Archive for January, 2012

CIRA Proposes Changes to IDN Plan

CIRA has launched a new round of consultations on its amended plans to introduce Internationalized Domain Names.  The new process will signficantly restrict the number of new domains as the dot-ca administrative agency is now proposing that the holder of a particular domain name would have the exclusive right to […]

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January 24, 2012 2 comments News

The TPP Impact on New Zealand’s Public Domain

Gareth Hughes, a New Zealand Green Party MP, has posted on the impact of extending the term of copyright in New Zealand from life plus 50 years to life plus 70 years as demanded by the Trans Pacific Partnership. Hughes calls attention to many leading NZ works that would be […]

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January 24, 2012 1 comment News

Polish Government Reconsiders ACTA

The Polish government is reconsidering signing the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement after several government sites were hit with denial of service attacks. A government minister admitted the government had failed to fully consult the public on the issue.  

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January 24, 2012 3 comments News

The Behind-the-Scenes Campaign To Bring SOPA To Canada

The Internet battle against SOPA and PIPA generated huge interest in Canada with many Canadians turning their sites dark (including Blogging Tories, Project Gutenberg Canada, and CIPPIC) in support of the protest. In writing about the link between SOPA and Canada, I noted that the proposed legislation featured an aggressive jurisdictional approach that could target Canadian websites. Moreover, I argued that the same lobby groups promoting SOPA in the U.S. are behind the digital lock rules in Bill C-11.

While SOPA may be dead (for now) in the U.S., lobby groups are likely to intensify their efforts to export SOPA-like rules to other countries. With Bill C-11 back on the legislative agenda at the end of the month, Canada will be a prime target for SOPA style rules. In fact, a close review of the unpublished submissions to the Bill C-32 legislative committee reveals that several groups have laid the groundwork to add SOPA-like rules into Bill C-11, including blocking websites and expanding the “enabler provision”to target a wider range of websites. Given the reaction to SOPA in the U.S., where millions contacted their elected representatives to object to rules that threatened their Internet and digital rights, the political risks inherent in embracing SOPA-like rules are significant. [UPDATE: I have a second post that examines how the proposed changes could be used to target Youtube]

The music industry is unsurprisingly leading the way, demanding a series of changes that would make Bill C-11 look much more like SOPA.

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January 23, 2012 77 comments News

musicindc32

musicindc32.pdf

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January 23, 2012 Comments are Disabled General