Regulate the Net, demands ‘coalition’
p2pnet news | Freedom:- A coalition of Canadian groups wants the government to step in and take control of the Net.
That’ll protect Canadian identity, according to Richard Hardacre, president of the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists (ACTRA).
“A drift away from regulation could be catastrophic for Canadian identity,” CanWest News Service has him saying. “We could be easily swallowed up by American programming.”
But, “That’s lunacy,” says Iain Grant, an analyst at research firm Seaboard Group, in the story.
“It’s like King Canute trying to stop the tides. There are two countries in the world that are trying to control the Internet: Saudi Arabia and China.”
Hardacre apparently didn’t have any ideas on how George W. Harper’s present Conservative government could, “impose content quotas online or which websites would be affected,” continues the the story.
However, “We have a great deal of faith in the CRTC,” Hardacre said. “We’re just asking them to not let this remain the Wild West.”
What to do? What to do?
Create something like the Canadian Television Fund, “which supports domestic productions and is subsidized by cable companies,” says Hardacre.
“The CRTC has been studying the impact of new media on Canadian creators, and how the commission’s goals can be applied to the web,” says CanWest, adding:
But, “Our view hasn’t changed,” the story has CRTC director-general Denis Carmel stating.
“There’s no need to regulate the Internet. We understand [the artists'] concern and we’ll be consulting with the public soon.”
The coalition comprises 18 groups including unions and trade organizations representing Quebec actors, filmmakers, musicians, theatre talent, dancers and producers, as well as the Canadian actors’ union, ACTRA and the Canadian Music Publishers’ Association, says the CBC.
“The Broadcast Act, “clearly obligates the CRTC to give primary consideration to the broadcasting system’s social and cultural contribution to Canada’s cultural identity,” the story has ADISQ Paul Dupont-Hébert stating.
Also See:
CanWest News Service – Regulate web like radio, TV: arts groups, November 1, 2007
CBC – Verner urged to stop CRTC drift to deregulation, October 31, 2007
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November 1st, 2007 at 2:56 pm
How utterly retarded. It’s so charming to see politicians try to figure out these Intertubes things.
November 1st, 2007 at 7:25 pm
Over time, perceptual cognitive behavioral patterns that we use frequently get strengthened. Those grooves get cut deeper and deeper into the brain. A time will come when the current paradigm will shift, and we who have spent our lives using keyboards and mice, thinking in the files/folders/desktop analogy will be as utterly lost as my grandmother receiving a new harddrive recorder for Christmas.
November 4th, 2007 at 2:33 am
George Orwell would be proud of Mr. Hardacre … One would hope that better heads and hearts will put paid to such foolishness as he is expounding!
My lifetime experience as a journalist over four decades has unfortunately included far too much contact with the likes of the president of the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists (ACTRA). Truly an analogue man in a digital world …
The age of the ‘Digital Gutenberg’ is at hand … There is no turning back the hands of the clock … that which can be digitized will be digitized … and the ‘control’ Mr. Hardacre wants is not just out of the question … it is a “Moore’s Law” impossibility as the Saudi’s and Chinese are eventually going to discover.