Digital Copyright Canada

Just a quick update on this.  First, the Heritage press releases:

http://www.canadianheritage.gc.ca/newsroom/news_e.cfm?Action=Display&code=3N0002E
http://www.canadianheritage.gc.ca/newsroom/news_e.cfm?Action=Display&code=3N0009E

  This forum was called "Creativity Content Culture" -- which speaks to
the 3 main communities: Creators, intermediaries and citizens/society.  
This conference was primarily made up of representatives of the various 
creator communities, with one librarian representing citizens.  This is 
not to say that all issues were not discussed as some creators also have 
the interests of citizens as a primary concern (and no, I was not alone), 
and some creators were also their own labels/distributors.

  I have asked our contact at Heritage Copyright Policy Branch if the full
list of participants can be published in this forum.  I suspect this will
not be a problem given Rogers was there to tape the event for CPAC.  In
fact, the 2-hour forum was done in a room set up as a studio full of
cameras, microphones, and simultaneous translators.

Summary
-------

  This was a great opportunity to connect creator communities together, 
and I have to thank Heritage for arranging this.  It has been very 
exciting, and I believe some connections have been made for future 
discussions.  This is a slow process of connecting a few people at a time, 
but we are all making progress.

  Beyond the policy discussions, this has just been great to be part of
the Juno weekend in this way.  I enjoyed just chatting with fellow
creators about their work, and look forward to the reception tonight.  
I'll be watching the Junos on Sunday with a very different eye (and ear)
than I have in the past.

Arriving
--------

  I got there early as I was excited to meet people.  There was a 
welcoming area where Heritage folks greeted participants  and handing them  
an information package (press releases, biographies of participants, etc).  I had 
met many of the Heritage Copyright Policy Branch folks from last year when 
I was invited to speak to them.

  http://www.pch.gc.ca/progs/ac-ca/progs/pda-cpb/

  Bruce Stockfish (Director General CPB -- we had already met a few times)  
introduced me to Minister Sheila Copps and Deputy Minister Judith A.
LaRocque (I believe that was the 2'nd woman-- I was getting many
introductions quickly).

Hi, my name is...
-----------------

  There was a reception area with food for people to eat while waiting for 
the forum.  As people showed up they introduced themselves and started 
chatting.  I first met Juan Pancho Eekels who is a video game designer and 
co-owner of Digital Extremes.  We chatted about how we may both be 
involved in software, our needs from copyright were very different.  I 
believe that game designers probably have more in common with the motion 
picture industry than they do with creators of communications tools.

  Susan Crean, who I already knew well, was the next person to sit down at 
our table.  Always great to chat with her as she has a way to help clarify 
issues, and is able to both listen (and understand what she hears) as well 
as being able to articulate her own position very well.
  Those who haven't heard her speak can still see the Rabble Rumble debate 
online at:  http://www.rabble.ca/rumble/  (or for those that the interface 
doesn't work on, direct links to the RealNetwork files can be found via 
http://weblog.flora.org/article.php3?story_id=267 )

  One of the most interesting conversations came from Andre Cornellier
(Photographer) who seemed to see any questioning of the strengthening of
copyright (and patent) protection as being a threat.  Any discussion I
tried seemed to go badly, although we did figure out a way to explain the
issue to people like him that would have worked (hindsight is great and
all ;-)

  Representing the users side of thing, the only person who wasn't part of 
the creator community was Barry Cull who is an academic librarian at the 
University of New Brunswick.  He did feel like the odd-man-out in this 
group of largely creators.

We are on air in 5, 4, 3, 2, ..
-------------------------------

  The forum(/debate) itself was really interesting.  Chaired by the
minister and Carole-Marie Allard (Parliamentary Secretary), it was
moderated by Juliette Powell (MuchMusic/Citytv producer-host).

  We did a short round where everyone introduced themselves, and gave a 
little bit about why each of us was there.

  In her introduction Laura Doyle indicated that she believes that sites 
like Napster put her project on the verge of bankruptcy.  Juliette started 
the discussion there with her explaining her situation.   Jane Siberry 
then suggested that as a Napster user herself that there was a different 
perspective to the whole thing.  It was interesting to see these two 
musicians, both taking a different position on the online file sharing 
debate.
  When asked how many people in the room were Napster users, only Jane 
said she was.

  After that discussion I had to ask how musicians felt about the private 
copying regime and how it legalized/legitimized copyright music without 
paying the musicians.   Sheila turned this topic on its head from what I 
had wanted it to be to being one of "it is the best solution we have found 
so far".   I tried to suggest that the levy was collected from the wrong 
people (not just users burning royalty-based music) and was being sent to 
the wrong people (based on record sales and airplay), and that it was 
building animosity from the general public toward the music industry.

  Even though I disagree with her viewpoint, Sheila is a good politician 
in that she knows how to steer a conversation to go her way.  The person I 
learned most about during the conversation was Sheila herself.

  Conversation will be aired on CPAC.  It did range through a number of 
topics that we have discussed here.  My attempt to talk about TPM failed 
as this was not a technical audience.   I tried to talk about how TPM is 
advertised as a "fence around the creators content" but in reality was a 
"fence around the tools used to communicate content".  I wanted to talk 
about how it was important to consider the views of the owners of these 
tools, but Minister Copps suggested that my "fence around the tools" 
comment was ludicrous and ended that conversation.

  Sheila also didn't like how I put Jack Valenti in a negative light after
she declared him a friend of copyright, reminding people that he wanted to
ban the VCR saying that the VCR was to his industry like Jack the Ripper
was to women at night.

  The concept of 'free' on the Internet was focused still on "no money".  
I never did have a chance to inject the "free speech, not free beer"  
comment in that more often helps clarify the situation.  While some people
do want something for nothing, people like myself as an Internet
Consultant are worried about communications rights.

  There was general consensus that we should be considering creators
rights in legislation, but no consensus on how far or in what form any
protection of rights should take.  We did have consensus that we did not
like the term "Copyright" as it was confusing to the layperson.  Susan
suggested that we just adopt the terminology growing worldwide, based
partly on the French language usage, of calling them creators rights.

  I like the term as rather than focusing on discussing "copying" which
is both often unrelated to what is happening, and tends to concentrate on
communications intermediaries, creators rights focuses on creators.  
There is then a balance between the rights of creators and the rights of
society as a whole, and the rights between the often conflicting needs of
different creators.  Lobbiests would not be able to as easily blur policy 
issues by saying "we are strengthening copyright" and then do things that 
benefit intermediaries at the expense of creators and citizens rights.

Free speech but not free beer
----------------------------

  After the formal discussion, discussions continued outside the studio
and then a smaller group of people headed to Elephant and Castle for a
beer.  I had a better chance to talk with Pat Durr (Visual Artist,
representative for Canadian Artists Representation, Arts Advisory Cmtee
for the City of Ottawa, etc), Andre Cornellier
<http://www.cornellierphoto.com> and Hal Niedzviecki
<http://www.brokenpencil.com/>.

  Jane Siberry <http://www.janesiberry.com/>, Adrienne Pierce
<http://www.adriennepierce.com> and Laura Doyle
<http://www.lauradoyle.com/> were there, but I didn't have a chance to
talk to them as much.

  Andre and I mostly spoke about copyright, and how our views differed.  
In clarifying my position I finally found one that worked for him: that in
software, copyright protects much more than just the expression of the
work but other similar works.  It would be like if you could get a
copyright on the direction that people read a book or a copyright on the
alphabet.  It would be like a painter could get a copyright on having
multiple family members in front of a tree being able to restrict all
other similar looking paintings.  From this perspective they totally 
understood why interface copyright (human-computer, hardware-software, 
software-software) was a considerable threat.

  Andre also didn't understand how eye-glasses had anything to do with
VCR's and home computers.  The latter two are electronic, but the first is
not (yet anyway, although the logical extension of the current policy
direction and technology is to have mandatory digital contact lenses which 
would block out content you weren't authorized to see)

  I am looking forward to talking more with Pat in the future.  She is 
doing a exhibition soon that will involve carbonated drinks  - a survey of 
drinking habits and additions, an online interactive component, a wall 
and possibly a dress made from old pop-cans.

  While chatting about policy is great, connecting to people as a creator 
and fan was also great.  

Another reception tonight
-------------------------

There is a further reception later this evening at the Grand Hall of the 
Canadian Museum of Civilization.

Future policy directions
------------------------

  Heritage Copyright Policy Branch appears to be well aware of our issue,
as can be seen by inviting both a communications tools and a game designer
to this Juno/Copyright event.  I suspect in the past that the only
software people would have been proprietary communications companies and
other technology intermediaries which we often consider to be "the other
side of the debate".  This should be an important indication to our
community that we are being heard.

  We do have a very long way to go with Heritage Minister Sheila Copps on
this issue.  I do not believe she yet realizes the threats that
centralized ownership of communications technology tools will have to her
stated primary constituency: creators.  I will not make any judgments
about how this community differs from those who are able to send her large
campaign contributions (the special interest intermediaries), but she
speaks as someone who does have the interests of creators at heart.

  It is critical for her to understand that "more, bigger, stronger" 
copyright is not better for creators, and that many of the amendments she 
has been pushing forward really only benefit the intermediaries at the 
expense of creators and citizens.

  I am now in email conversations with Ian Kerr and Alana Maurushat who
are two of the 3 authors involved in the TPM report (part 1) recently
published on the Heritage website.  Alana is an Open Source aware lawyer,
and assures me that the later part of the heritage report will include
this.  She says that the first part won't make sense until the second part
is released.  Both indicated availability problems (Alana isn't in Canada 
at the moment), but an interest in getting together to talk in the future.   
This isn't the only project they are working on where there is a 
connection to our community.

  I believe that once the final report is there, that this may be useful 
for the minister to understand some of the more complex issues.  It is 
critical that we eventually reach her as her political career in Canada is 
growing, and she is seen as representing "Creativity Content Culture", 
even if we see her actions as harming creativity and culture.

---
 Russell McOrmond, Internet Consultant: <http://www.flora.ca/>
 Any 'hardware assist' for communications, whether it be eye-glasses, 
 VCR's, or personal computers, must be under the control of the citizen 
 and not a third party.   -- http://www.flora.ca/russell/

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[d@DCC] Personal report from the Ministers forum on Copyright.

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