Bill C-11’s Digital Locks Provisions – Why ?
The digital lock provisions included in Bill C-11 are meant to curb the circumvention of “technological protection measures“, to halt piracy. But unfortunately many consumers currently circumvent digital locks to perform private copies of music recordings or to view films that are unavailable in their region.
At the moment Canadians are able to purchase music on iTunes and use this
program to convert their legally purchased ACC files to the mp3 format.
These consumers can also purchase region free DVD or blu-ray players from Amazon.com
Neither of the above acts result in the unauthorized, uncompensated distribution of copyrighted works to third parties yet these acts could technically be forbidden by Section 41 of the Copyright Act if Bill C-11 passes.
Private Copying, as defined in Part VIII of our Copyright Act, is not exempt in Bill C-11. And Section 41 explicitly forbids the manufacturing, importation, sale or rental of technologies, devices or componants whose primary function is the circumvention of copy protection.
It appearently doesn’t matter that the copyright owners were compensated when the recordings were legally purchased from legitimate vendors and that if it weren’t for copy protection that these acts would be considered private copying in law.
The authors of Bill C-11 insist on labeling these acts “piracy”, even when consent is implied by the sale of these recordings to law abiding Canadian consumers.
The American entertainment industry has yet to specify what losses are incured in the private copying of copy protected works. They also failed to specify how they are loosing funds on legally purchased foreign recordings they refuse to sell in Canada.
Why are we allowing this undue, unjustified foreign influence on our Parlamentary processes ?
Canadians Will Need To Wait
The introduction of the Kindle Fire
The available products are the Wi-Fi tablet and Free 3G/Wi-Fi tablet. But we will probably not get the Kindle Fire
Access to those services are two of the major selling points for this tablet, although they could decide to open up an app store in Canada for an international device. I guess only time will tell.
New Parliamentary Session Starts Today
Parliament will be in session today and many bills are scheduled to be introduced by the last scheduled sitting day in December, including two re-introduced bills that consumers should be made aware of.
Both should be of concern to Canadian consumers as they are scheduled to be re-introduced with little to no changes, possibly resulting in a loss in the ability to make private copies from copy protected recordings, loss of privacy when it comes to the internet and higher subscription fees for internet access.
The Hurt Locker Lawsuits Come North
It appears that Bell Canada, Cogeco Cable and Videotron GP were ordered to provide Voltage Pictures LLC subscriber information by a Federal Court in Montreal yesterday.
The producer of the film “The Hurt Locker” had used a previous rulling in regards to music piracy to obtain this information and it appears that the internet providers will comply, including Bell who were asked to divulge information on less than 10 subscribers according to Mediacaster Magazine.
It’s time to secure those open wi-fi connections guys.
Zip To Expand Movie Rental Kiosks
Online movie rental retailer Zip.ca will partner with Metro Inc. to bring their movie rental kiosks to over 800 Metro grocery stores though-out Canada.
These red kiosks, which rented DVDs for $1 and blu-ray disc for $2, were successfully tested in Ottawa and Montreal Metro stores. And the company is hoping to gain more customers from Blockbuster Canada‘s extensive membership.
Zip is also currently offering internet movie rentals on Samsung brand devices.