Angie McKaig - E-Business Consultant and Entrepreneur
file sharing north of the border2003.10.30
There's an interesting interview on News.com with Michael Geist (the Canada research chair in Internet and e-commerce law at the University of Ottawa) about how anti-piracy law works up here in Canada, and whether Canadians are next to be targeted.
Q: Can Canadians legally download copyrighted music from peer-to-peer networks?
A: The short answer is: Nobody knows for sure. But the issue is far murkier than in other jurisdictions like the United States. The key provision in Canada's copyright legislation is a private copyright exemption that lets Canadians make private copies for noncommercial use. The way we justify the exemption is by way of a levy that applies to blank media such as blank CDs and blank audio cassettes.
Why can't the US just adopt a similar system, and extend it to cover file-sharing software (make it paid rather than ad-supported, and add a levy for file-sharing), CD burners, MP3 players, etc?
Or am I making this too simple?
