Leaked secret EU-Canada copyright agreement - EU screws Canada

I know that nothing can more quickly marginalize a viewpoint than using the C-word, but I think it is time that the word was somewhat reclaimed for intelligible usage.

Conspiracy.

Once this word was taken pretty seriously - heads rolled, I am told, regarding real and perceived conspiracies. Today it is synonymous with 'conspiracy theory', which in turn appears synonymous with 'schizoid blather'.

I would like to propose that a conspiracy - in the traditional definition of the word which means, according to Oxford, "a secret plan by a group to do something unlawful or harmful" - has taken place.

There appears to be a highly-coordinated, international-in-scope, well-organized and strategically-sound secret agenda regarding global copyright reform.

This secret agenda seems to me to be particularly harmful. So, I am prepared to call this secret agenda a copyright conspiracy. I expect that most people here will be sympathetic to both my harmfulness argument and my secrecy argument, but I will happily defend both if challenged.

My request:

Will someone wiser than me please either: a) inform me that this is, and should be, a suitable time to allege that a 'conspiracy' has occurred; or b)explain why such a claim is, and ought to be, dismissed as loony nonsense?

Whenever I try to tell people about this stuff they don't believe me. Unfortunately when my time to prove myself arrives, it will be very dark days indeed. :(

OMG, I didn't know things looked that bleak in Europe. I didn't get to read the full thing: Who wrote the EU's position? Hopefully not lawmakers but some special-interest lobbying group?

A treaty that has to be agreed to by both sides is EU screwing Canada? Uh, no. If Canadians get screwed, it is the fault of the Canadian government, not the EU.

Don't blame the EU for being smarter and tougher than the Canadians. Blame Canadians for electing people who will sell them out.

I'm sorry but "what the hell?" The only way I can act about this is flabbergasted. This government is terrible @ these sort of things. Now while we're getting screwed by the US with ACTA Europe will also rip us a new one with this one. I wonder when Asia will smarten up and want a piece. :(

What justification can there be to eliminate first sale*? If the rights holders don't want to sell material, they can lease/rent/license it instead, then THEY have to keep track of who, when and how much. If they decide that isn't worth their time, how can you reasonably expect the purcharser to do so?

*I don't know what they call the doctrine of "first Sale" in Canada. I understand that it is NOT nearly as through as the USonian version.

It isn't Europe screwing Canada, give me a break man! Copyright laws hurt everyone. For a cutting edge publication you still use a very outdated language, which doesn't help.
Be specific! Who is screwing who?

"royalty on the sale of used copyrighted goods"

Okay. I was just blown away.

So now libraries will have to keep track of each and every un-shelved book they sell to support their activities and then send a percentage of the $.25 paid for each book to the publishing company? What about yard sales? Used books stores will really be in a heap of trouble. I guess it's time to just strip the covers and give them away. Who, then, will bother to publish a paper book ever again?

@jeligua

I hate to break it to you, but libraries already have to keep track of that kind of stuff so that they can properly administer Public Lending rights.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Lending_Right

That's right libraries already pay a royalty for the books they keep.

(None of the above should imply that I agree with any of this of course)

Well it sounds like Tony Clement is doing as good a job being Minister of Industry as he did being Minister of Health.

I like the idea of an international copyright treaty. I don't like the idea that these treaty proposals seem to have been written according to movie industry wishlists.

Have any of the governments involved considered that Disney and Friends aren't the only copyright holders out there? They are of course the only ones with a vested financial interest in longer terms than exist now (70th Anniversary Edition of Wizard of Oz just came out! how long before that one is public domain?)

In the end I thought th point of laws and governments was to do what was best for the people. Corporations are not people. And this is the sort of thing anti- globalisationists are talking about- corporate groups working with governments to either write laws that favour them alone or letting those laws be side- stepped if you happen to be Coca- Cola.

If treaties ever force libraries in the US to pay copyright holders to lend books out, or to sell old books, then the libraries will just shut down and disappear. They are underfunded already, and the local governments that fund them are broke.

This might be affordable in some countries because their tax money isn't funding a massive military and they don't have a "all taxes are evil" mentality.

Now wait just a minute.

What's with the Eurocrat hegemony? Negotiating abusive treaties with Canada is our job, dammit.

Signed:
- The US

I think we'd be far better off without any international copyright treaties. Let individual nations have varying (or no) copyright protections, and observe the results.

All I can say is so long civil liberties, so long national soveriegnty, so long privacy.... and so long to the logical copyright laws of times past (E.G. UK 1988 Copyright Designs and Patents Act - which states that it's legal to obtain copyright material for personal use, but not legal to distribute them or make a profit directly or indirectly from them).

The short list of countries I'd like to live in is running very low. It's time to look at other planets. Earth is full of a bunch of political rejects.

All I can say is hello decentralized, encrypted p2p.

http://gnunet.org/