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Canadian Political Parties Clarify Their Positions on Copyright

Drew Wilson — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 05:55:50 +0000

It'll be May 2nd when Canadians head to the polls, and the positions on copyright can be rather muddied at times. That makes the CCA posting on political parties so interesting. Canadian political parties were asked a series of questions related to the arts and some of this ground covers copyright.

Recently, ZeroPaid's own Jared Moya noted that ACTRA was asking Canadians to vote for candidates who would support a three strikes law. The question being raised here is which party best suits your position if you are Canadian. We've already reviewed the platforms of the Conservative, Bloc, Liberal, Green and Pirate party platforms. Well, if reading the platforms weren't enough for you, the Canadian Conference of the Arts (CCA) sent a series of questions to the Bloc, Conservative, Green, Liberal and NDP parties with regards to the arts in Canada. There responses might prove quite interesting for some voters to say the least. As it seems to be par for the course, the Conservative party did not answer any questions, so that leaves the Liberal, NDP, Bloc and Green parties. We've read through the comments and have put together some notes. The parties were asked, "How do you intend to protect culture in international trade negotiations?" The Green party had an interesting response, saying:

Bad trade deals are bad for Canadians. A Green Government will renegotiate NAFTA and FTAA, as well as other agreements currently under negotiation (e.g. Canadian-EU Trade Agreement (CETA)). Any Chapter 11-type Investor-State provision that allow foreign companies to sue our government and its agencies (e.g. CRTC) will be removed.

Copyright was then asked. The question specifically was "Precisely when does your party intend to present amendments to modernize the Copyright Act?" The Bloc responded with the following:

If Bill C-32 is presented before Parliament again in its current form, the Bloc will try to better balance the bill by proposing amendments during the committee's study.

While this response specifically seems rather vague, judging by our platform review, chances are, they mean that they are going to restrict copyright more to the liking of foreign multinational companies (re: DMCA-style copyright law) The Liberals response was particularly eye-opening:

Recent studies have shown that Canada’s out-of-date Copyright act translates into major economic loss (up to 965 million dollars lost last year due to piracy, according to an Ipsos/ Oxford economics study) for Canadian creators all across the country; the Liberal Party will thus start working on presenting a modernised copyright act as soon as we form government. Bill C-32, the latest Conservative attempt to modernise copyright, was unbalanced and unfair; a Liberal government will work with all stakeholders to ensure creators rights and their sources of revenues are protected under the Copyright act. Digital technology offers many new opportunities, but enjoying content without compensating its creators shouldn’t be among them. A new Liberal government will introduce technology neutral copyright legislation that balances the needs of creators and consumers and reflects the principle that our artists and musicians should be paid for their work. We will stand with Canadian creators as they navigate both the opportunities and challenges of the new digital society. During the debate on copyright legislation in the last Parliament, it was the Liberal Party that developed a practical solution to providing musicians with compensation through a new private copying compensation fund rather than a levy. A Liberal government will look to develop similarly innovative solutions to ensure that the Copyright Act protects creators’ existing and future rights and revenue streams in a digital age. Likewise, the Liberal party believes that any exception under fair dealings must be clearly defined with a clear and strict test for fair use so that creators are fairly compensated for their work.
Bottom line, it sounds like the Liberals are planning on also changing copyright laws so that they are more strict. While their track record (what we mentioned in our Liberal platform review) suggests that they want to increase exceptions, that seems to be the only highlight of their position as they sound like they are merely going along with what foreign corporations want copyright laws to be from the sounds of things. The NDP simply had this to say:
If elected, Jack Layton and the New Democrat team are committed to introducing legislation to modernize Canada’s copyright regime within 12 months of taking office.
The parties were then asked, "What types of amendments do you intend to put forward? " The Bloc's response:
Copyright law does not take into account the impact of new technologies, including the advent of the internet, and must be changed as quickly as possible. All work deserves proper compensation, so it is essential that artists and creators receive their dues, while also ensuring that consumers benefit from access to creative products. Illegal downloading is detrimental to artists, who receive no fair compensation for their works, while internet service providers are able to benefit financially from their labour. Introduced in June 2010 by the Conservatives, Bill C-32 fails to make ISPs responsible and is satisfied with attacking the consumers who pay ISPs for internet access.
This appears to be repeating what they said earlier in their platform about making ISPs liable for copyright infringement. It also seems to reaffirm that they are merely going to toe the viewpoint of foreign multi-national corporations. The Green parties response was rather surprising:
The Green Party believes that Bill C-32 needs more work and that the educational exceptions in particular disrespect creators and threatens their livelihoods and businesses. The Green Party of Canada is committed to working with the CCA and all the relevant stakeholders to modernize our outdated copyright system.
I don't understand exactly how the educational exceptions in Bill C-32 disrespected creators. It locked down art whenever there was a DRM present, thus restricting what educators could do with material for educational purposes. I personally find this response puzzling. The NDP was more open to fair dealing:
We would begin by addressing issues including private copying, fair dealing, and the regime governing statutory damages, among others.
The next question was this: "Which elements of Bill C-32 will your party keep, and which elements of the bill will your party remove or change in a new bill to modernize the Copyright Act?" The Bloc responded:
The Bloc Québécois will ensure that the new bill is fair to both creators and consumers. This balance must be achieved, most notably through: an upgraded system for private copying, applying to mp3 players and other digital music players; reasonable royalties to artists for redistribution of their works; the abolition of the education exemption and fair recognition of the resale rights of visual artists.
They went on to re-iterate that they want to make ISPs liable for copyright infringement. The Green Party had an interesting response:
The Green Party of Canada strongly supports artists' rights to guaranteed fair compensation through fair patent and copyright laws. At the same time, we consider the digital lock provision in Bill C-32 to be excessively restrictive in that it will not allow students and journalists to properly create and conduct research. We will work with the CCA and other stakeholders to sharpen the definition of "educational uses" to find the right balance to give researchers this ability in a manner consistent with a thriving information commons, fair dealing principles, and moral rights.
This seems to be similar to the Liberals position on the DRM exceptions that they are far too strict and, essentially, choke off certain kinds of innovation legally speaking. The NDP had a very specific response:
In reviewing Bill C-32, New Democrats would closely examine a number of key issues contained in the proposed legislation, including (but not limited to) ISP liability, Technological Protection Measures (TPMs, or so-called “digital locks”), statutory damages, private copying and reproduction for private purposes, broadcast mechanical licensing and fair dealing. In order to arrive at an equilibrium between the interests of rights-holders and those of consumers, New Democrats would likely begin developing new copyright laws, beginning by consulting widely with stakeholder groups with the aim of creating a legislation that is – unlike C-32 – truly technology-neutral, balanced and flexible enough to ensure its adaptability to new platforms and technologies in the years to come. We would also determine definitively Canada’s obligations as a signatory to various international treaties governing copyright and intellectual property.
While they are glossing over a lot of subjects, they are, at least, recognizing that these issues do matter to them. If you would like to see the full responses and questions in these and other topics, you can check out the CCA website. So, if ACTRA is hoping to find a political party that explicitly says they'll support a three strikes law, well, it's clear that this policy isn't exactly on the minds of the political parties judging by these responses. The closest mention of three strikes is the mention of CETA. That was the Green party and they explicitly said that such an agreement was a bad idea. What is noticeable in these responses is how some parties (namely the Liberals and the Bloc) seem to be more warm to the idea of a more DMCA-style approach to copyright. The Bloc went further by saying that ISPs should be liable for copyright infringement. While I personally fully disagree with this policy because ISPs are used for way more than accessing music, they seem to have been very consistent on this position. The NDP appear to at least recognize the complexities of copyright the most with mentioning not just TPMs and fair dealing, but statutory damages and ISP liability as well. Overall, these are very interesting comments given that sometimes, the party platforms were vague at times. Some of these responses really did clarify the party positions on these issues. I think that the NDP further clarified their positions the most while the Bloc merely reaffirmed their positions. The other parties were somewhere in between reaffirming their positions and clarifying the points they made in their platform. Does these positions change your vote? Which party do you think had the position that reflects your stance on copyright the most? Are all of the issues that are of concern to you being addressed so far in this election? Have a tip? Want to contact the author? You can do so by sending a PM via the forums or via e-mail at drew@zeropaid.com.

Copyright Infringement Litigation Campaign Now Sees Senator Candidate As Latest Victim

Drew Wilson — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 07:50:48 +0000

News and commentary often go hand in hand. That's not untrue when it comes to political news. Proving not only that large litigation campaigns aren't just for file-sharers anymore and that copyright infringement cases are bi-partisan, US Republican senator candidate Sharron Angle has found herself on the copyright lawsuit hit list.

During the RIAAs litigation campaign against students in their effort to stop campus piracy, there was one noticeable school that was always missing from the schools that were affected - Harvard Law School. It also always seemed like whenever a lawsuit would go beyond discovery, the person on the wrong end of the lawsuit almost always seemed to fit the demographic of someone who couldn't afford to defend themselves. It's no surprise that these observations have led some to believe that the way precedents are set (when it comes to copyright matters) by finding the easiest target and trying to set as many precedents as possible that work out in the copyright holders favor. If you thought that this will always be the case, well, that image may have been shattered thanks to a newspapers legal campaign to stop copyright infringing material related to news. A few months ago, Threat Level reported on Righthaven LLC and their quest to save the news industry:

Borrowing a page from patent trolls, the CEO of fledgling Las Vegas-based Righthaven has begun buying out the copyrights to newspaper content for the sole purpose of suing blogs and websites that re-post those articles without permission. And he says he’s making money. “We believe it’s the best solution out there,” Gibson says. “Media companies’ assets are very much their copyrights. These companies need to understand and appreciate that those assets have value more than merely the present advertising revenues.”

The article presented a few cases of copyright infringement where Conservative media outlets were targeted for this copyright infringement campaign. It turns out, the litigation campaign has grown significantly since its early beginnings. The Las Vegas Sun is now reporting that Republican Senate candidate Sharron Angle has now also received a copyright infringement notice. Apparently, they are demanding $150,000 in fines and direct ownership of her domain for reposting a part of a newspaper article. If you think that this is only Republicans being affected and that this is a partisan issue, think again. From the Las Vegas Sun:

The Democratic Party of Nevada, which has also been sued by Righthaven, charged in an Aug. 23 press release that the Review-Journal had a double standard to “hold Angle harmless while suing the Democratic Party and progressive organizations.” Steve Friess, a Las Vegas freelancer writer and columnist for Las Vegas Weekly, a sister newspaper to the Las Vegas Sun, has been supportive of Righthaven because Friess has seen material owned by him and other freelancers infringed on. In a blog post last month, Friess said Righthaven had to sue Angle. Friess posted several screenshots of R-J stories on Angle’s website and wrote that “thousands of readers have seen these stories on SharronAngle.Com and not ReviewJournal.Com; that’s a clear loss of the eyeballs that translate into advertising revenue.”

So, ultimately speaking, both sides of the US political spectrum have been hit with this litigation campaign. So if this is not a partisan issue, then it's clearly a rather surreal battle that pits corporate interests against political entities. Quite strange considering when it comes to the DMCA, copyright term extension and raising penalties for copyright violations, you'd almost get the impression that corporate interests were pretty much lock-step with political interests. Apparently, not in this case. Still, it raises a much more important issue of free speech. If one were to, say, take a snippet out of an article and commented much like what I am doing right now, is that not fair use? I am linking to the sources of these articles and commenting on a tiny snippet and offering new bits of information to contribute to the knowledge of the issue. I don't see how this would be considered contributing to the "loss of the eyeballs that translate into advertising revenue." If, however, a whole article was simply copy and pasted, that's a different matter - it would no doubt be harder to say that it was an act of fair use. So which is it? Well, one of the postings mentioned in the Sun article was this posting which was alleged to have infringed on this article. The article on the candidate's site featured 7 paragraphs from the original source. The article from the original source had a grand total of 22 paragraphs. I'm not a legal expert, but as my personal opinion, that looks like its grounds to argue fair use in this case. I would go further to say that even if there is no opinion attached to the alleged infringing posting, it's still free advertising nevertheless, so I don't personally think it would necessarily prevent any eyes from seeing the original site - in fact, quite the contrary, it encourages users to see that article in the first place. That's pretty much one of the purposes of linking in the first place. After looking at this case, I'd say this shows legitimate concern that free speech would be hamstrung by copyright lawsuits because many sites use news as a means of informing their audience of what's going on and it's often sourced from other journalists. In many academic papers, blockquotes are used to take entire chunks from other copyrighted material for the purpose of engaging discussion. In schools, parts of an article can be used to make an audience engaged and interested in a given topic and, in a lecture scenario, content might not be added to the article. Some sites offer printer friendly versions of their articles? Is it now an infringement to print that article? There's plenty of ways to look at this that would suggest this sort of activity wouldn't really be infringing. Additionally, what is being solved by suing hundreds of blogs anyway? If the purpose is to discourage an audience from reading your articles, then yes, the campaign is potentially going to be successful - but few journalists want to stop readers from reading their article to my knowledge. Personally, I think suing your audience is not how you conduct a news-related business online. Stopping people from reading your articles to protect your business - to my knowledge, that's not how the business end of the internet works. Have a tip? Want to contact the author? You can do so by sending a PM via the forums or via e-mail at drew@zeropaid.com.

RIAA Record Label Founder Says Internet Not Music’s Enemy

Drew Wilson — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 22:18:36 +0000

Just shortly after Stevie Nicks said that the Internet has destroyed rock, the founder of Elektra Records, an RIAA record label according to RIAA Radar, says that music has a bright future and the internet is not the enemy.

There's a fascinating article over on CNet which shows that Jac Holzman, founder of Elektra Records and helped bring you artists such as The Doors, has had some positive things to say about the digital age. He helped push the record industry to adopt the CD and was quoted as saying "I think the music industry has a bright future" when discussing the internet. Here's two excerpts from the article:

In music, Holzman saw the rise of the LP, 8-track tape, DAT, compact disc, MP3, and BitTorrent. After all that, new technologies don't spook him. On the contrary, he says many of these technologies helped make a lot of artists and industry people rich. When it comes to the Internet and digital distribution, Holzman is confident music labels can capitalize on them too. He says they really don't have a choice. "I was having lunch with a very dear friend of mine [in the record business] sometime around 2000," Holzman said during an interview this week with CNET. "We met right around the time when Napster came together, and I said 'There are opportunities and there are potholes. How are you preparing for a digital future?' He said to me, 'Jac, I just want it to go away.' Well, you can't continue that conversation."

Holzman suggested that the big labels goofed when they sued Napster out of existence. At that point, the rise of the CD had left the industry without an effective way to sell individual songs. Before the CD, the 45-rpm vinyl disc was the perfect singles vehicle. The costs of manufacturing CDs, however, made that format more suited to selling full albums, according to Holzman. "With Napster, it would have been easy to proliferate singles," Holzman said. "You would have had no manufacturing costs. You would still have the value of the single as a calling card for albums and you could have sold [songs] for something like 79 cents, made it affordable. You would have had ability to count because all of the transactions went through a central server at Napster, unlike peer-to-peer where you bypassed servers. Now, would P2P still have happened? Yes it would. But we would have established a principle of being paid for digital music."

Holzman also sees positive things when it comes to the re-use of copyrighted works through fair use. Additionally, he thinks that suing music fans is a mistake and that ISPs should share some profits from the music that has been flowing through their networks. All this comes after Stevie Nicks, in spite of the evidence that suggests otherwise, blamed the internet for destroying rock as well as John Mellencamp saying that the internet is the most dangerous invention since the A-bomb. So where does this leaves the mainstream American music industry? I think it shows that everyone in the RIAA ranks don't universally have the opinion that the internet is destroying music. Even within the RIAA, there are opposing views with the digital age and how it affects music. It's a lot like the misconceptions of those who support digital rights. Those who support a loosening copyright laws don't necessarily all say that copyright laws should be abolished and that everything should be free. In fact, many who support a more liberal copyright law even say that they are more than happy to pay for copyrighted material. In the ranks of the RIAA, not everyone is of the extreme point of view that the internet should just be dismantled. Do such people exist? Yes. Are they all of the same opinion? No. That doesn't mean that the debate hasn't shown signs of polarity. I think it's the extreme points of view that do have this affect though. If one person says that the internet should be abolished, a large number of people with various points of view will rally against a call like that. Overall, it's very refreshing to see something like this surface. Have a tip? Want to contact the author? You can do so by sending a PM via the forums or via e-mail at drew@zeropaid.com.

American Anti-Circumvention Laws Becoming More Liberal?

Drew Wilson — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 07:22:36 +0000

The US might be one party pushing for tougher copyright rules internationally through ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement), but the laws surrounding anti-circumvention appear to be getting looser these days. It may very well be a sign that the toughest anti-circumvention rules around might not be in everyone's best interest.

ACTA, about two weeks ago, made headlines over its more recent leak. We did a quick read-through at the time and discovered some very tough anti-circumvention laws embedded in the text. While the US is, no doubt, pushing for tougher copyright rules abroad, it makes the two latest developments on anti-circumvention laws within the US all the more interesting. According to the Courthouse News Service on Friday, a court ruling found that the mere act of breaking a digital lock is not, in and of itself, an infringement. From the report:

"Merely bypassing a technological protection that restricts a user from viewing or using a work is insufficient to trigger the (Digital Millennium Copyright Act's) anti-circumvention provision," Judge Garza wrote for the New Orleans-based court. "The DMCA prohibits only forms of access that would violate or impinge on the protections that the Copyright Act otherwise affords copyright owners."

This is a very interesting court ruling even though it relates to physical devices from General Electric. Coincidentally, though, new rules surrounding copy protection was issued by the Librarian of Congress at the US copyright office. During a review thanks to Section 1201, the ruling designates six new classes of non-infringing activities:

(1) Motion pictures on DVDs that are lawfully made and acquired and that are protected by the Content Scrambling System when circumvention is accomplished solely in order to accomplish the incorporation of short portions of motion pictures into new works for the purpose of criticism or comment, and where the person engaging in circumvention believes and has reasonable grounds for believing that circumvention is necessary to fulfill the purpose of the use in the following instances: (i) Educational uses by college and university professors and by college and university film and media studies students; (ii) Documentary filmmaking; (iii) Noncommercial videos (2) Computer programs that enable wireless telephone handsets to execute software applications, where circumvention is accomplished for the sole purpose of enabling interoperability of such applications, when they have been lawfully obtained, with computer programs on the telephone handset. (3) Computer programs, in the form of firmware or software, that enable used wireless telephone handsets to connect to a wireless telecommunications network, when circumvention is initiated by the owner of the copy of the computer program solely in order to connect to a wireless telecommunications network and access to the network is authorized by the operator of the network. (4) Video games accessible on personal computers and protected by technological protection measures that control access to lawfully obtained works, when circumvention is accomplished solely for the purpose of good faith testing for, investigating, or correcting security flaws or vulnerabilities, if: (i) The information derived from the security testing is used primarily to promote the security of the owner or operator of a computer, computer system, or computer network; and (ii) The information derived from the security testing is used or maintained in a manner that does not facilitate copyright infringement or a violation of applicable law. (5) Computer programs protected by dongles that prevent access due to malfunction or damage and which are obsolete. A dongle shall be considered obsolete if it is no longer manufactured or if a replacement or repair is no longer reasonably available in the commercial marketplace; and (6) Literary works distributed in ebook format when all existing ebook editions of the work (including digital text editions made available by authorized entities) contain access controls that prevent the enabling either of the book’s read-aloud function or of screen readers that render the text into a specialized format.

CrunchGear commented that this essentially means that it's not illegal to bi-pass the CSS of a DVD for the purpose of Fair Use. They also suggested that this ruling also means that it is no longer illegal to jail-break your phone. Overall, though, it's really nice to see something legally happen that seems to give American citizens a little breathing room. A positive development in American law that favors regular citizens, particularly in copyright related issues, really doesn't happen that often with all the copyright term extensions just being handed to big copyright corporations to name one example. Apple Furious With Development It's no surprise that some companies are furious with this development. Apple is furious (PDF - hat tip CNet) over this news, saying in a statement that they oppose this new development with regards to cell phones. "Apple is opposed to the proposed Class #1 exemption because it will destroy the technological protection of Apple’s key copyrighted computer programs in the iPhone™ device itself and of copyrighted content owned by Apple that plays on the iPhone," Apple said in a statement, "resulting in copyright infringement, potential damage to the device and other potential harmful physical effects, adverse effects on the functioning of the device, and breach of contract. The proponents of the exemption have also not satisfied their burden of proof of showing harm to non-infringing uses of the copyrighted works protected by the technological protection measures on the iPhone. In addition, because Congress has already explicitly addressed circumvention for interoperability in Section 1201(f) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA),4 the Copyright Office should not create interoperability exemptions outside that statutory structure, at least without a clear showing of specific and significant harm, which has not been put forth here." Let's face it, the law is not stopping people from jail breaking their phones. The only thing the law does is create more copyright criminals who feel that their rights with what they legally pay for is far too narrow. In fact, according to PCMag, Apple is enjoying record breaking profits:

Apple reported a net profit of $3.25 billion on revenue of $15.7 billion, both of which shot up dramatically from a year ago, when Apple reported profits of $1.83 billion on revenue of $9.73 billion.

So really, cry me a river. It's not like Apple can't weep on spare thousand dollar bills laying around the office. EFF Welcomes the Move The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is currently applauding this development, calling this a victory for people who would otherwise be sued for what would otherwise be considered fair use activities. "By granting all of EFF's applications, the Copyright Office and Librarian of Congress have taken three important steps today to mitigate some of the harms caused by the DMCA," said Jennifer Granick, EFF's Civil Liberties Director. "We are thrilled to have helped free jailbreakers, unlockers and vidders from this law's overbroad reach." "Copyright law has long held that making programs interoperable is fair use," confirmed Corynne McSherry, EFF's Senior Staff Attorney. "It's gratifying that the Copyright Office acknowledges this right and agrees that the anticircumvention laws should not interfere with interoperability." "Noncommercial videos are a powerful art form online, and many use short clips from popular movies. Finally the creative people that make those videos won't have to worry that they are breaking the law in the process, even though their works are clearly fair uses. That benefits everyone — from the artists themselves to those of us who enjoy watching the amazing works they create," added McSherry. As for the phone jailbreaking exceptions: "The Copyright Office recognizes that the primary purpose of the locks on cell phones is to bind customers to their existing networks, rather than to protect copyrights," said Granick. "The Copyright Office agrees with EFF that the DMCA shouldn't be used as a barrier to prevent people who purchase phones from keeping those phones when they change carriers. The DMCA also shouldn't be used to interfere with recyclers who want to extend the useful life of a handset." Overall, it sounds like a very positive development within the US. There's actually a new hint of fairness within one of the most controversial copyright law in the world, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Have a tip? Want to contact the author? You can do so by sending a PM via the forums or via e-mail at drew@zeropaid.com.

‘Trillions’ Contributed to US Economy Through Fair Use

Drew Wilson — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 04:18:15 +0000

While in countries like Canada, there is a debate over whether an expanded fair dealings is being played out, a study in the US looked at how much the economy benefits from fair use. The answer: $4.7 Trillion in 2007.

The major movie studios as well as the major record labels have been, by extension, fighting a war against fair use through a combination of DRM and anti-circumvention laws. In a time when anything that contributes significantly to the US economy is more than likely good news, this could be considered significantly good news. The report comes courtesy of Wireds Threat Level which also comments that the US government also urged caution when measuring the economic impact of intellectual property related issues like this. It seems like a reasonable caution, but in a time when major copyright industries are going around the world urging countries to avoid laws such as fair use as seen in the US, this can always be a nice counter-balance to those arguments. The study suggests that in 2007, $4.7 Trillion in revenue was created by the fair use economy. That money helped employ 17 million people. The Computer & Communications Industry Association is behind that study. Have a tip? Want to contact the author? You can do so by sending a PM via the forums or via e-mail at drew@zeropaid.com.

Global IP Watchlist on Global Consumer Rights Released

Drew Wilson — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 00:17:49 +0000

The US's Special 301 report which tries to paint several countries as piracy havens has always generated sceptical interest - with increasing emphasis on 'sceptical'. Now a new kind of report which shows human rights with respect to access to knowledge has been released.

Every year, there is always the increasingly controversial special 301 report which targets countries for not tightening down on copyright laws. The report is noted to have significant ties to major record labels and movie studios and their demands on other countries. Now, a new kind of report which the Electronic Frontier Foundation has described as being "created to highlight how countries' laws actually fare in facilitating A2K and to act as a counterbalance to the annual Special 301 Report produced by the US Trade Representative." A2K is short for Access to Knowledge. The report says that "in this survey we use a composite measure of 60 criteria, developed and weighted by experts from around the world. But in simple terms, we are interested in how balanced the country's copyright law is, whether it is enforced in ways that impact consumers' interests, and whether the country fosters the exchange of knowledge in forms that are not encumbered by exclusive rights." In short, how well are your rights protected in different countries with respect to intellectual property laws and knowledge? The report certainly demystifies consumer rights on the world stage and even ranks the surveyed countries by a grading system similar to that of a standard school system grades. The report explains, "A represents a good score, that shows that consumers' interests are being observed in this area. B, C and D are progressively not so good... and F is a fail." As a feature, they ranked the top ten best countries and the top ten worst countries. The report ranked India as the best ranked country for protecting consumer rights while Chile was ranked as the worst country for protecting consumer rights. We looked for countries that have been making their way in to the headlines here and the United States ranked at number four for protecting consumer rights. No doubt, the concept of fair use has played a roll in boosting that countries rankings. The US got a B overall boosted by a strong access to knowledge online, for libraries and the disabled. However, there was room for improvement as the US got a 'D' in the category for administration and enforcement as well as 'c's in education access, press access and freedom to share and transfer information. The fair use regime has been a topic for quite some time in Canada's copyright debate for some time. Many argue that Canada needs a much stronger fair dealings regime as seen in the United States, but Canada wasn't seen on either list. While it's both good and bad news for Canada, there were some interesting highlights in Canada's ranking. Overall, Canada scored a 'C' with high marks for access to knowledge for the press and the disabled. Canada lost major marks for access to knowledge for public affairs, for home users and content creators. Canada even received an 'F' for the category 'Freedom to share and transfer' content. The United Kingdom scored a C- while Sweden, Spain and Australia scored B-'s respectively. France and Germany were not surveyed. The report also noted a few patterns saying, "the category in which most countries bombed out was in ‘Freedom to share and transfer’. This means that no countries are doing very much to promote consumers' freedom to share information and knowledge with their neighbours. They could do better if they devoted resources towards maintaining and promoting public domain material (to which no copyright applies), encouraged the take-up of Creative Commons licences and open source software, and helped to unlock the value of ‘orphan works’." The report further explains, "The category in which most countries did best, on average, was in freedoms to access and use by the press. Whilst that's certainly nice to know, it must be said that this is the probably the single category which has the least direct relevance to consumers." Fair use in the United States was a topic discussed in depth. From the report:

There are many uses of copyright materials that are allowed under US law as ‘fair use’, that would not be allowed under the more specific exceptions of other countries. These include new and innovative uses of copyright works, such as the production of audio and visual collages or ‘mash-ups’, as well as more prosaic uses such as transferring music to an MP3 player, or recording your favourite television show to watch later. Businesses, too, can benefit from fair use – for example, the way in which an Internet search engine operates, by providing short excerpts from websites and thumbnail pictures of images, relies on this exception. The fair use exception of US law is not perfect. Because it is by nature so imprecise, it is difficult to be certain whether a given use falls within the exception or not (in fact, fair use rights have been more cynically described as ‘the right to consult a lawyer’). For this reason CI advocates the adoption of a fair use exception as a supplement to existing more specific exceptions, not as a substitute for them. Fair use, in other words, should operate as a ‘catch-all’ exception, to ensure that consumers do not become unwitting infringers when copyright laws fall behind.

This certainly rings true for Canadians for instance. Supporters for consumer rights have long been advocating that if copyright laws were to be amended, then Canada's "Fair Dealing" regime should be more closely aligned with the United States 'Fair Use' regime, however, lobbyists and others who represent the opposition to consumer rights have long argued against it saying that this move would be a disaster. So really, for as many faults the US has about its copyright system, it at least has a more reasonable approach for use of various works through the system of Fair Use, however many ways it could become undermined by anti-circumvention laws. As an example, just image when satirical examination has been pretty much wiped out of fair use and it would be more in line with Canada's fair dealings because it's much harder to argue parody in Canada for use of copyrighted works.

Copyright Industry Lawyer – You Can’t Access Legal Content Forever!

Drew Wilson — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 21:16:21 +0000

The hearing in the United States over whether or not to allow new exceptions to the DMCA, which involves instances where one could legally circumvent DRM, has once again roared into the spotlight. A representative from the MPAA and the RIAA commented “we reject the view [...] that copyright owners and their licensees are required to provide consumers with perpetual access to creative works.” This was in response to what happens when a DRM service shuts down, rendering legally purchased music useless for users.

It’s a legitimate fear as it’s happened multiple times – a music service shutters its DMR music service and servers, rendering all legally purchased tracks useless. For those who do the more honest thing of purchasing music, the very idea that a corporate entity could render legally purchased material useless seems like a betrayal to consumer confidence. It’s not a realistic situation for those that spent 10′s of thousands of dollars on vinyl copies of music (that one day, the content themselves all fail at the same time) but it can technically happen with DRM encoded music.

It’s partly why it makes Steven J. Metalitz’s comments regarding authentification servers during a Q&A session of a copyright hearing so outrageous.

“we reject the view,” Metalitz writes (PDF), “that copyright owners and their licensees are required to provide consumers with perpetual access to creative works. No other product or service providers are held to such lofty standards.”

He then explains the reasoning behind it, “No one expects computers or other electronic devices to work properly in perpetuity, and there is no reason that any particular mode of distributing copyrighted works should be required to do so.”

For many, this would mean that back-ups are illegal – especially in the event of a failure either on the user end or the retailers side of it. That would mean that people would be asked to pay for their legally purchased content again – so much for fair use.

“To recognize the proposed exemption would surely discourage any content provider from entering the marketplace for online distribution or offering consumers the convenience of online authentication of disc-based content unless it was committed to do so — or to guarantee the ability of a third -party service to do so — forever.” He continues, “This would not be good for consumers, who would find a marketplace with less innovation and fewer choices and options. Any argument that such barriers to entry are needed to protect consumers in some way is more appropriately addressed to the Federal Trade Commission, rather than to the Register and the Librarian in this proceeding.”

It’s comments like this that re-enforces what many have known for a very long time already – when you “purchase” content with DRM, you don’t own it, you merely rent it. With thinking like this, it’s no surprise when users turn to piracy. It’s not like they simply want to get content for free, it’s just that they want to be able to have the option to create a way to recover their content in the event something goes wrong – something the industry doesn’t seem to keen on allowing. It’s a mystery how preventing back-ups would be discouraging users and innovation when plenty of innovation revolves around re-using the works in unique ways – something DRM prevents.

“I’ve got 78RPM records from my grandparents’ basement that play just fine today — and I’ve got Logo programs I wrote in 1979 that I can run today. I own a piano roll from 1903 that I can play back if I can clear the space for a player piano. I’ve got books printed in the 17th century that can still be read” Cory Doctorow wrote in response, “and if they can’t be read, they can be scanned and the scans can be read. This is what an open format means.”

“It’s hilarious that the same yahoos who argue for perpetual copyright (implying that copyrighted works have value forever) also argue for time-limited ownership (implying that people who buy copyrighted works should be content to enjoy them for a few weeks or years until the DRM stops working).” Doctorow said.

There’s plenty out there who would easily recognize that given that the computer is effectively a copying machine for the most part, it’s not surprising that many would see this latest argument from the industry as backwards at best.

[Via Arstechnica]

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MPAA – Camming Movies is an Acceptable Practice (for Teachers)

Drew Wilson — Fri, 08 May 2009 21:43:37 +0000

The fair use community of the United States is abuzz over a video clip that shows how the MPAA feels that educational exception should operate. A number of people are already absolutely stunned not just the method the MPAA proposed, but how they presented the idea as well.

There’s plenty of places to find this story now. One way is to find it on BoingBoing. What’s causing the stir is the MPAAs demonstration video on how an educational fair use – showing a video clip for educational purposes – can be obtained by the teachers. “In 2006,” the video description says, “film and media professors were granted an exemption in order to break copy protection on DVDs so that they could utilize high quality video clips in classroom teaching. Up for consideration during the 2009 exemption hearings is whether this exemption should be extended to apply to faculty teaching in all disciplines, and whether the exemption should apply to students.”

For our readers who are still stuck on 56k modems thanks to, say, a local duopoly of ISPs who deem your area not profitable enough to extend their networks to your home even though the local government gave them money and/or the resources to do so, here’s a description of what goes on in the video. An MPAA official narrates a demonstration video on how teachers can extract a required 18 second video clip from a movie. The video shows a woman, presumably your average teacher, hooking up a chord to a camcorder that’s already hooked up to a DVD player. The narrator describes how this method can be used to obtain multiple clips from multiple discs by simply recording and playing and stopping the camera’s recording. The woman then, as described by the narrator, frames the television set with the camera, making sure that the TV set sides, a large wide screen plat panel TV, is not showing while none of the picture is actually cut off. Not wanting to bore the audience, he stops the clip so he can go over the results of the practise, also revealing he was using VLC in his presentation. He then goes over a series of short clips, trying to show that it’s still high quality. At the end, comparing the actual clip from the DVD to the camcorded version. What is also emphasized is that this is using a standard DVD.

The most obvious ironic thing about this is the fact that the MPAA has been waging a war against people who take cameras into theatres and record the movie. The comparable practise that was demonstrated here is known as a telesync which is known to be the method to getting a higher quality cam in the theatre.

Another thing that’s ironic about the clip is the use of VLC. While we weren’t able to find any verifiable reference on what the MPAA thinks of VLC, we do know that the MPAA has been pounding RealNetworks over alleged ease of bi-passing encryption through RealDVD – thus leading to a very simple conclusion that technology such as VLC wouldn’t be allowed to flourish on US soil given that it’s known to read so many codecs.

Another ironic part about this is the use of the camera itself. Why this is significant, one would have to really dig around a news archive from 2002. The example we came up with comes from the EFF at Lawyerpoint which has the following:

The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) filed the “Content Protection Status Report” with the Senate Judiciary Committee last month, laying out its plan to remake the technology world to suit its own ends. The report calls for regulation of analog-to-digital converters (ADCs), generic computing components found in scientific, medical and entertainment devices. Under its proposal, every ADC will be controlled by a “cop-chip” that will shut it down if it is asked to assist in converting copyrighted material — your cellphone would refuse to transmit your voice if you wandered too close to the copyrighted music coming from your stereo.

One final thing that we can safely note that’s ironic about this is the portrayal of what is suppose to be an average teacher exercising fair use rights. The equipment itself, given the common budget of a school like high schools, how realistic is it that the average teacher would just happen to have a nice expensive spare big screen television set, a high quality camera that is suppose to pick up on the video in a reasonably clear scenario, an assistant to watch their every move, a large open space to work with and that much free time to sit and figure out how to put together such a supposedly simple set-up? Particularly when there are a number of teachers out there that just bring DVDs into the class, skip to the scene and just show the scene in question in the first place? It’s likely that the MPAA just wants to prevent any more exceptions from happening and make the act of fair use as difficult to accomplish as possible.

What isn’t shown in the video is how to convert the footage on a camera (many of which uses tapes like the MiniDV tape) and converting that footage over to a format that is recognized by the player in the classroom. There’s two possible methods of accomplishing this, neither of which is easy (as easy as just playing the DVDs in the classroom that is).

One way is to hook up an IEEE fire wire cable to the camera, hook it up to a computer that hopefully recognizes the signal. Transfer the footage over, hoping there’ll be enough room on that hard drive. Then editing the footage through video editing software like Adobe Premier or Sony Vegas (both of which are, of course, cheap and easy to use pieces of software for such a task), then encoding the finished video into, preferably, an MPEG2/broadcast ready format, making sure to have specific scenes in the footage that the DVD players CSS would recognize for ease of use naturally, burning the footage onto a DVD and then playing that footage to your class. These are just minor details of course.

The other possible method is to take the camera into the classroom, having studied whatever entertainment system that classroom has available of course. Next is bringing compatible audio and video cords, properly routing the signals to the equipment like a television set, setting up the television set or viewing screen so it will properly read the signals and display what you want (a step teachers, of course, universally accept is such a pain free step) then playing the footage via the camera. Again, just minor details.

Let’s just hope that teachers would just be granted the exception so they can exercise their fair use rights.

French Court – Private Copying is Not a Right

Jorge Gonzalez — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 06:36:06 +0000

Says companies are allowed to put Digital Rights Management on their CDs, even if it doesn’t work on some devices.

It may be a small setback to advocates who want to broaden their rights when they copy a CD. According to 01net (Google Translated), a French court has ruled that if a company puts Digital Rights Management (DRM) on their CD and a consumer can’t play it, the company did not break any laws and cannot be held liable for damages. Naturally, proponents for DRM applauded the decision (Google Translation)

While many users of content may feel that copying is a right, the ruling seems to just reinforce what has been generally set in stone in many other countries, that, legally speaking, private copying is an exception, not a right. If a company chooses to put DRM on their CD, then they are entitled to do so.

In countries like Canada and the United States, there are systems where if one buys a blank CD, they also pay into a levy system which makes it’s way back to rights holders. Whether or not the system is fair has been a topic for debate for years. Still, there are many examples of this system reinforcing the fact that private copying is an exception under law, not technically a right.

The real battle has been fought on whether a user has a right to make a copy of, say, an album, and burn it onto an additional CD or any other device. In short, it has been a war between the “I bought it, it’s, therefore, my property, I can do whatever I want with it” perspective and, “We need to stop piracy and enforce our intellectual property rights” perspective.

This ruling, judging by the reports, doesn’t seem to be that big of a departure.

Take a Picture of Yourself, Help Protest Restrictive Copyright Reform

Jorge Gonzalez — Sat, 10 May 2008 22:31:28 +0000

The Open Source Cinema is currently looking for mugshots of you for an upcoming movie that opposes restrictive copyright changes. Users are asked to use the Copyright Criminals photo plate to show that under certain copyright reform laws, you would become a criminal.

Yesterday, we reported on the growing movement against copyright reform every time there is even mention of changing copyright laws in Canada. Now we have learned that there is a call for people to submit mugshots of themselves.

It is not necessarily a contest, but if you care about the copyright laws in Canada and have a camera, this may be for you. How do people qualify? If you copy anything in any way, if you remix something, if you share something, if you back up DVDs, if you ever partaken in iPod parties, if you watch DVDs through a Linux machine, if you time shift, if you mix music, if you DJ your own web radio show, if you remix and photoshop pictures, if you make fun of something, etc. You too may become a “Copyright Criminal” in Canada under new laws.