Hey, let's have the DMCA in Canada too!

Want to see the DCMA come to Canada? The Canadian parliment's INDU commitee is suggesting something pretty much like that. A recent report makes a substantial series of recommendations. They have inaccurate and unsubstantiated figures on the impact and size of piracy. One of these is the INDU endorsement of the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty which is distasteful and represents a serious infringement on personal freedom (for example, see Michael Geist's article or the Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue forum on copyright on this topic).

If you think this is a bad thing, then you should write to the Canadian politicians, who might actually make a difference. Their web pages provide email addresses.

The proposed prohibition on devices that would permit copy protection circumvention will be difficult to enforce and has an enormous potential to also prohibit numerous legitimate technologies (including legitimate data backup or cross-platform use of legally owned content). There are many professionals who believe, incidentally, that the American DMCA has had a repressive and negative effect on technological innovation and uptake in the USA.

The membership of the committee making these recommendations is here [parl.gc.ca]. The INDU report lists [parl.gc.ca] the "witnesses" in Appendix A: all big media and software businesses.

Send each of these politicians an email message. If you don't use that traditional mechanism for expressing your opinion, then don't complaint about the consequences. If can't write them all, at least write a few, maybe including your own MP (listed by postal code) if you live in Canada.


[ Update: See the more recent article on this subject in a more recent article. ]