The Conference Board of Canada plagiarism and undue influence story – which with the Board’s report and overdue apology to Curtis Cook will now go on hiatus until new reports are issued in the fall – has obviously attracted considerable interest. Looking back, while plagiarism is rare, it is the public airing of the copyright lobby policy laundering effort that is the far more important development.
This lengthy post seeks to unravel the effort further by demonstrating how there has been a clear strategy of deploying seemingly independent organizations to advance the same goals, claims, arguments, and recommendations. Over the past three years, this strategy has played out with multiple reports, each building on the next with a steady stream of self-citation. The following diagram highlights the key players:
 |
Although there are many groups involved in copyright lobbying, at the heart of the strategy are two organizations – the Canadian Recording Industry Association and the Canadian Motion Picture Distributors Association. CRIA’s board is made up the four major music labels plus its director, while the CMPDA’s board is comprised of representatives of the Hollywood movie studios. Those same studios and music labels provide support for the International Intellectual Property Association, which influences Canadian copyright policy by supporting U.S. government copyright lobby efforts.
In addition to their active individual lobbying (described here), CRIA and CMPDA have provided financial support for three associations newly active on copyright lobbying – the Canadian Anti-Counterfeiting Network, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce’s IP Council, and the Ontario Chamber of Commerce (there are other funders including pharmaceutical companies and law firms). Those groups have issued virtually identical reports and in turn supported seemingly independent sources such as the Conference Board of Canada and paid polling efforts through Environics.
The net effect has been a steady stream of reports that all say basically the same thing, cite to the same sources, make the same recommendations, and often rely on each other to substantiate the manufactured consensus on copyright reform. The relevant reports are as follows:
- CACN – Report on Counterfeiting and Piracy in Canada: A Roadmap for Change (2007)
- Ontario Chamber of Commerce – Protection of Intellectual Copyright: A Case for Ontario (2008)
- Environics polling (2008)
- IP Council (Canadian Chamber of Commerce) – A Time For Change: Towards a New Era for Intellectual Property Rights in Canada (2009)
- Conference Board of Canada – Intellectual Property Rights in the Digital Economy (2009 – recalled)
Just how similar are these reports? First consider some sample recommendations (note particularly the Ontario Chamber and Conference Board recommendations which include arguable plagiarism problems):
| Recommendation | CACN | Ontario Chamber | IP Council | Conference Board |
| Create an IP Council | Establish a federal Intellectual Property Coordination Council consisting of senior civil servants and IP rights holders whose key objectives would include: (i) creating and implementing educational programs, with emphasis on Canadian youth, that teach the rationale for and importance of intellectual property; (ii) communicating with IP right holders to ensure that their IP needs are being met by the current application of the laws; |
IP Inter-Ministerial Coordination Council: – comprising high-level representatives from ministries involved in innovation and intellectual property rights protection (Ministry of Research and Innovation, Ministry of Economic Development and Trade, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Finance) partnered with key industry stakeholders – will be responsible for creating policy programs to promote the protection of IP and increase innovative capacity, such as education programs targeting youth as well as an awareness campaign for businesses and consumers |
Establish an Intellectual Property Rights Coordination Council consisting of senior government officials, representatives from the business community, and IP rights holders. The Council should develop and implement a robust IPR framework that promotes the creation and exploitation of innovative products and services in Canada. | IP Inter-ministerial coordination council: comprising high-level representatives from the IP sector; would create policy programs to promote the protection of IP; would enforce key elements such as exposing the dangers and risks to consumer health and safety, highlighting the relationship between IPR crime and organized crime, providing information and resources to SMEs, and creating programs to exploit IPR. |
| Create an Intellectual Property Crime Task Force | Adequately fund an Intellectual Property Crime Task Force, composed of police officers, customs officers, and federal prosecutors, to guide and coordinate IP criminal enforcement. | IP Task Force: – comprising of specialized IPR prosecutors and police officers dedicated to IP related crime – will coordinate enforcement and prosecution activities against counterfeiters and pirates – will work with border officials to address counterfeit products detected at border crossings |
Establish a specialized IP Crime Task Force to guide, coordinate and lead anti-counterfeiting and anti-piracy enforcement efforts in Canada. | IP Task Force: comprising individuals dedicated to IP-related crime; would coordinate enforcement and prosecution activities against counterfeiters and pirates; would work with CBSA to track counterfeit products. |
| Tougher penalties | Immediately encourage prosecutors to seek more significant penalties, including jail time. | The Federal government must strengthen current IPR protection legislative framework by (…) Incur sufficiently severe penalties to deter and neutralize offenders, i.e. inclusion of jail/prison time as punishment. | impose stronger penalties for counterfeiting and pirating violations that endanger the health and safety of Canadians | enact appropriate penalties as a deterrent |
| Implement the WIPO Internet Treaties and anti-circumvention measures | Enact criminal legislation clearly defining offences for commercial circumvention activities (including trafficking in circumvention devices) | The Federal government must strengthen current IPR protection legislative framework by (…) Implementing the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Internet Treaties to curtail internet piracy and counterfeiting. | The Government of Canada should rapidly adopt IP legislation that fully implements the WIPO Internet treaties in a manner that is consistent with international norms and standards and enables the curtailment of counterfeiting and piracy in the online environment (whether physical or digital) | implementing WIPO Internet treaties to curtail Internet piracy and counterfeiting |
| Create public education and awareness programs | creating and implementing educational programs, with emphasis on Canadian youth, that teach the rationale for and importance of intellectual property | Private and public sector stakeholders should work in partnership with consumer protection groups and education institutions to generate greater public awareness of the impact of counterfeiting and piracy on public health and safety, as well as to the economy | Establish an intellectual property education program targeting the public, businesses, innovators, creators, and government officials. | Private and public sector stakeholders should work with consumer protection groups and academia to generate awareness of the impact of counterfeiting and piracy on public health and safety, as well as to the economy. |
| Increase funding and resources to tackle IP crime | Provide the RCMP and the Department of Justice with adequate financial and human resources to effectively address counterfeiting. | Federal and provincial governments to provide additional funding and training to CBSA, police, Crown attorneys and judges specifically for the purpose of enhancing IPR protection. | the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) should be provided with the legislative authority and resources needed to target, detain, seize and destroy counterfeit and pirated goods on its own initiative. |
Federal and provincial governments should provide additional funding and training to all relevant enforcement authorities for enhancing IPR protection. |
Not only are the recommendations the same, so too are the claims and the arguments used to support the recommendations. First the claims:
1. Counterfeiting costs the Canadian economy billions. (see posts on the uncertainty associated with counterfeiting claims here, here, and here)
| Organization | Claim | Source |
| CACN | The RCMP estimates that the cost to the Canadian economy from counterfeiting and piracy is in the billions. | Royal Canadian Mounted Police “Intellectual Property Crime in Canada – Hazardous and Costly” RCMP Feature Focus 2005 Economic Crime in Canada |
| Ontario Chamber | In Canada, the RCMP and others have acknowledged that there is no comprehensive study regarding the specific amount of pirated and counterfeit goods. However, a widely accepted estimated cost of counterfeiting and piracy to the Canadian economy, ranges between CDN $10 billion and CDN $30 billion. | Royal Canadian Mounted Police “Intellectual Property Crime in Canada – Hazardous and Costly” RCMP Feature Focus 2005 Economic Crime in Canada |
| IP Council | It has been conservatively estimated that counterfeiting and piracy cost the Canadian economy $22 billion annually in lost tax revenue, investment and innovation. | Royal Canadian Mounted Police. “Intellectual Property Rights Crime.” Presentation. Montreal. Sept 16, 2008. |
| Conference Board | Although the RCMP and others acknowledge that no comprehensive study has been done on the specific amount of pirated and counterfeit goods, they concur that a widely accepted estimated cost of counterfeiting and piracy to the Canadian economy ranges between $10 billion and $30 billion per year. | Ontario Chamber of Commerce, Protection of Intellectual Copyright: A Case for Ontario |
2. Lost revenues in the software industry (see my post on the BSA numbers here, dodgy software numbers here)
| Organization | Claim | Source |
| CACN | In 2005, the loss to the software industry as a result of piracy was approximately $736 million. This meant a tax loss of $345 million and a loss of thousands of software-related jobs. | Royal Canadian Mounted Police “Intellectual Property Crime in Canada – Hazardous and Costly” RCMP Feature Focus 2005 Economic Crime in Canada |
| Ontario Chamber | The RCMP reports that in 2005, the Canadian software industry lost approximately $736 million and 32,000 software related jobs as a result of counterfeiting and crime, the majority of which were lost in Ontario. | Royal Canadian Mounted Police “Intellectual Property Crime in Canada – Hazardous and Costly” RCMP Feature Focus 2005 Economic Crime in Canada |
| IP Council | According to a study commissioned by the Business Software Alliance (BSA), losses to the Canadian economy due to software piracy surpassed $1 billion in 2007. | Business Software Alliance. News Release. “BSA Urges Stronger Copyright Legislation To Reduce Impact of Piracy on Canadian Economy.” May 14, 2008. |
| Conference Board | Losses to the software and film industries are approximately $1 billion in Canada. | Ontario Chamber of Commerce, Protection of Intellectual Copyright: A Case for Ontario |
3. Losses Due to Film Piracy (see my post on movie industry losses here).
| Organization | Claim | Source |
| CACN | The annual consumer spending loss in Canada due to film piracy in 2005 was estimated at approximately $270 million, while the loss of tax revenues due to film piracy in Canada in 2005 was estimated at approximately $41 million | The Canadian Motion Picture Distributors Association (CMPDA) Beyond Borders: An Agenda to Combat Film Piracy in Canada (Beyond Borders) 2006. |
| Ontario Chamber | The annual consumer spending loss in Canada due to film piracy in 2005 was estimated at approximately $270 million with a loss of tax revenue accruing to an estimated $41 million | The Canadian Motion Picture Distributors Association (CMPDA) Beyond Borders: An Agenda to Combat Film Piracy in Canada (Beyond Borders) 2006. |
| IP Council | Film piracy resulted in consumer spending losses of approximately $270 million in 2005, as well as tax revenue losses of $41 million | The Canadian Motion Picture Distributors Association (CMPDA) Beyond Borders: An Agenda to Combat Film Piracy in Canada (Beyond Borders) 2006. |
| Conference Board | Losses to the software and film industries are approximately $1 billion in Canada. | Ontario Chamber of Commerce, Protection of Intellectual Copyright: A Case for Ontario |
4. Losses to the Music Industry
| Organization | Claim | Source |
| CACN | As a result of the combined impact of the physical and online black markets, the Canadian music industry’s retail sales of pre-recorded CDs and cassettes declined by 48 percent ($637 million) from 1999 to 2006. | The Canadian Recording Industry Association, Press Release, March 2, 2006. |
| Ontario Chamber | The Canadian music industry’s retail sales of pre-recorded CDs and cassettes have declined by 44 percent from 1999 to 2005, a decrease of $541 million. As a result, the Canadian recording industry has had to shed its workforce by 20 per cent, with most lost in Ontario | The Canadian Recording Industry Association, Press Release, March 2, 2006. |
| IP Council | Canada’s music industry, faced with unchecked online counterfeiting and piracy, experienced a 48% ($637 million) drop in retail sales from 1999 to 2006. | The Canadian Recording Industry Association, Press Release, March 2, 2006. |
And a few of the arguments:
1. Piracy is out of control in Canada
| CACN | Piracy can only thrive in a culture where citizens view the acquisition of counterfeit goods as acceptable, thereby opening the way to consumer demand for those products. This appears to be case in Canada – particularly among youth – where research has found that stealing IP is increasingly regarded as morally acceptable. |
| Ontario Chamber | the OECD found in a December 2005 report that Canada had the highest level of peer-to-peer downloading among OECD countries. |
| IP Council | The RCMP has identified an “ever-growing use of the Internet for IP crime” in Canada, and predicted that the problem will escalate because “soft ware, music and movie piracy are easy, low-risk activities.” In November of 2007, the Quebec Superior Court declared that unauthorized file sharing in Canada was an “endemic” problem. |
| Conference Board | The Internet piracy problem within Canada continues to worsen and is causing serious problems for markets in other countries. |
2. The U.S. is unhappy with Canada
| CACN | The United States Congressional International Anti-Piracy Caucus, which designated Canada as a “Watch List Country” (along with China, Russia, Mexico, India, and Malaysia) because of its failure to amend its copyright law in accordance with its WIPO obligations and because of “Canada’s lax border measures [that] appear to permit the importation of pirated products from East Asia, Pakistan, and Russia.” |
| Ontario Chamber | Further, the United States Trade Representative (USTR) has stated that Canada’s lax border measures “appear to be non-compliant with TRIPS requirements” and the Canadian Anti-Counterfeiting Network has stated that “Canada has effectively failed to meet” its TRIPS obligations. |
| IP Council | Several international organizations and countries have specifically identified Canada for its failure to adequately protect IP rights. In March 2008, the International Intellectual Property Alliance placed Canada in the same league as well known counterfeiting havens like China and Russia by listing it among “countries of the greatest concern.” In April 2008, the United States Trade Representative (USTR) placed Canada on the Special 301 Watch List for the fourteenth consecutive year. |
| Conference Board | There is ongoing debate and outcry in Canada regarding the 2007 and 2009 Special 301 Reports issued by the Office of the United States Trade Representative. |
3. Canada’s lax IP protection hampers innovation and puts foreign investment at risk
| CACN | By providing a marketplace where investments in creative goods and services will be profitable, IP protection fosters innovation, job creation and economic prosperity. In developed nations like Canada, where innovation has become a key economic driver, this has never been more important. Unfortunately, it appears that all levels of government in Canada lack a sophisticated understanding of the connection between innovation and IP. |
| Ontario Chamber | There is a real concern that mounting criticism of Canada’s IPR regime will impact Ontario’s attractiveness to foreign investors, its ability to foster innovation as well as overall competitiveness |
| IP Council | Canadian failure to properly protect IPR directly affects the willingness of foreign firms to invest domestically. |
| Conference Board | Canada is not among the top innovation nations, but is well positioned to do better if it can bring together its fragmented and uncoordinated innovation infrastructure. Otherwise, Canada will continue to offer only a marginal framework for developing and exploiting intellectual property from both the private and public sectors. The role of intellectual property systems in Canada has received inadequate attention. If Canada does not change, its economic outlook will suffer. |
False Momentum
It is not just that these reports all receive financial support from the same organizations and say largely the same thing. It is also that the reports each build on one another, creating the false impression of growing momentum and consensus on the state of Canadian law and the need for specific reforms. Consider the IP Council’s A Time for Change, which was released in early 2009. The very first chapter of the report is titled “Canada’s Emerging Consensus on Intellectual Property Rights.” Where does this consensus come from?
According to the IP Council, it starts with the CACN report, followed by two House of Commons committees that heard primarily from these groups and which led to the 2007 Speech from the Throne and Canada’s participation in ACTA. The chapter then states that IPR policy was taken to the “next level” with the Ontario Chamber report, the founding of the IP Council, and the 2008 Conference Board of Canada conference that led to the three recalled IP reports. The chapter then notes the “growing public awareness of the need for action” which cites Environics polls (paid for by the IP Council) and a Toronto Star supplement on counterfeiting (paid for by the CACN). In all, the IP Council cites the CACN four times, the Ontario Chamber twice, the Conference Board of Canada proceedings 13 times, and the Environics research five times.
Environics
The influence over some of these independent reports is evident in other ways. For example, Environics has emerged as the survey company of choice for this effort (Pollara was a favourite until Duncan McKie left to run the Canadian Independent Record Production Association). Environics lead on these issues was once Don Hogarth, who now provides communications for CRIA. On June 4, 2008 – one week before the introduction of C-61 – Environics released a poll that it said found that Canadians are looking for leadership on IP issues. The report repeats the CACN, Ontario Chamber, and IP Council assertions, stating:
over the past several years Canada has fallen behind the international community when it comes to the protection of intellectual property and products of the mind. The gap between Canadian laws and international standards in the area of counterfeiting, piracy, and illegal downloading is growing ever wider. Canada has been maintained by the U.S. Trade Representative on a special watch list specifically because of its laxity in the realm of protecting intellectual property.
What makes the timing particularly noteworthy is that even though Environics issued a press release claiming that the data came from a new study, the data was not new. Rather, it was drawn from a 2006 survey that seemingly sat idle for two years until the opportune moment to raise it days before the introduction of new copyright legislation. Who funded the questions related to intellectual property? It will come as little surprise to find that CRIA paid for those. Moreover, Environics oddly proceeded to re-issue the identical press release six months later (June 2008 version, December 2008 version) in conjunction with an IP Council commissioned survey on counterfeiting.
What does it all mean?
At a certain level, none of this will come as a surprise. Companies lobby for their position and what made the Conference Board of Canada series of events so unusual was the way in which it was exposed. Yet the Conference Board of Canada’s recalled reports were clearly just a part of a much larger strategy to influence Canadian copyright policy by creating a narrative of crisis and the false impression of Canada as a piracy haven. This week’s comments from Industry Minister Tony Clement and Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore provide the strong sense that they better understand the current dynamic around copyright, but it is obvious that the lobbying on the issue is only going to intensify in the months ahead.
Micheal Im in complete awe that you have taken your precious time to share this information.
Unsurprisingly this is what most already knew, just never took the time (as you have) to point it out. Once again your persevereance of the truth is inspiring. I have to admit this would have made me chuckle if it wasn’t so sickening.
captcha phrase: charcoal found . IRONY…..
what specifically is this about? are they creating a new copyright bill?
Loss to the software industry?
How much of the loss posted is actually due to piracy? Seems to me that most jobs were outsourced to nations with no wage laws and shoddy human rights records. The taxes collected from workers in Canada in the software industry are no more due to corporate greed.
These business types are not exactly know for being upfront and honest. I call BS.
corruption?
It is upsetting that a few get to have more influence over our government than the voting population just because they are rich. We should get them to make some laws to control this sort of behavior. We should be able to get a decent number of people to consent that bribery shouldn’t be tolerated, even if it’s thinly veiled. Now if only we could somehow influence what our government does based on what a majority of the electorate wants…
Foreign influence
Wouldn’t it be useful to show the major players in the CMPDA, CRIA, etc.? I suspect some of them can be traced back to the USA. I thought the Canadian CDMA was mostly written by U.S. interests, but maybe I’m misremembering.
Unbelievable
I am left in awe at the arrogance and willful contempt that these corporations are showing to their customers and fellow citizens. Karma is unforgiving and these RIAA corporations have had it coming since Napster so let them play their dirty games but when WE THE PEOPLE decide enough is enough they won’t be able to sell their products to anyone because their customers will hate them so much for what they have done to them in the past.
In the end it’s all about the fight to save our Canadian culture and how it’s being stolen from us by giant and organized American corporations. Almost a bad horror movie plot but it’s real. Thank you Mr. Geist for a very informative article.
Money talks
The rest of us walk.
Exposing Them
Exposing this for all to see is the next step share this piece with friends.
Thanks Michael,
I shall be writing my MP about this and this past Thursday. It’s time I got involved, this is a major strike against Representative Government and Government by the People.
Write an article on your methods Dr. Geist
Hello Dr. Geist,
Again thanks for all your amazing work, no one else is speaking for the masses on this matter besides you it seems. Ironic since I remember voting for my MP and not the CMDPA or CRIA. I am concerned though that its just you doing this work, while they apparently seem to have a small army spewing their lies. Please write an article on where you are getting your reports from, perhaps a small volunteer group can also filter through items. We can then get multiple people blogging and writing about these matters.
thanks.
Well Done!
Can someone also please tell these organizations that the CRIA doesn’t represent the music industry as a whole. I’m a bit disappointed to see the Ontario Chamber’s position on this. Remind me not to renew my membership.
gezlhume@gmail.com
No connections to SOCAN? I know they were involved with the CRIA in getting the private copying levy created…
A communications disruption can mean only one thing — invasion
🙂 The phantom menace 🙂
losses = fake
I love when they talk about losses.
The part they never mentioned is the one about where these “losses” go? Do they supposedly leave the country?
Oh, right. We’re consumers. When the money is “lost” it just goes elsewhere within the country. This is why there are so many loopholes in the “money lost” idea. If everyone was making a profit off “illegal copies” then there’d be real money lost. However, since we’re just getting it for free and spending elsewhere, the money is still going back into government taxing and what have you.
Also, good writeup, maybe people will realize soon that they are colluding. Does Canada have laws against this type of collusion?
grunt
reactions, emotions, objectives.
the term is to ‘buffalo’ here, i think.
something like bull, right?
odd the wiretaping, bugging (glass beads, anyone?), and other sir-valence tech
didn’t get a mention. It is a communication system, after all.
Thanks
for being on our side!
Very disappointed with Environics being tied to this.
Response to “Loss in the software industry?”
“How much of the loss posted is actually due to piracy?”
Likely a whole lot less than they claim. The Business Software Alliance is an American-based front group for large software companies in the US (Microsoft, Adobe and Autodesk are the main contributors), who are paid to find and punish copyright infringement. I’d believe one of their arguments about as much as I’d believe an argument about copyright from the CRIA.
I thought us Canadians were nice
Hello, but I am a bit confused here by this quote
“In Canada, the RCMP and others have acknowledged that there is no comprehensive study regarding the specific amount of pirated and counterfeit goods. However, a widely accepted estimated cost of counterfeiting and piracy to the Canadian economy, ranges between CDN $10 billion and CDN $30 billion.”
That works out to about $1 billion worth of “theft” for each and every Canadian. Well I have not copied any IP, neither has my wife, so some louse is doing lots for both of us if these figures are true.
But I have purchased CD’s directly from Canadian artists at their concerts. These are talented Canadians (who record and produce their own CDs) that the recording industry lobbyists have never heard of.
Linux Kid: not sure what you meant to say, but $30 billion / $30 million = $1000. And ya, that’s a ridiculous amount.
Hopefully the Government does not want to be painted with the same brush that tarnished the Conference Board
It seems that the web of “mis-truths” that are the foundation of CRIA, MPAA and their bed mates are finally visible to the Government. I guess that they needed a consistent pattern over many years to get it. The real test is whether legislation reflects the truth, or lobby lies. Now that the Conservative Government gets it – Liberals, what’s your position on the matter? (just in case there is a change in government)
The lobbyists and their patrons probably have dart boards with Dr. Geist’s image at the bulls eye since he and his researchers, and peers, have diligently reminded us about the pack of lies (oops … mis-truth) emanating from these individuals and organizations.
Is there an english word that describes individuals who sell their soul, moral integrity, nay – their bodies for money?
… Gez/Linux Kid: $30 billion / 30 million = $1000 for every man, woman, child. And this is supposed to be annually.
I guess that means Dad gets a new copy of AutoCad, Mom Photoshop, a few copies of Vista, and the kids a couple hundred CD’s/DVD’s. And that’s every year!
C’mon, people … the name’s Tucker, not Sucker.
. And ya, that’s a ridiculous amount.
Exceptional work!!
Congratulations Michael Geist for exposing these cartels what they’re worth, nothing. You have my humble thanks!! ^o^
This article exposes two aspects of the copyright lobby’s propaganda:
the multiple front organizations, and the false claims they repeat.
However, there is another aspect which works at a more insidious
level: propaganda terms such as “piracy” and “intellectual property”
which are designed to lead people to frame the issue in a way that
favors the copyright lobby. Each one of us who uses those terms
(rather than denouncing them as propaganda) becomes, in that moment,
a front for the copyright lobby’s ideas.
So let’s not do it!
See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html for more explanation.
Good work
Good work Michael, we will now see if the actual government is working for the people who voted for them or if it is working for the money provider corporate liars!! . The way they will proceed with this bill, will tell us.
bcodeproject@yahoo.com
>> [damage] ranges between CDN $10 billion and CDN $30 billion.
> That works out to about $1 billion worth of “theft” for each and every Canadian.
Aha! I caught anti-copyright advocates advancing a false argument, therefore, the anti-copyright crowd is wrong about everything!
Are there only 10-30 Canadians in Canada? I think your numbers should be $333-$1000 per Canadian. Obviously those numbers are wrong for two reasons: First, because it’s unlikely to be that much money per person, and second, the “losses” aren’t to the Canadian economy. The Canadians are largely pirating American content, so those would mostly be losses to the US. Of course, from a completely selfish standpoint, Canada might as well rip-off other countries.
Thank you..
..for being our voice, you are becoming a Canadian hero.
Don’t Support Them
http://mininova.org
Michael Geist for Order of Canada! For this is true patriot love.
Why do you need to lie about Canada’s enforcement?
“clearly just a part of a much larger strategy to influence Canadian copyright policy by creating a narrative of crisis and the false impression of Canada as a piracy haven.”
Punishment for private copyright infringement in Canada is extremely rare, as you would find it impossible even if hard pressed to disprove. By all reasonable definitions, from this fact ALONE, Canada can be described as a ‘piracy haven’ – if something is done at will and not punished, then by definition, there is a ‘haven’ for it. Why do you need to lie about the strictness of Canadian copyright enforcement, Mr. Geist?
Thanks for the excellent work Mr. Geist. Just goes to show when you have no transparency and accountability in any level of government that it feeds corruption. Corporate lobbyist with their deep pockets making contributions and deals behind close doors with politicians and high level government bureaucrats; that don’t change with the the whims of the elections.
Sadly it’s not just here but all over the world. In Sweden, a shocking show trial to get rid of the “world’s largest Bit Torrent tracker”. Yet despite obvious bias in judges the decision was in made in favour of the corporations; despite not being able to prove a thing in the court proceedings.
It’s a shame when corporate greed & power has more say than an individual’s right and freedoms.
What a result
Brilliantly done.
Copyright law is antiquated; thanks Mr Geist for helping to speed up the process.
http://www.orato.com/entertainment/coming-through-rye-banned
Soooo, a relatively small amount of pro-copyright groups paid many other groups to parrot their views so it would look like there is a ‘copyright emergency’, basically?
I didn’t know DeviantArt shenanigans worked in real world politics.
1984 – Desinformation Ministry and New Talk
While everybody is busy discussing how much is “lost” by “piracy” and “stolen” content, I want to protest the use of such words of “piracy” and “stolen” in the first place, which are designed to brain wash the population into thinking IP is like real property. Here are some quotes:
1 – When talking about piracy the entertainment industry and politicians often use the term “theft.†This is a huge problem according to the Swedish sociologist of law Stefan Larsson. In his thesis “Metaphors and Norms – Understanding Copyright Law in a Digital Society,†he explains that these metaphors are in part keeping the wide gap between people’s norms and the law intact.
http://torrentfreak.com/piracy-is-not-theft-111104/
2 – Canadian law professor Stephen Waddams, in a well-regarded book about how we think about law, wrote that when a dispute arises about intangibles, such as copyrighted works, information, or… time,
[T]he claimant is always eager to categorize the claim as proprietary. Thus, the conduct of the defendant is apt to be described by claimants as piracy, highway robbery, and brazen theft. This is rhetoric: the taking of a photograph, the re-broadcasting of television signals, the use of confidential information, or the copying of a design cannot, in fact or law, be piracy, robbery (on or off the highway), or theft, and if it were any of these things, the rhetoric would be unnecessary…
[…] Describing someone as a thief or trespasser is a metaphoric step in gaining property rights, and not the result of having a property right in the first place. If one already had a property right, the property owner would sue for violation of that right and would not have to strut around… blaring loudly about “piracy.â€
[…]
Copyright owners [describe] their right as “intellectual property.†The purpose of advocating something as a property right is to take it outside of the need for any empirical, social justification. As a property right we do not ask about incentives, and we do not ask whether the property interest benefits the public. Property simply is and need not be justified. Those who own property rights are entitled to hunt down unauthorized users as free-riders, as criminals, as a threat to polite society just as surely as who break into our homes and steal our cars.
Copyright law isn’t about theft and clearly fenced-off property. It’s a set of social relationships between creators and the public, granting creators certain exclusive rights, for a limited time, for the benefit of everyone. Abusing the theft metaphor shifts the focus away from the fundamentals of copyright, making it difficult to have any sort of meaningful or fruitful discussion about copyright.
http://www.rootsmusic.ca/2010/01/25/why-copyright-infringement-isnt-theft/
3 –
“intellectual property is composed of two parts: the right of sale, and the intellectual monopoly. The first gives the producer or any rightful owner of a copy of the idea the power to sell it to another party. The second gives the patent or copyright holder the right to control and limit the usage of the idea by any other person.
The latter is not just a simple well-defined right of property. It establishes a monopoly that we do not usually allow producers of other goods. We will argue that this monopoly creates many social costs, yet has little social benefit. It largely redistributes income and wealth from the many that do not have it, to the “lucky†ones who have managed to obtain it.
Boldrin & Levine: Against Intellectual Monopoly, Chapter 1, page 8
http://www.dklevine.com/general/intellectual/against.htm