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[personal profile] velvetpage
Technically, it's illegal for me to bring a movie from my personal collection and show it at school. I have a personal home-use licence on that movie, not a public viewing licence, and a school is considered public viewing even if we're not charging for it.

I think this law is ridiculous and impossible to enforce, but it's on the books. I also think that most schools would agree to pay a small amount more for a copy that was licensed for classroom use - classroom use being a different category from general-public use. I'm sure most schools would be willing to pay, say, $30 for a DVD they could get for $20 without the licence, in order to be on the right side of the law. But that requires an update in copyright legislation, and copyright legislation is not going towards making thing easier for the consumer these days. In fact, there's a law being debated in Canada right now that would make transfering music from my CD to my computer to my MP3 player illegal, even if the original CD was legally purchased.

Any thoughts?

(no subject)

Date: 2007-12-07 06:02 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] etherlad.livejournal.com
Yeah, the new copyright law (http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/1447/273/) would remove the concept of fair use entirely, which is ridiculous. I should be able to do whatever I want, within reason, with the media I buy. The value of the content I'm buying is in the message, not the medium. If I buy a CD with songs on it, it's the songs I'm after, and I should be able to listen to them however I want. Particularly with the media levees we're paying.

Even if the law passes, it doesn't look like it's really going to be enforced, though. As it is, the RCMP has declared (http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ledevoir.com%2F2007%2F11%2F08%2F163562.html&langpair=fr%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF-8) that they're not going after personal filesharers, because it isn't worth their time. "It is too easy to copy these days and we do not know how to stop it." I can only imagine that this will be doubly so once even more people are considered criminals.

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