as mentioned, following the tabling of Bill, of the Bill C-61 we agree with the fact that the government needs to adapt the law to technology. And that the government align itself with international standards. We fail and felt and feel that it is good to have a balance between the interest of creators and users.

But we have questions about the real balance that the, that C-61 tried to establish. We were rather convinced that the measures would increase the lack of balance. That's why we're happy to have the opportunity today to express our preoccupations and make some recommendations among others not to increase the problems of equilibrium.

We don't know what the future holds, so it's important to have a law on copyrights that is technologically neutral, I think that's been heard often enough today. So a technologically neutral law that would give rights holders income no matter what platform is used by the consumers. Don't confuse freedom of access by the web and free content on the web.

And in the end like that, repeating ourselves, as mentioned by Mrs. Lemarre, in '08, 40 billion music song were downloaded illegally in the world. This represents 95% of the total of downloaded music.

So the Canadian government has to help us to find and to implement effective tools first to control the exploitation of content no matter which platform so that rights holders whether they're authors, singers or whatever will be respected. And second, to marginalise as much as possible or stop illegal access to protected content. It's clear that in the implementation of tools ISP's have an important role to play.

They will have to be part of a solution and as other stakeholders, they can't just watch the parade go by, that's clear. The content creators need to sit down together to find the solution. However if this search for solution does not yield results we invite the government to impose measures so that ISP's will be held accountable.

Now in terms of, the law is not up to date in terms of copyright. I won't dwell on this. But it's clear that digital recorders like iPod's are the most popular supports to download and keep music. So we need to broaden the number of covered supports otherwise the system will die. A bill that will resist to time needs to offer as much as flexibility as possible to reflect the evolution of the market.

And finally, the law in terms of fair dealing, it has exemption of royalties of radio stations on part of their advertising income. So radio stations don't pay royalties on advertising income below $1.5 million. This exemption must be withdrawn. As mentioned by the copyright commission in one of it's rulings, and I'm quoting, allow the big broadcasters who have important profits to escape from paying royalties on any portion of their income is at best a hidden subsidy.

This exemption means tens of thousands of dollars are lost to right holders and music is nevertheless an important proportion of their air time and has an important role to play in their financial success. This is why after ten years, after the neighbouring rights regime we are asking the government to withdraw this exemption and therefore give it's true meaning to fair dealing. Thank you.

Jean Chabot: (Translator speaking) Good afternoon Mr. Minister. I want to welcome you to our beautiful city of Quebec and thank you for coming in person for this public consultation. My name is Jean Chabot, I'm director manager and a librarian for the National Assembly Library in Quebec City. But today I'm going to wear another hat. I'm mandated by Mr. Philippe Sauvageau (ph) who is the former president of the ASTED, Association of Documentary Technicians, an organization that has librarians, documentalists(ph) and documentation technicians here in Quebec.

I want to mention that I want to reflect the point of view of libraries and talk about the exceptions in the existing law on the fair use of a work by libraries, articles 19 and 20 of the existing law.

I believe that the legislator will have to take into account the ruling by the Supreme Court in CCH against the Upper Canada Bar. The unanimous ruling of the court puts the users at the heart of the process while inviting the rights holders to hold back somewhat. During the drafting of the next law the idea of fair use will have to be clarified as well as its application conditions in order to have a greater clarity and precision, avoiding gray areas and abusive interpretation that leads use of tribunals to adjucate(ph) in terms of everyone's rights, in terms of what is a client, what is communication of a work, what is digitisation and so on.

Libraries have to be able to realize their mandate as effectively as possible because almost all of them work with public funds, therefore the exceptions in the law must remain all the while clarifying their scope in order to balance the, between the monopoly given to rights holders for the commercial exploitation of their works without being prejudiced to users and libraries.

The next law will have to be flexible and neutral in order to adapt to the many technological changes for communication of works. It's drafting will have to be clear and be specific to clearly define the rights of rights holders and users. It is not a questioning of the rights of creators, but a recognition of rights of users and to do this we have to limit the right of creators in terms of fair use by libraries. The legislature will have to use a more open definition of fair use based on the rulings of the Supreme Courts in 2004. Copyrights are poorly understood by users and difficult to apply.

Following the drafting and adoption of a future law, I believe that the key to its implementation will be to have true and sincere efforts to communicate it and make it known. It is more profitable to educate the public to the reality of copyrights than to act in a punitive manner.

We have to allow libraries to use copyrighted material without infringing copyrights. This is under the public's interest, the law will have to defend the economic rights of rights holders, but not at the expense of free exchange of ideas that is a key to democracy.

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James Moore: (Translator speaking) And the free circulation of ideas, does that include music?

Jean Chabot: (Translator speaking) Quite.

James Moore: (Translator) Pardon?

Jean Chabot: (Translator speaking) Yes, quite, quite. It includes music. Any artistic expression.

M. Martin Hudon: (Translator speaking) Thank you Mr. Moore, Martin Hudon, I represent the CREPUQ. The CREPUQ is the Conference of deans of universities of Quebec, we group the 18 Quebec universities. I want to mention by the way that the CREPUQ is in cooperation with the AUCC, the Canadian University and College Association. So there are some common positions between the positions of Canadian and Quebec universities, I'm sure.

I wanted to mention that I was watching Mission Impossible yesterday and I felt I have the same kind of mission by presenting in 4 or 5 minutes the complete vision of universities on this question, but I'll give you a high level view as my colleagues have done as well.

First I want to mention the fact that universities aren't usual users of works. They're not commercial users. We have a public mission of communication of knowledge through teaching and research. This is a quote, a basic quote in which all the universities' reflection is based.

Of course the CREPUQ recognizes, and all Quebec universities recognize, that we need to foster a balance between payment of royalties to creators for the use of copyrighted works and public access. Public being for universities, more specifically students, professors, and teachers, and researchers. In other words, users that Mr. Chabot referred to on my right here a few moments ago.

So in this context universities agree with an updating of exceptions in the copyright law to adapt them to the electronic age. We're thinking here of the mediatisation(ph) of teaching, remote teaching for example, that under the law causes some application problems.

That nevertheless it still works, Mr. Moore, so we need to update this exception and many others in the copyright law. Universities are also in favour of new exceptions to allow the use of works that are broadcast on the web for free and that advertise as such. We don't want to create a license regime for works that are already advertised as being free on the web. Of course universities are in favour of broadcasting of digital work in a more simple manner. We have a convention, an agreement with COPIBEC for paper works and the universities would like to extend to digital works these agreements.

Now there are other exceptions that should be revised. My colleague has mentioned a few with regards to libraries and also archives. There are exceptions that should be adapted to the digital age.

I'd like to add in closing Mr. Moore that if possible these exceptions should be as simple as possible. Without the administrative burden, without adding any administrative burden to the process because those exceptions that are in effect have various, yes, we have to hold law books and so on. So this is not practicable, this makes the administration of administration very cumbersome and difficult to apply.

When we're talking between colleagues, I'm a lawyer by training, and we also consult many copyright lawyers in the discussions. I mean, backroom discussions, the exceptions to the law and those that were produced in the bill that are so complex are incredibly complex, it's very difficult to make heads or tails of that for specialized lawyers. So imagine in the universities where you have, as my colleague mentioned, demonstrate, learn, teach to our staff to administer the law properly, if it was possible to create come exceptions that are simple to apply that would be a great step forward, thank you.

James Moore: (Translator speaking) Thank you very much, so now we have about 15 or so minutes. Does anyone want to add anything or respond to a point that somebody else has raised? Yes.

Jean Grégoire: (Translator speaking) Well for our part we're satisfied with the roundtable. Moreover, it's important to consider that university management and students agree on anything, simple exceptions and communication of work for teaching, public teaching, without considering those who trade illegally, that should be studied, we seldom agree. Now I'd like to come back because I heard very often that students and youth and users want everything to be free and accessible without condition. I want to be clear, that is not the position of university students in Quebec.

We are quite aware theat rights holders and producers deserve to get their fair share of revenues from what is produced. But in the law there needs to be an exception that hinders research and teaching to allow better communication of works and to encourage innovation which is essential to Canadian industry. It's important for students never to be considered, as was the case in C-61, and through its complexity and technical measures to be criminals, they must be able to exchange what they produce, exchange their ideas, have access to other ideas throughout the world. We're not talking about free, but we're talking about access.

James Moore: (Translator speaking) Before we address each other lets just quickly give our name and our title just for the benefit of those who are listening to our conversation.

Aline Cote: (Translator speaking) Aline Cote, the ANEL, the National Association of Book Editors in Quebec. Just a comment on editors and interpreters and photographers who, by the way, the first being those who buy copyrights, we spend a great deal every year to buy copyrights for works and we do need to discuss the broadening of the scope of the provisions in this regard for these people. There are for example people who are ready to accept the changes to the framework of their works, of their activities to ensure that these rights be respected. Photographers, for example.

When it comes to media and teaching telecommunications in class, (inaudible) we pretty much agree to all that. Then the legislation regarding digitalizing books for schools and the circulation of this, we think that this is really a part of our prerogative, our capacity to create a format that is accessible and that will be of use in this area. So we would like the law to specify that digitalized books be purchased, clearly identified with traceability elements and so on and so forth for follow up.

Hélène Messier: (Translator speaking) Hélène Messier, COPIBEC. Let me mention that we often hear, let's say from universities or from other educational institutions or libraries that they would like to use digital supports in order to allow for training at a distance, for example. But we never hear of this at COPIBEC, it's as though they're waiting for some sort of change to the law that would allow them to have access to this material for free.

We are ready to negotiate with them for some sort of rights for the authors and editors. Of course, we will be asking for restricted diffusion of these works. We wish to be able to compensate the authors and the editors.

So I think that people are making this request, but when we actually sit down and discuss issues like traceability of the works and remuneration that's when we have trouble pursuing the discussion and we rarely receive requests from universities and so on for rights to share and negotiate work at a distance and that's probably because we've already entered into good discussions and we've already settled certain things with them.

Jean Chabot: Let me say that we have always paid royalties, we've always paid for what we used but the prices have to be competitive and fair and take into account the special nature of libraries. Any other points that people would like to bring up before we draw this to a close?

Unknown Speaker: (Translator speaking) I would like to pick up on what Mr. Chabot mentioned about education and awareness raising amongst the public when it comes to copyright. I think it would be important at this point to look at this more clearly, it's as though it's become a common practice, a cultural practice to share let's say music peer to peer. Even people around me, everyone's consuming music but no one really knows much about copyright.

So I don't think we should just give up on this, I often draw a parallel to recycling to the importance of the environment. If we've been able to convince young people of the importance of protecting the environment it seems to me that in the medium term we should be able to do the same for protecting the rights of those who create our Canadian culture.

Christian Bédard: (Translator speaking) Just briefly, Christian Bédard, of the Artists and Visual Artists Association here in Quebec. Let me point out that the whole search for a proper balance is really what's at issue, I think that the copyright act is intended to stimulate creation to maintain Canada's, to support Canada's cultural diversity, and without necessarily wanting to restrict the right to access protected works it's important to keep the first two elements in mind. Access to collective works or collective access to works to some would be a good tool to work our way through this.

Hélène Messier: (Translator speaking) Hélène Messier, I have a question for you, Mr. Minister, and with your permission, you will probably say that you're waiting for the, this process to draw to a close before you express your opinion. But we've been at this for a while now in Canada so could you tell us what has struck you more particularly in this file?

James Moore: (Translator speaking) A number of matters, there are a number of ideas that have come forth at these roundtables. Our government has seriously undertook to listen carefully and to take action on this. I have a number of pages of notes right here before me and I know that the civil servants in Ottawa are going through all the presentations made here as well as the written documents that are handed in and are taking due note of all the ideas expressed.

What I really note is the complex nature of this problem, it's difficult to hold a debate like this that will really please everyone, you know. For example here we're discussing the needs of the musical community. Definitions are key in this matter, we're also discussing the needs of students, but what is a student? Primary school? High school? Universities? How many classes are they taking before they're a music specialist, and then when are they no longer a student and so on and so forth. These details have to be addressed in the new act.

I also do hear from time to time the expression of true regional differences in terms of the nature of the preoccupations and the concerns expressed and the reactions of people to Bill 61. There were things in C-61 that people appreciated, there were things that they found of some concern that we need to revise, but the next (inaudible), each discussion is very interesting.

As you know there were a number of criticisms that we received about the process for working up Bill C-61, so we want to ensure that everyone at the very outset of the process has the chance to express their ideas to the government. We will present a bill which will really be in the best interest of Canadians through our mind in the minority government situation. So we will hold a true debate in parliament and this will be our true Canadian debate. So is there anything that anyone wishes to add, or are you all satisfied with what you've had a chance to express?

Aline Cote: (Translator speaking) Well just to pick up on what Mr. Bedard has said, what has struck us is the extent to which the debate seems to have set up the whole issue of rights and right holders as though there's some sort of a problem that's very fundamental. Whereas we all know that as soon as new technologies come in, we do have to rethink copyright acts, copyright laws and that copyright laws has always been used by nations to manage right of access to markets. It's very tightly linked into the new economy.

For example, you know, we can think of people who make a lot of money or prevent other people for leaning, earning money by hacking on the broadbands and so on. Sometimes people say that, "oh no, it's the students against the copyright holders and so on." All this is really not the core of the matter, it's really a tool used to rebalance the distribution of wealth around the creation of new knowledge. That's really the history of the copyright act, and that's really what we have to keep in mind as we try to make use of the copyright act in the current technological and economic context. It's very important not to slip down to discussions of how libraries are opposed to broadcasters and so on and so forth.

James Moore: (Translator speaking) Thank you very much Ms. Cote, and thank you to each of you for the time that you've invested in presenting your ideas on this topic, for your testimony rendered here. And this debate will be ongoing online as I've already mentioned. And I encourage all those who wish to participate in this debate to share their ideas online and to provide their ideas in that fashion or in writing if they've been unable to join us here at this roundtable. Thank you very much.