“Following up on an earlier story, the IIAA wants to add Canada to a blacklist of the worst intellectual property offenders. A powerful coalition of U.S. software, movie and music producers is urging the Bush administration to put Canada on an infamous blacklist of intellectual property villains, alongside China, Russia and Belize. ‘Canada’s chronic failure to modernize its copyright regime has made it a global hub for bootleg movies, pirated software and tiny microchips that allow video-game users to bypass copyright protections’, the International Intellectual Property Alliance complains in a submission to the U.S. government.” Full Story.
This is baloney. I don’t know about you, but when’s the last time you’ve ever seen anyone sell pirated DVDs on the streets? I sure haven’t. In fact, for the sake of research, I asked a cop that would be informed about such things. There was apparently a stall in this mall…. somewhere in Toronto. But he wasn’t sure.
I have seen pirated DVDs being sold in one country, however: the US of A. Yep, I was walking down a pretty prominent section of downtown New York City, and a guy was selling his pirated wares on a side alley. In daylight. In central Manhattan. But in Canada? I’ve yet to ever see an actual pirated copy. How dare they compare us to the likes of China, or Indonesia, countries in which legitimate goods are harder to find than their pirated equivalents.
And mod chips. “Piracy chips?” Hardly. More like “Unlock Chips.” This has nothing to do with piracy, it has to do with the ability to free consoles from the artificial lock-in of their manufacturer. Why? Well so that you can turn your NintendoDS into an IRC client, or an MP3 player. Cool stuff. Or heck – use an XBox to play a live audio stream for parties. Think about buying a computer, but it only allows you to run software from manufacturer X. Now if you change the hardware, so that it runs software from manufacturer X, Y, and Z, these guys want manufacturer X to be able to sue you.
Now granted, some of these chips are indeed used for the purposes of playing pirated games. I’m not denying this, and I think piracy should be stopped. But these mod chips, reguardless of their use, are too few in numbers to warrant this justification that Canada is a piracy haven. The whole situation is especially hypocritical since mod chips are just as prevalent in American markets – the law has done nothing to curb their use; or actually their distribution. So to use this as motive to prove that Canada is a cesspool of piracy is utter bullshit.
Oh and “it’s not illegal to camcord in Canada.” Bullcrap. You’re not allowed to do it in theaters. If you do it, and you’re not kicked out, it’s because the people working in the theatres are in cooperation with you. Laws have no impact over this. Am I against such a law? Not really. Do I think it’ll solve things? No, and as such is poor justification to warrant this labelling.
This is no more than an arm twisting tactic to force the imposition of laws. Laws which are not necessarily what’s best for the interest of the people (corporations included.) Want to have a debate over TPM/camcording/you-name-it legislation? GREAT! I’m all for that! Have qualified individuals from all camps to discuss their points in an elaborate manner. But I resent these hypocritical attempts to paint Canada in such a bad light, especially given that the US is in the same shape we are. They might have the laws, but they’re in no better shape.
