Comments on: Farcical wishlist from Canada's copyright/pharma lobby: warrantless search, Canadian SOPA, jail time for downloaders, public subsidy of copyright enforcement

By: elix

elix — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 23:39:00 +0000

Did Canadians make their concerns known to the GG, or did they just whine and grumble about it over coffee? The trick with participatory democracy is that it requires participation.

By: Sam Pourasghar

Sam Pourasghar — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 16:00:00 +0000

They should maybe call it the “Let’s Make The World Shit” proposal. I propose that they are stopped from making these stupid proposals, I dunno, by fitting them with reverse beartraps that are triggered by a “bullshit-ometer”.

By: Ryan Lenethen

Ryan Lenethen — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 13:07:00 +0000

If the GG didn’t boot them out for suspending parliament at will, what makes you think the GG would for anything. I think it is just showed how toothless and symbolic the position is, and it should be eliminated as it serves no purpose whatsoever.

By: miasm

miasm — Sun, 10 Jun 2012 19:21:00 +0000

6. I will be made King of People and all will bow to my divine presence.

By: angusm

angusm — Sun, 10 Jun 2012 08:13:00 +0000

Suppose we give them everything they want. What will they ask for next? Because you just know that the corporations aren’t going to say “OK, we’re cool now”, and the lobbyists they pay aren’t going to tell them “Great working with you guys. I guess you won’t be needing us any more.”

By: elix

elix — Sun, 10 Jun 2012 00:49:00 +0000

We need to get the Governor-General to kick the bastards out. Harper is acting against the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

By: Warren Grant

Warren Grant — Sun, 10 Jun 2012 00:43:00 +0000

Its going to be a hard fight against this. The Conservative majority is enabling them to push very hard for all this fascist IP policy. Their Entertainment industry masters are not going to give up. If they can get us to submit to this harsh legal regime, then they can use us as an argument in the US to impose the same harsh rules.
I sincerely hope we can drag this obscene push for power out long enough to allow Canadians to elect a government that actually wants to represent them, not merely the corporations that feed their campaigns. I doubt that will happen sadly. This will eventually pass in some form or another, and the result will be horrid.

By: elix

elix — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 23:27:00 +0000

1. How about no?

2. How about no?

3. How about no?

4. How about no?

5. How about fuck no?

By: peterblue11

peterblue11 — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 21:43:00 +0000

how can you read it any different? exposes the lobbies behind these propositions for exactly what they are: idiots.

By: EH

EH — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 18:13:00 +0000

Ask for more than what you want, so any compromise is within tolerable limits. I would like to find or start an organization to enshrine everything listed here so they can’t take another bite at ANY of these apples again.

By: That_Anonymous_Coward

That_Anonymous_Coward — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 17:12:00 +0000

The “fee” for owning a copyright is having to actually protect your copyright and not shift costs onto everyone else. A prime example is Google’s ContentID, totally paid for by Google because it was cheaper than the hundreds of lawsuits that had no real merit.

Maybe if we closed all the loopholes we give them, and shut down the accounting practices we might get them to pay the same tax rate as regular folks. Think how that might benefit society.
After all one of the first Star Wars movies still has yet to break even while it is one of the top earners of all time…. if we did our taxes that way the IRS would be throwing us all in jail.

By: Jim Brinkman

Jim Brinkman — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 16:36:00 +0000

I read that exactly the same way…

By: Lemoutan

Lemoutan — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 16:15:00 +0000

Oh, you.

By: commentor

commentor — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 15:26:00 +0000

Copyright has become an expensive proposition, particularly for a government running low on funds. There should be a fee for owning a copyright, one that balances the incentive of protecting the work with the cost to society in protecting that work and loss of cultural property.

Start the fee at 1.00, or even 0.01, and every year you pay for the next years protection. Each year the fee is doubled, forming an exponential fee schedule. Failure to pay drops the work into the public domain, and if you care to get it back, just bring the fee up to date.

This would let anyone keep their works under perpetual protection, assuming they can afford it, provides revenue to a cash-strapped government, and provides initial protection at a very reasonable price.

The exponential curve reflect the value and cost of protecting an increasingly popular work, while also providing a disincentive to keeping unpopular works locked up.

The low starting fee helps the creator until they can start profiting from the effort, while serving as a reminder of the cost of the protection.

By: Gio Ciampa

Gio Ciampa — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 14:56:00 +0000

“The Criminalization of Intellectual Property”

Sounds good – make ownership of IP a criminal offence!

By: That_Anonymous_Coward

That_Anonymous_Coward — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 14:53:00 +0000

Except the IP owners refuse time and time again to spend any of their own money to fight these things that they claim are stealing billions of dollars from them.
They know they lost the battle, they declared war on consumers and consumers said whatever. They use the idea of helping terrorists, drug dealers, child labor to scare people into being good little consumers.
They have now reached the point of wanting special rights to invade peoples lives on the off chance you might share a hot new artist you just heard. The future sales might go up, but they are more focused on the dollar they “lost” by you sharing, and you need to pay up hundreds of thousands of dollars for doing it.
They keep spending money trying to buy laws, rather than finding out how to adapt to the current world marketplace.
Copyright was to benefit them and the public, it seems the public is long overdue to get anything from this arrangement.

By: countzero1234

countzero1234 — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 14:20:00 +0000

To play a little devil’s advocate I’d support some more draconian enforcement in exchange for greatly reduced time limits on IP. Make the limit 15 or even 10 years and then lets talk.

Using government dollars to enforce content created 40 or even 20 years ago is a waste. If you can’t create anything else in 15 years then the government has no incentive to continue spending money on your IP as you are not progressing the arts.

If you want 70+ years of protection that it should be on the IP owners to enforce it, not ISPs, not the government. No one except the IP owner has a vested interest in 40 year old IP, it helps no one else.

By: Heartfruit

Heartfruit — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 14:19:00 +0000

I can’t help but think this might backlash on them.

By: Lemoutan

Lemoutan — Sat, 09 Jun 2012 13:15:00 +0000

Is this the phase where they know they have a huge battle to fight so they go in with the most ridiculous but still believable wishlist they can come up with, knowing it’ll fail, but which allows them to fall back to negotiating – to everyone’s relief and acceptance – the outcome they wanted in the first place? I’m betting on number 4.