Changed My Mind--I'm Kinda Fretted About This

Okay, so this government is supposed to be anti-crime.

So you'd expect that they'd want to introduce meaningful anti-crime legislation, something with a little teeth in it, right? Something that'd protect the Canadian public, maybe?

Sadly, no.

The "crimes" this government wants to tackle are often not really crimes at all. In recent months this government has:

1) Tried to raise the age of consent for sex from 14 to 16. Doubtless this will clear lover's lanes around the country.

2) Introduced "anti-dealer" legislation and asset forfeture without considering the legalization or decriminalization of offences such as simple posession.

3) Made moves to scrap the gun registry, allowing more unlicensed, untraceable firearms into Canadian communities, over the objections of a majority of Canadian police chiefs.

Let's see: Morality by decree, a War on Drugs, and no gun control--can Canadians think of another country with this sort of stupidity going on? I can. And Stephen Harper thinks it's a place he wants to live. However, rather than move to that place he's decided to try and recreate Canada in its image.

Witness the latest "anti-crime" bill popping up on the radar: the US-style (Canadian) Digital Music Copyright Act.

Canadians already pay a hefty tax on blank media. The "blank media levy" is applied to digital content and devices no matter what you're going to use them for. So if I buy a CD-R to back up the content I myself have created, a fee is charged--theoretically to compensate content creators for digital piracy.

A side note: Thus far I have received no payment. I wonder how many other artists have?

But now lobbyists filling the plates and pockets of Members of Parliament have managed to get industry minister Jim Prentice to step forward and have a third shot at this. The previous minister, Bev Oda, lost her post, possibly because of backlash from the discovery that she was being fed both calories and cash by the Music Producers Association of America, or the nearest equivalent, to push this crap at us. Check the field of links at the bottom of that post to see the whole sordid story.

I wonder what Prentice is charging for his services?

Again, the Conservatives seem to be moving toward the US-style legislation on this: toward laws that treat people who buy expensive digital junk as criminals. You think I'm joking, O Avid fan? Go buy yourself a $30 legal Napster card. You remember Napster? They used to be a gang of thugs and criminals enabling music piracy until they figured out they could make money selling crippled songs to their customers.

Mme Metro last year used a Napster card to download some audio stories and music from their online store.

She had to install their crippleware on her computer, in order to play the memory-sucking tracks in some proprietary format.
She was required to "register" every portable player she meant to put them on, which meant installing said crippleware.
When the "three month subscription" ran out (it wasn't), everything stopped working. And Napster refused to respond to any attempts at contact.

In other words, Mme paid $30 for music in digital form. Had she spent $30 on CDs it would still be playable. But instead, she has nothing, because Napster is a big fan of "digital rights management". Guess whose rights they're managing?

And as far as I can tell, that's just the way the conservatives want it. And they DO NOT want public participation. The CBC compiled a list of 250 questions for Jim Prentice, who refused to answer any of them.

I ask any Canadian Avid Fans to write your MP--just a short polite note, asking them not to support US-style "command-and-control" digital rights legislation.

BoingBoing's latest post on this.

Online Rights Canada (ORC).

The CBC program Search Engine posted a list of 250 questions for Jim Prentice