ARCHIVED — TransGaming Technologies Inc

Copyright Reform Process

SUBMISSIONS RECEIVED REGARDING THE CONSULTATION PAPERS

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Documents received have been posted in the official language in which they were submitted. All are posted as received by the departments, however all address information has been removed.

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Submission from TransGaming Technologies Inc. received in English only on September 14, 2001 via e-mail

Subject: Comments - Government of Canada Copryright Reform

PDF Version


To Whom it May Concern,

I submit this comment on the proposed amendments to Canada's Copyright legislation as both a concerned citizen, interested in protecting my rights and the rights of other Canadian citizens, and as the Chief Executive Officer of TransGaming Technologies Inc, a startup technology firm which will be profoundly affected by the proposed modifications to Copyright legislation.

The digital economy is an increasingly important engine for Canada's future economic and social development. From the design and manufacture of hardware, to the provision of software and services to the creation of new music, films, and books, it is inescapably clear that the decisions we make today about how we choose to protect and reward the creators of information goods will have a widespread impact on both our economy and our society as a whole.

One of the core focuses of the proposed legislation is to provide corporations that publish information goods with an added layer of protection against unauthorized copying, by forbidding the creation and dissemination of technological means to circumvent copy-protection technology. I believe that this approach puts Canada on an exceedingly dangerous path - one where tightly knit foreign corporate oligarchies are able to exert an unheard of level of control over which authors are able to have their works disseminated, and how Canadians are allowed to consume the content that they have legally purchased. There are further dangers for the technology industry as a whole if it is providers of media products - and not consumer demand - which are allowed to dictate the hardware and software products that will come to market.

Furthermore, the proposed legislation raises the specter of widespread monitoring and control of private communications, with communications companies and internet service providers acting as enforcers of the will of the media oligarchies. Similar legislation in the United States has resulted in the banning web-sites containing computer code for decrypting DVD movies - as well as the banning of T-Shirts emblazoned with the same code!

Also in the United States, individuals have had vital communications services curtailed on the basis of mere accusation of copyright improprieties. See the following URL for more details: http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2001/08/23/pirate/index.html

Even though I am myself an author of material that will be 'protected' by the proposed copyright changes, my freedom is far more important to me than any additional rights I may gain as a copyright holder.

TransGaming Technologies is a start-up software company focused on allowing games and entertainment software written for one hardware/software platform to be played on other platforms. One of our initial products, scheduled to become available in just a few weeks, allows users of the Linux operating system to play games written for Microsoft's Windows system. Users can purchase a Windows game off the shelf, and install and run their new software under Linux. Future products will support a variety of other platforms.

Much of the entertainment software available today is protected by copy-prevention technologies. Some of these technologies restrict the users ability to make backups of their legally purchased software, or require the users to have the CD-ROM for their software physically present in their computer - a serious concern for many notebook users. More directly relevant to TransGaming, these technologies often prevent games from being played under Linux using our portability environment - consumers with legally purchased software are thus prevented from using that software in a perfectly legal fashion.

In many cases, the only way in which the purchased software can be used on Linux is if the copy-prevention is removed using circumvention technology widely available on the internet. The proposed legislation would criminalize the distribution and use of this circumvention technology, and require our customers to break the law in order to use their legally purchased software.

If passed, the proposed legislation could effectively ruin TransGaming's prospects for our Linux-based products, and possibly force the company to end the employment of several workers. Furthermore, by thus diminishing the ability for Linux based systems to compete in the marketplace against convicted anti-trust violator Microsoft, this legislation would affect dozens of other Canadian corporations that aim to provide Linux based systems for consumer use.

Do we really want Canada's information and media industry to be run as a branch-plant of American owned conglomerates? That, in effect, is what the proposed changes to copyright legislation will result in.

If we are to move forward with copyright reform in this country, what we need is mechanisms that support innovative thinking in how we run our information economy, not a reinforcement of the status quo of the media oligarchies. We need legislation that explicitly allows the reverse engineering of products for compatibility purposes. We need legislation that forbids 'copyright misuse' by large organizations that seek to support their market monopolies through complex license agreements that forbid the use of their product on platforms they do not control. We need legislation that requires companies bidding on government contracts to use open standards based systems, so that taxpayers are not locked into one vendors proprietary file formats and applications forever.

And finally, we need to support individuals and companies with new visions and ideas about how the benefits of the information economy can be shared more widely with society as a whole. There has been too much talk of how to protect industry from the society it serves, and not nearly enough about how to ensure that society is served well by industry.


Gavriel State,
CEO,
TransGaming Technologies Inc.