Gigbloggy

If you live in Canada and have an interest in how copyright legislation is being handled by your government, you should know that your country is having a little identity crisis with its US neighbors.

Long story short, the US implemented the DMCA (Digital Millenuim Copyright Act) in 1996 in response to the WIPO’s (The World Intellectual Property Organization) new sets of laws on copyright protection in the digital era. These laws re-enforced the use and the applications of DRMs – those nasty technical measures such as encryption, serial codification that won’t let rip a CD you bought legally to make a backup or that won’t let you listen to an iTunes’ freshly bought Mp3 on anything other than your iPod.

The US government, heavily lobbied by the RIAA, applies the DMCA, and all related digital copyright protection measure very rigorously since 1996. Europe has its own version called EUCD that differs a little from the DMCA, but that backstabs consumers and content owner accordingly.

Canada on the other hand has adopted a DMCA style approach for years. Although less strict than for the American consumer, the Canadian copyright legislation has been found very objectionable by the public as well as by creators.

On July 20, 2009, Industry Minister Tony Clement and Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore launched the first Canadian public consultation on copyright policy since 2001.  The consultation, which runs until September 13, 2009, provides Canadians with an exceptional opportunity to have their voice heard on the future of copyright law in Canada. Here’s a short video produced by Micheal Geist on why Canadian should get involved.

A part from just encouraging our Canadian readers to take action, this video proposes some good refreshing insight on the whole copyright debate that has been going on for years now.

Canadians! If you wish to have your personal say on how you believe copyright should be enforced in Canada, you can:

• Send your impressions directly to government officials via at info @ copyrightconsultation . gc . ca
• Submit a copy of your comments to your local Member of Parliament so that they are aware of your views on copyright. You can find the name of your local MP here.
• Go to Speak Out On Copyright (http://speakoutoncopyright.ca) for more information.

Bark