Homo Sum:
humani nil a me alienum puto

I know you’re tired of it, but I’m going to mention the Canadian DMCA again, since it’s been announced various places that Prentice will be tabling it tomorrow.

There’s some coverage at the National Post, which while using neutral language manages to present the legislation as something harmful to consumers:

The new Copyright Act has been updated to reflect the growth of digital media and is said to include a number of contentious provisions including:

– A $500 fine for each illegal file shared online

– Making it illegal to unlock cellphones or copy music from protected CDs to iPods

– Forbidding the right to copy “time shifted” shows onto personal video recorders if flagged by broadcasters.

I think that second bullet will wake up anyone who reads that article.

Of course I favour a much less neutral approach. Like Cory’s:

Here it is, folks, at long last: Industry Canada Minister Jim Prentice is about to introduce his Canadian version of America’s disastrous Digital Millennium Copyright Act tomorrow. In so doing, he is violating his own party’s promise to seek public consultation on all treaty accession bills, he’s ignoring the cries of rightsholders, industry, educators, artists, librarians, citizens’ rights groups, legal scholars and pretty much everyone with a stake in this, except the US Trade Representative and the US Ambassador, who, apparently, have had ample opportunity to chat with the Minister and give him his marching orders.

I’m sure Cory will use BoingBoing to keep us informed tomorrow, and I also expect significant coverage at a ton of other sites, notably including Michael Geist’s.

In the meantime, read this comic if you haven’t yet (and be sure to use the embedded links to get yourself informed).

Here’s some other sites for you to check tomorrow:

Copyright For Canadians
Appropriation Art
Digital Copyright Canada
faircopyright.ca
Fair Copyright for Canada
Excess Copyright
The Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic

Tags: canadian law,copyright,dmca,freedom,p2p,public domain

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 11th, 2008 at 11:10 pm and is filed under Political. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.