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Friday January 18, 2013 |
Today is Internet Freedom Day,
a day to celebrate efforts to ensure an open and free Internet. Coming
on the anniversary of the Wikipedia blackout that successfully stopped
the Stop Online Piracy Act in the United States, it is worth thinking
about the many successes (ACTA, Internet surveillance in Canada),
failures (TPP, digital locks in Canadian copyright law), and tragedies
(Aaron Swartz) that have occurred in the past year.
Last fall, I delivered a keynote address at the University of Saskatchewan for its Technology Week
2012 that focused on these issues. The talk was titled When the Internet Met Copyright and can be viewed via a stream here (sorry no embed available). copyright, internet, sopa Slashdot, Digg, Del.icio.us, Newsfeeder, Reddit, StumbleUpon, TwitterTagsShareFriday January 18, 2013 |
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Thursday June 14, 2012 |
Over the past few years, the Motion Picture Association - Canada, the
Canadian arm of the MPAA, has recorded nearly 100 meetings with
government ministers, MPs, and senior officials. While their lobbying
effort will not come as a surprise, last October there were several
meetings that fell outside the norm. On October 18, 2011, MPA-Canada
reports meeting with Canadian
Heritage Minister James Moore, Foreign
Minister John Baird, and Industry
Canada Senior Associate Deputy Minister Simon Kennedy, all on the
same day. These meetings occured less than three weeks after the
introduction of Bill C-11 and the
decision to sign ACTA, and only eight days before SOPA was launched in
the
U.S.
To get a sense of how rare these meeting were, this is the only
registered meeting John Baird has had on intellectual property since
Bill C-11 was introduced and ACTA was signed by Canada. Similarly,
since the introduction of Bill
C-11, James Moore has only two intellectual property meetings listed -
this one with MPA-Canada and one in March 2012 with the Canadian
Wireless Telecommunications Association (in fact, Moore had only three
meetings on intellectual property in all of 2011. Those meetings were
with MPA-Canada, the Canadian Recording Industry Association, and the
Canadian Chamber of Commerce). Even the Simon Kennedy meeting was a
rarity as he has had multiple meetings with pharmaceutical companies,
but only two (MPA-Canada and the Canadian Council of Chief Executives)
that appear to have included copyright.
Given how unusual it is for a single lobby group to gain access to two
of Canada's leading cabinet ministers and a senior department official
on the same day, it begs the question of how they did it.
acta, c-11, copyright, dodd, mpa-canada, mpaa, sopa Slashdot, Digg, Del.icio.us, Newsfeeder, Reddit, StumbleUpon, TwitterTagsShareThursday June 14, 2012 |
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Friday June 08, 2012 |
The Canadian intellectual property's lead lobby group, the Canadian IP Council
(itself a group within the Canadian Chamber of Commerce) released a new
policy document yesterday that identifies its legislative priorities
for the coming years. Anyone hoping that the SOPA protests, the
European backlash against ACTA, and the imminent passage of Bill C-11
might moderate the lobby group demands will be sorely disappointed. Counterfeiting
in the Canadian Market: How Do We Stop It?
is the most extremist IP policy document ever released in Canada,
calling for the implementation of ACTA, SOPA-style rules including
website blocking and stopping search results from resolving, liability
for advertisers and payment companies, massive surveillance at the
border and through delivery channels including searching through
individual packages without court oversight, and spending hundreds of
millions of tax dollars on private enforcement.
This long post reviews the report, focusing on the case it makes for
addressing counterfeiting concerns in Canada and on the resulting
recommendations. The recommendations are divided into five main groups:
- Introduce a Canadian SOPA
- ACTA Implementation
- New Search Powers Without Court Oversight
- The Criminalization of Intellectual Property
- Massive Increase in Public Spending Creating an IP Enforcement
Subsidy
acta, copyright, counterfeit, ip, ip council, sopa Slashdot, Digg, Del.icio.us, Newsfeeder, Reddit, StumbleUpon, TwitterTagsShareFriday June 08, 2012 |
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Tuesday May 08, 2012 |
Harvard professor Yochai Benkler recently delivered an exceptional
talk
examining how the SOPA and ACTA protests unfolded. The talk highlights
the role of online new sources and the rapidly changing key players in
raising awareness or generating protest activity.
The Guardian: Blueprint for Democratic Participation from The Guardian and The Paley Center for Media on FORA.tv
acta, benkler, sopa Slashdot, Digg, Del.icio.us, Newsfeeder, Reddit, StumbleUpon, TwitterTagsShareTuesday May 08, 2012 |
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