Julianna Yau identifies precisely why the CMEC's copyright education exemption proposal is so damaging – it actively encourages the use of DRM to lock out education.
Post Tagged with: "cmec"
Two More Opponents of Prentice’s Canadian DMCA
The list of opponents to Industry Minister Jim Prentice's Canadian DMCA continues to grow. I've already noted that the bill is likely to be opposed by thousands of Canadians, librarians, teachers, universities, musicians, artists, film makers, consumers, digital security companies, major retailers, the Privacy Commissioner of Canada, and the Canadian […]
Canadian DMCA To Be Introduced This Spring
The Hill Times reports this week (issue still not online) that the Conservative government will introduce copyright reform legislation this spring provided that there is no election. The paper points to two main changes from the Liberals Bill C-60 – tougher anti-circumvention legislation (ie. DMCA-style laws that ban devices that can be used to circumvent as well as provisions that block all circumvention subject to the odd exception) and an educational exception that will provide for free access to web-based materials.
If this report is true, the bill will be remarkable in its ability generate more opposition than any prior copyright bill in Canadian history. From a policy perspective, it is a disaster – dangerous and unnecessary laws to support DRM and an educational exception that does little to address the needs of the education community while encouraging even greater use of DRM.
From a political perspective, it is even worse. Who will oppose the bill? For starters:
Quebec and Copyright
Today's Le Devoir features a noteworthy op-ed on copyright from many of Quebec's leading publishers. The gist of the op-ed is that copyright is crucial to Quebec culture, the educational exception proposed by Canadian Ministers of Education would have a devastating effect on that culture, and the Conservatives seem ready to support the education exception without any public debate.
Given the transparent efforts of the minority Conservatives to court the Quebec vote – this week alone Industry Minister Bernier gave two speeches in Montreal on economic development and the environment, while Heritage Minister Bev Oda opened an OAS conference on culture – it is worth considering how copyright reform will play in Quebec.
The working assumption is generally that culture is major issue in Quebec, that copyright is viewed as an integral part of cultural policy, and that therefore stronger copyright laws are an election winner in the province. Yet if the rumours about the contents of the forthcoming copyright bill are accurate, the Conservatives are about to fundamentally misread where the support for copyright reform lies. The bill is likely to contain two pillars – anti-circumvention legislation and the education exception (there will obviously be other provisions but these are the two issues designed to address the loudest lobby groups, namely CRIA and CMEC). Both issues are losers in Quebec.
Cancopy Law
The Canadian Association of University Teachers recently held a major conference on intellectual property issues. I was delighted to provide the keynote address, which I titled Cancopy Law. The talk criticized the current incarnations of “cancopy law” (which include CMEC’s Copyright Matters and Access Copyright’s Captain Copyright) and discussed the importance to education of adopting a progressive approach to copyright. A podcast of the talk is now available.
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