Copyright and voting Conservative

Politics is not like shopping for groceries where you can fill your cart with the policies you like and leave the ones you don’t like on the shelf. Like it or not, when you vote for a particular party, you get the whole bundle: the good policies with the bad.

That said, I can understand where Alec Saunders is coming from. A recent post on his blog explains why he will be voting against Stephen Harper when an election is called. I have also been critical of the Conservative’s copyright bill.

As it stands now, Bill C-61 is so egregiously bad I think they want it to fail. We can only hope it never moves forward.

Given the groundswell of opposition to the current bill, which includes virtually everything corporate media interests have asked for, I can’t imagine the CPC actually proceeding with it. It makes no sense to turn people into criminals simply for making a backup copy of their store-bought Disney DVD for their kids to use. Now that they have tried with this bill, they can legitimately say to the next U.S. administration that it just won’t fly.

As for Alec Saunders, if this one issue is of such paramount importance to him, I would suggest he weigh his options carefully before voting against the Conservatives. Does the bad he sees likely to come from Bill C-61 more than offset all the good that might come from other "conservative" policies which he would otherwise be inclined to support? And what about the damage that the many boneheaded policies supported by other parties could cause?

In the case of the Liberals, there is really little fundamental difference between the previous Liberal copyright bill and that of the Conservatives. So a vote for the Liberals wouldn’t likely get him any further ahead on his one burning issue. In the meantime, he would have to swallow a lot of bad Liberal policies (can you say Green Shift?) with which he may fundamentally disagree.

That leaves the NDP which, of course, can adopt any policy it wants because it knows it will never get in power. But if Alec is truly conservative minded, it is hard to imagine him going to this extreme. In so doing, he would be in common cause with the likes of Lester, one of his commenters who advocates we “vote against this NeoConservative pig.”

I recognize that there is a real risk that the Conservatives may revive Bill C-61 in a similar form if they get a majority in the coming election. It is this very possibility that acts to temper my enthusiasm and desire to help the Conservatives win the election. But as important as this issue is to me, I’m not about to vote NDP. All I can say to Alec is to vote wisely.

Courting copyright controversy

This is dumb. Really dumb.

If the reports are true, I'll be tearing up my CPC membership card. I can't believe Harper could be so stupid.

After months of delays and speculation, the federal government is set to unveil its controversial update to the Copyright Act of Canada Thursday.

According to a press release, Industry Minister Jim Prentice and Heritage Minister Josée Verner are set to introduce the legislation during the morning Parliamentary session. Both ministers will deliver brief statements and answer media inquiries shortly after the tabling of a bill to amend the Copyright Act.

Reports have also indicated that the two ministers will unveil the Copyright Act under the slogan "Made In Canada Copyright Reform" during a scheduled press conference.

The new Copyright Act has been updated to reflect the growth of digital media and is said to include a number of contentious provisions including:

-- A $500 fine for each illegal file shared online

-- Making it illegal to unlock cellphones or copy music from protected CDs to iPods

-- Forbidding the right to copy "time shifted" shows onto personal video recorders if flagged by broadcasters.

While this might make Hollywood and Big Media happy, they don't vote. Once consumers realize that the content they just purchased has been locked down, they will be furious.

The Conservatives are going to take a big hit for this. Watch the sparks fly.

"Piracy is just another business model"

There are better ways of beating the pirates than suing your customers:

Media piracy will always be with us. But the pirates, Mr. Bylund writes, “can be beaten — it happens all the time — but not primarily by means of legal threats and lawsuits.” Rather, he says: “You subjugate these rebels with the tools of free enterprise. Piracy is just another business model, and the pirates will lose and go away when you come up with a better model.”

Consumers make buying decisions based on three factors, according to Mr. Bylund: “price, convenience and quality.” Pirates will always win on price (free), but media companies can and do beat them on the other factors. Among the examples he cites is the cable channel Comedy Central, owned by Viacom (comedycentral.com). The Web site offers the complete archives of “The Daily Show” and makes them searchable. Hulu, owned by NBC and Fox, offers many television shows and some movies with limited (and short) advertisements (hulu.com). All are offered in high-quality video.

But it should not stop there, Mr. Bylund says. “Figure out an ad-supported model if you can, or charge less than a dollar per episode. Let people burn it to DVD or play the file on iPhones for a buck.” Eventually, “piracy will force all the big-time content producers to move in this kind of direction,” Mr. Bylund says. “Capitalism, properly applied, will beat the rebels every time.”

Once a pirate

One hundred and fifty years ago, even America's closest trade partners were despairing about our cheating ways. Charles Dickens, who visited in 1842, was, like many Britons, stunned by the economic ambition of our nation's inhabitants, and appalled by what they would do for the sake of profit. When he first stepped off the boat in Boston, he found the city's bookstores rife with pirated copies of his novels, along with those of his countrymen. Dickens would later deliver lectures decrying the practice, and wrote home in outrage: "my blood so boiled as I thought of the monstrous injustice."

[...]

In the literary realm, for most of the 19th century the United States remained an outlaw in the world of international copyright. The nation's publishers merrily pirated books without permission, and without paying the authors or original publishers a dime. When Dickens published a scathing account of his visit, "American Notes for General Circulation," it was, appropriately enough, immediately pirated in the United States.

The end of DRM?

Steve Jobs may have made Bev Oda's job easier. Balancing the different views on digital rights management (DRM) has been a key factor holding up Oda's legislation on copyright. DRM is used to protect music, movies and other digital content. In a recent essay, Jobs envisages a world without DRM. He makes a convincing case:

The third alternative is to abolish DRMs entirely. Imagine a world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats. In such a world, any player can play music purchased from any store, and any store can sell music which is playable on all players. This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store. Every iPod ever made will play this DRM-free music.

Why would the big four music companies agree to let Apple and others distribute their music without using DRM systems to protect it? The simplest answer is because DRMs haven’t worked, and may never work, to halt music piracy. Though the big four music companies require that all their music sold online be protected with DRMs, these same music companies continue to sell billions of CDs a year which contain completely unprotected music. That’s right! No DRM system was ever developed for the CD, so all the music distributed on CDs can be easily uploaded to the Internet, then (illegally) downloaded and played on any computer or player.

In 2006, under 2 billion DRM-protected songs were sold worldwide by online stores, while over 20 billion songs were sold completely DRM-free and unprotected on CDs by the music companies themselves. The music companies sell the vast majority of their music DRM-free, and show no signs of changing this behavior, since the overwhelming majority of their revenues depend on selling CDs which must play in CD players that support no DRM system.

So if the music companies are selling over 90 percent of their music DRM-free, what benefits do they get from selling the remaining small percentage of their music encumbered with a DRM system? There appear to be none. If anything, the technical expertise and overhead required to create, operate and update a DRM system has limited the number of participants selling DRM protected music. If such requirements were removed, the music industry might experience an influx of new companies willing to invest in innovative new stores and players. This can only be seen as a positive by the music companies.

Much of the concern over DRM systems has arisen in European countries. Perhaps those unhappy with the current situation should redirect their energies towards persuading the music companies to sell their music DRM-free. For Europeans, two and a half of the big four music companies are located right in their backyard. The largest, Universal, is 100% owned by Vivendi, a French company. EMI is a British company, and Sony BMG is 50% owned by Bertelsmann, a German company. Convincing them to license their music to Apple and others DRM-free will create a truly interoperable music marketplace. Apple will embrace this wholeheartedly.

All the music on my iPod is DRM free. Virtually all of it is ripped from my CD collection. My experiences with protected content have not been positive. I refuse to buy it. I only buy CDs.

I do have two DRM-protected tracks (Iggy Pop's I'm a Conservative and Vaccination Scar by the Tragically Hip) on my computer that I once downloaded from PureTracks with a digital coupon I received with some cheese I bought. Unfortunately I have been unable to play them. I've "refreshed" the licence at least three times, but they no longer work. That is far too much trouble to play something for which I own the rights. DRM has got to go.

Steve Jobs is on the right track. DRM is not worth the hassle for consumers, and its ability to protect the rights of creators is seriously in question. I hope Oda is listening. Protecting DRM has no place in Canadian copyright leglislation.

Liberal Sam Bulte doesn't get it

It seems my little question at Wednesday night’s all-candidates meeting for the Parkdale-High Park riding has set the blogosphere on fire. I asked Liberal incumbent Sarmite Bulte to take Michael Geist's copyright pledge, which simply commits candidates to exclude themselves from potential conflicts in deliberations on copyright reform if they accept contributions from entertainment and media industry interests. Bulte responded with outright anger to my question, so much so that she might have throttled me if the microphone had been any closer to the candidates table.

Accordion Guy has a video of her response on his blog.

The sad thing is that Bulte does not get it. She is oblivious to the obvious conflict of her deep involvement in reforming Canadian copyright laws and the direct support she receives from the primary beneficiaries of her proposed leglislation.

Here is my full question with notes. The parts I skipped over, largely due to Liberal-orchestrated jeering, are in faded text.

My name is Steve Stinson.

I moved to this riding five months ago from the Saint-Lambert riding on the Montreal south shore [some polite clapping here].

This question is directed to all the candidates, but first a little background. [Here I was asked to choose a specific candidate to which I replied it was probably most appropriate if Ms. Bulte answered first.]

My old riding gained considerable notoriety as a result of the Liberal candidate Yolande Thibeault receiving more than $19,000 in declared contributions from the principal parties implicated in the Gomery report. [Midway through this part some people, led apparently by Bulte's campaign manager, started shouting “ask the question.” A little rattled, I diligently ploughed on.]

Somehow, I thought things would be different when I moved Toronto. However, I was quite dismayed to read that our current MP Sarmite Bulte has received significant individual and corporate contributions from the very groups that she oversees in her role as Canadian Heritage parliamentary secretary. [At this point, the moderator also piled on demanding I ask the question.] They are also reportedly organizing an upcoming fundraiser.

Consequently, I would ask each of the candidates whether they would take the Copyright Pledge proposed by University of Ottawa law professor and Toronto Star columnist Michael Geist. The pledge is as follows:

No Member of Parliament who has accepted financial contributions or other benefits from

(i) a copyright lobby group,
(ii) its corporate members, or
(iii) senior executives as well as
(iv) a copyright collective

shall serve as Minister of Canadian Heritage or as Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage, nor sit on any legislative committee conducting hearings or deliberations on copyright matters. [Here my microphone was turned off and I abandoned my concluding comment which follows.]

Sounds reasonable to me. The voters of High Park-Parkdale need reassurance that our MP will be working for us, and not corporate media interests.

With the exception of Bulte, all the candidates accepted the pledge including Conservative candidate Jurij Klufas, who outlined how the CPC would ban all corporate donations to political parties and limit individual contributions to $1000 per year. NDP candidate Peggy Nash also responded articulately to the question, highlighting the need to balance the rights of both creators and users in reforming our copyright laws.

Parkdale-High Park residents deserve better. On January 23rd, Bulte is going to get her butt kicked.

Note: After the meeting, Gregory Hamara, chair of the Bloor West Village Residents Association, apologized to me for interrupting and cutting off my question. Overall, he did an excellent job moderating an unruly meeting.