For those interested, I found two articles explaining in simple terms Bill C-61 on the amendments proposed to Copyright Law.

You have to register to the site to read the articles, it is free:

http://www.mondaq.com/article.asp?article_id=62156&lk=1
http://www.mondaq.com/article.asp?article_id=62010&lk=1

JulieD

This is a great post …. lots of good discussion among your fans.

Rafe,

Bill-C61 is not yet law which is why we all need to get educated on this and act quickly.

Michael Geist just wrote another short post on the subject with a good example. He also has some good suggestions for actions once you have an opinion. http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3041/125/

Allan Isfan
http://isfanstartup.blogspot.com

The real issue in the end is that it is all very confusing which is why I pointed people to Michael’s blog. I’m trying to get my head around all of this and it is brutally hard, even when you’re in the business and have a guy like Michael holding your hand through it.

My hope is that artists benefit MORE by having an open system where people can feel free to share content with others. For example, if I could beam a David Usher song from my iPOD to a friend’s MP3 player, he is more likely to become a fan and spend $ on premium stuff, the whole album, concerts etc. The more fans, the bigger the concerts, the more radio play, the more merchandise and so on. In this way, you truly take advantage of Word of Mouth to spread the joy and the artists will ultimately benefit. If people are scared to death to be sued … especially if it starts happening more often … it will be bad for everyone.

However, this would be impractical (there would be too many persons to sue)…and I think that there would be better ways to do it.

When companies sue others, in patent infringement cases, they usually do not sue their direct customers (for the same reason you would not sue a fan), but they sue distributors, retailers, fabricants, …

I think that a creative lawyer, with a good supporting text of law, could imagine ways to get royalties for creators without suing their fans.

JulieD

A bill is not a law…at least not yet. It could be modified and could even end up never coming into force at all. And, the many protestations should encourage the government to modify it.

By the way, read the bill and make your own opinion, everything in it is not completely bad, except for the infringers, maybe…

Also, if the bill ever comes into force and is at a disadvantage for canadians, there will always be the courts to set things right, eventually.

I think that it is a good thing that the government tries to do something about piracy. Most people seem to think that they can use copyrighted material without paying for it. They generally know that they should not, but since everybody do it…they do the same.

How are the creators to live if they sell only a few copies of their work and the rest is downloaded illegally?

JulieD

I’m not going to be categoric about Bill C-61 good or bad but would like to point you to Michael Geist’s blog where this is analyzed and discussed in detail http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/blogsection/0/125/.

You might change your mind after you read his thoughts.

Michael Geist is a law professor at the University of Ottawa where he holds the Canada Research Chair of Internet and E-commerce Law. He was actually the keynote speaker at the MESH conference in May and did an awesome job.

(disclosure: Michael is an advisor to FaveQuest)