A group representing more than 100,000 professional content creators has laid out key principles and suggestions to guide the new Canadian majority government as it prepares new copyright legislation.
The Creators' Copyright Coalition, an alliance of the national associations, unions and collectives representing individual artists formed in 2002, is offering up what it calls "practical ideas [to] unleash the full creative and economic potential of Canadian artists, writers, photographers, visual artists, screenwriters, directors, composers, musicians and performers."
The CCC says it has reached out to Heritage Minister James Moore and Industry Minister Christian Paradis and opposition critics with a 'guiding principles' paper and an offer to meet and work co-operatively with them as they write new legislation.
"We know that new copyright legislation is a top priority for the new government, and that's great news for creators," Bill Freeman, Chair of The Creators' Copyright Coalition, said in a statement. "We are committed to working with the government to create a new bill that allows creators to contribute as much as we can to our economy."
Changes, revisions and updates to the country's Copyright Act are long overdue, and the last such attempt, Bill C-32, was shelved for the election call.
Canada is behind in its implementation of WIPO, World Intellectual Property Organization, and its so-called Internet Treaties, which other countries and trading partners have implemented.
Principles outlined in the CCC statement include:
- Payment for use of copyright material
- "Hand-outs" must not replace legal rights
- Collective rights management is good for both creators and consumers
- Collective licensing and tariffs, supervised by the Copyright Board, are a better solution than exceptions from copyright infringement
- Copyright laws must be clear in order to avoid excessive litigation; and
- There must be effective and equitable remedies against content theft
"Legislation built on these core principles will benefit both creators and users," said Freeman. "The end goal is to get clear laws in place that allow users to access our work while ensuring creators get paid for use so we can continue innovating and contributing to Canada's digital economy."
For more Mediacaster Magazine coverage related to this topic, please see:
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