Digital Copyright Canada

This past summer, the British government attempted to exercise its powers under copyright law to try to suppress, or at least, suppress the basis of, a book critical of the US and British governments actions in Uzbekistan.

The book, written by Craig Murray, the former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, draws upon several government documents to substantiate the claims it makes. Those government documents were initially posted on the authors website, but in the summer the government threatened Murray to have him remove them. Murray removed them for a while, but then apparently decided not to give in to the threat and re-posted all or most of them. This was an action on Murray's part which is not for the faint of heart, and it should not be necessary in a free and democratic society.

Legendary Evel Knievel is sueing rapper Kanye West for alleged "trademark infringement, trademark dilution, unfair competition, and unauthorized use of Evel Knievel's likeness". In the video (see video here) Kanye took the persona of Evel Knieval and tries to jump the Grand Canyon in a rocket as Evel did decades ago. The rocket Kanye uses is similarly marked as Evels was for his attempt. There is actually no doubt that Kanye is copying large portions of this event, That undoubtedly is his intent.

The MPAA has release their badge requirements for the dreaded Scout Copyright merit badge. Not surprisingly it is full of loaded terms such as "Copyright Theft", "Stealing IP", "piracy" and "bootleg". Also not surprisingly it focuses exclusively on protecting the monopoly rights of copyright holders, without even giving an acknowledgement that the consumers of copyrighted works have any rights at all.

Any copyright 'curriculum' which makes no mention of the public domain and term of copyright, or fair use rights cannot be considered balanced. Labeling people who infringe copyright as 'copyright thieves' is an attempt to influence opinion through word association. The term theft cannot properly apply to copyright as the copyright owner is never deprived of what he owns.

Michael Geist's weekly Law Bytes column (Toronto Star version, Weblog version) examines efforts in Canada to develop a national digital information strategy. The column argues that the government would do well to resist introducing expensive new initiatives by first maximizing the benefits that can be extracted from the current set of policies and programs. Immediate steps could include promotion of open access for federally funded research, adding a digital copy to the legal deposit program, and addressing some relatively non-controversial copyright issues.