Frulla, Emerson Op-Ed
p2pnet.net News:- Canadian heritage and industry ministers Liza Fruilla and David Emerson have taken a lot of flac for their roles in the creation of Bill C-60 which, if adopted as-is, will turn Canada into a virtual marketing and sales division for the entertainment and software cartels.
They’ve also received non-stop criticism on the bill’s potential to have serious adverse effects on the use of Net material for educational purposes and in a surprising move, have jointly posted what they call an Op-Ed on an official Government of Canada web site.
“Canadian schools currently spend millions of dollars each year on copyright licenses to provide students with access to educational materials,” says an online petition.
“The Supreme Court of Canada recently ruled that teachers, students and schools do not have to pay for certain uses of these materials (including research, private study, and certain classroom instruction).
“Contrary to the Court’s ruling and despite the millions of dollars schools already pay for copyright materials, the committee would require schools to divert millions of dollars more from education budgets – from students, schools and taxpayers – to pay for publicly available material on the Internet.”
The Op-Ed is meant to ‘clarify’ things.
Read on >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
CLARIFYING COPYRIGHT AND EDUCATIONAL USE OF THE INTERNET
By Liza Frulla Minister of Canadian Heritage and Minister responsible for Status of Women and David L. Emerson, Minister of Industry
Lately there have been a number of media reports and editorials about new legislation to update the Copyright Act and in particular about the issue of educational access to works on the Internet. They say that Bill C-60 will make it illegal to use Internet material for educational and research purposes.
In fact, Bill C-60 will not address Internet material, although it does contain provisions to enable the use of the Internet for distance education and the digital delivery of inter-library loans. As well, the Government has taken special care to ensure that the exercise of new digital rights for creators will not hamper access to works for educational or other socially important purposes.
The issue is complex and raises a number of difficult considerations. For example, what material on the Internet should be considered “publicly available” for uncompensated use? Copyright legislation provides that copyright protection arises automatically upon creation of an original work, whether or not the author of the work wishes to exploit the right. Stakeholders who have been consulted, including rights holders and educators, have nevertheless agreed to the principle that “where there is no expectation of payment, there should not be a requirement to pay.”
However, no agreement has been reached on a set of criteria to identify “publicly available material.” In fact, no other country has specifically addressed the issue of educational use of Internet material. The result is that there are few models for comparison. In the United States, educators may make certain uses of Internet material pursuant to the American “fair use” doctrine.
The Government has long recognized the importance of technology to education. As a result, we have helped ensure that schools have access to the Internet and fostered the creation and dissemination of high-quality digital content. Rather than dealing hastily with this issue or refusing to address these educational concerns, the Government has undertaken to consult more broadly on this issue. We hope to gather new insights that will enable us to address the interests of all Canadians. Good public policy can only emerge from a full, open and constructive dialogue. Consultations on this issue are expected to begin this fall, at the same time as hearings on Bill C-60 get underway in Parliament.
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CIPPIC (Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic) legal counsel David Fewer is not, however, impressed.
“In their 2002 Report on copyright, ‘Supporting Culture and Innovation’, the departments committed to addressing ‘access and educational use’ concerns as a ‘short term’ objective of the government,” he told p2pnet. “The departments recognized that ‘copyright legislation should facilitate new Internet opportunities for culture, education and innovation.’
“In Bill C-60, this amounts to a distance learning and electronic interlibrary loan exception that is so restrictive – both administratively and technologically – as to be virtually useless.
“Where is the recognition of the need to expand fair use?
“Where is the commitment – not just lip service – to enhancing Canadians’ access to even Crown works, much less to copyrighted works generally?
“ Unfortunately, I don’t see sufficient evidence that this government understands the role that access to copyrighted materials plays in the innovation process.”
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