senatorhung's pad
ramblings of an information troubleshooter

it's all just special effects anyway

going thru the motions

plagued by questions; unenlightened by answers

In March 2004, the Supreme Court of 
Canada stated in its CCH copyright
decision that users' rights must be 
balanced with creators' rights.  Only 
2 months later, a Canadian Heritage 
standing committee issued a report 
that recommended stronger copyright 
measures without addressing users' 
rights at all.  The chair of that 
committee, a Liberal MP, is now being 
accused of having a conflict of 
interest for actively taking 
campaign contributions from 
foreign-controlled record companies.

This past Hallowe'en, one of those 
record companies was caught putting
malicious copy-protection software on 
its music cd's.  When buyers of these 
cd's played them on their computers, 
this software installed hidden spyware 
and opened security holes which 
left those computers vulnerable to
hackers and viruses.

Ms. Karetak-Lindell,

Do you still support the extreme 
recommendations that you made, as a
member of the standing committee that 
issued the 2004 copyright report, that 
big record companies should have the 
legal right to use dangerous copyright 
schemes to hijack or even break our 
personal computers {1}, and also that 
our schools and Nunavummiut, especially 
our youth in communities who have just 
received broadband, should have to pay 
every single time they access 
information that has been made available 
for free on the internet, even for 
educational purposes {2} ?


{1} s.34.02 of Copyright Act as it would 
have been amended by Bill C-60

{2} s.30.02(1)(a)(i) of Copyright Act as it 
would have been amended by Bill C-60

bouncing thru the day like a pinball

• ip link of the day: party platforms on copyright and educational usage (as disclosed to the canadian teachers federation).

looking for the pause button

• ip idiocy link of the day: northworthy puts the claims of CRIA to the test and finds them wanting:

  ... the claim that the fall off 
  in sales is due to the theft of 
  recordings has to be put up 
  against the fall in the number 
  of new releases by the non-Canadian 
  controlled companies, which is an 
  entirely different problem than 
  theft from filesharing, in my 
  opinion.  Industry revenues for 
  the Canadian controlled companies 
  were up $66,915,000 while the 
  non-Canadian controlled companies 
  were down $237,590,000, between 
  1998 and 2003.  With the 
  non-Canadian controlled new 
  releases from non-Canadian artists 
  down 22.4% and their new releases 
  of Canadian artists down 50.5%, 
  the non-Canadian controlled 
  companies should be explaining 
  this while the Canadian industry 
  thriving in terms of revenue growth.  
  What if their new releases from 
  their foreign repertoire did not 
  fall?  Perhaps its not a Canadian 
  problem at all.
  

  he includes lots of pretty charts for those who are more visually inclined. also, he argues that 'bulte' should be added to the canadian lexicon. i heartily second that motion.

unsung heroes

• ip idiocy link of the day: matthew good gives his take on the bulte controversy and thumbs up to filesharing:

  Yes, in the past I have spoke against 
  downloading.  That was primarily when 
  it was a new phenomenon and most 
  artists were being told that it would 
  decimate their careers.  What wasn’t 
  discussed was what the industry was 
  doing – or in this case not doing – to 
  embrace new technologies in an effort 
  to use that technology to the advantage 
  of artists.  Rather, their position 
  only alienated people and ultimately 
  hurt artists more.  Even now their 
  ineptitude with regards to new media is 
  astounding.  I know teenagers with 
  better qualifications to run new media 
  departments at major record labels than 
  those that currently do.  For my past 
  position I take full responsibility.
  
  I don’t care who you are, when you’re 
  an MP and the corporate elements of an 
  industry are throwing donations your 
  way and you just happened to pen 
  proposed legislation that benefits 
  them, I’m not entirely okay with that.  
  Nor am I okay with people using the 
  interests of artists in this country 
  to make their case when artists in 
  this country largely get treated like 
  indentured servants by those same 
  elements. 
  

a day of openings