Jack Kapica, Ottawa's copyright plans wrongheaded, experts say, Globe and Mail, November 11, 2004. Excerpt: 'Last week, the standing committee on Canadian Heritage resubmitted its recommendations for updating the Copyright Act of 1998 and ratifying the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) treaty....Among other things, the committee proposes that photographers keep the rights to their work and surfers would have to pay a levy for material even if was offered free of charge. Copyright holders could also shut down websites that they claim -- even erroneously -- are violating copyright, putting the burden of proof on the website charged. Michael Geist, who holds the Canada Research chair in Internet and e-commerce law at the University of Ottawa, and Howard Knopf, a Canadian copyright lawyer and director for the Center for Intellectual Property at the John Marshall Law School in Chicago, have sharply condemned the proposals. Mr. Geist blames "an amazing lobby job" by the recording industry, and Mr. Knopf calls it a "travesty [and] an exercise in hyperbole." The committee's premise is that all work on the Internet is someone's property. You can read it or listen to it, but unless there is an explicit legal notice saying the material can be used, you would not be permitted to save a copy to disk or print it out without paying a copyright collective such as Access Copyright. "This last part is crucial," says Laura Murray, a Queen's University English professor who maintains a website called FairCopyright.ca. "It means that the bulk of sites used in educational settings -- [open access] resources designed by museums, libraries, universities, experts of various kinds -- that are intended for educational uses may be levied," with a government agency automatically charging for the content.'
Posted by
Peter Suber at 11/12/2004 01:49:00 PM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
