Canadian Songwriters Propose Collective Licensing

aboivin writes "The Songwriters association of Canada has put forward a proposition for collective licensing of music for personal use. The Right to Equitable Remuneration for Music File Sharing would legalize sharing of a copy of a copyrighted musical work without motive of financial gain, for a monthly fee of $5.00 applied to all Canadian internet connections, which would be distributed to creators and rights holders. From the proposal: 'File sharing is both a revolution in music distribution and a very positive phenomenon. The volunteer efforts of millions of music fans creates a much greater choice of repertoire for consumers while allowing songs — both new and old, well known and obscure — to be heard. All that's needed to fulfill this revolution in distribution is a way for Creators and rights holders to be paid.'"

Re:$5 Canadian??

[Traxxas]

Try $5.03 the Canadian Dollar is stronger than the US Dollar.

Re:$5 Canadian??

[Citizen of Earth]

Try $5.03 the Canadian Dollar is stronger than the US Dollar.

Not today. The Canadian dollar closed at $0.9958 US, so CA$5.00 would be US$4.979.

Re:$5 Canadian??

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Mr. Troll

According to The bank of Canada today: http://www.bankofcanada.ca/en/rates/exchange.html [bankofcanada.ca]

1 CAD (noon) = 0.9956 0.9956 USD

In short, virtually par. You may not be good at making paper airplanes with our money, but you should also brush up your skills at using Google to find bank rates. Maybe read a newspaper from time to time to keep up with current events, d00d.

- A guy from "Canadia"

Somewhat old news

[Hemogoblin]

This was reported on December 3rd by Dr. Michael Geist on his blog here [michaelgeist.ca]. If you're interested in copyright issues in Canada check out his site; he's very informed and an interesting source of information.

While the SAC could have taken a stronger stand against DRM, this proposal should (though likely won't) cause the government to rethink its decision to import the DMCA into Canada. Even if you disagree with portions of this proposal, it is great to see Canadian songwriters, musicians, and music labels now singing the same song, promoting ways to make money from P2P rather than engage in failed attempt to stop it.
- Michael Geist

Re:$5 Canadian??

[dryeo]

This is exactly what I thought. I'm on dialup, average connection is 26.4. That's an hour to DL a song with the wife complaining about the phone being tied up, my son complaining about his connection being dead etc.
And I'd sure love to find a decent plan for 2.95 a month. I pay 24.95 a month (plus GST) in a province where the radio is advertising lo-hi-speed (128 kb?) connections for $14.95.
Oh well they figure fiber should be here inside of 20 years.

Re:$5 Canadian??

[Anonymous Coward]

More importantly, the statutory damages claimed for copyright infringement in U.S. actions at civil law against individuals are effectively unavailable in Canadian courts.

While Canadian Copyright law is neither based on tort law or property law, and is based on statute rather than common law, Canadian courts have generally held that it must be read consistently with common law or the Code civil du Quebec, and must not be so unfair as to bring the system of justice into disrepute.

Most provincial courts will look to injunctive relief first and foremost, and will generally only consider liquidated or ascertained damages.

In Quebec, 1457 & 1458 CcQ are the tools for assessing damages, and are generally in line with the common law practice of strictly limiting damages to real losses incurred.

The (federal) Copyright Act is consistent in this too, favouring the wording: "injunction, damages, accounts, delivery up and otherwise", in that order. The key point with respect to civil actions:

Liability for infringement

35. (1) Where a person infringes copyright, the person is liable to pay such damages to the owner of the copyright as the owner has suffered due to the infringement and, in addition to those damages, such part of the profits that the infringer has made from the infringement and that were not taken into account in calculating the damages as the court considers just.

Proof of profits

(2) In proving profits,
(a) the plaintiff shall be required to prove only receipts or revenues derived from the infringement; and

(b) the defendant shall be required to prove every element of cost that the defendant claims.

R.S., 1985, c. C-42, s. 35; 1997, c. 24, s. 20.

Statutory damages are available in Canada, but they are dramatically different from statutory damages under U.S. statute.

In particular, the trend has been to read this very broadly: "38. (1)(3)(b) the awarding of even the minimum amount referred to in subsection (1) or (2) would result in a total award that, in the court's opinion, is grossly out of proportion to the infringement, the court may award, with respect to each work or other subject-matter, such lower amount than $500 or $200, as the case may be, as the court considers just."

Plaintiffs pursuing civil actions against large-scale commercial infringers almost invariably avoid opting for statutory damages (a noteworthy exception being Microsoft Corporation v. 9038-3746 Quebec Inc., et al., which was concerned with large-scale counterfeiting by corporations whose behaviour before and during the trial, and whose obvious bad faith, made opting for statutory damages less risky than usual. Several other cases have seen statutory damages reduced to pennies per infringement, on the grounds that statutory damages are not designed to unjustly enrich plaintiffs, but to facilitate the court's determination of equity.

Pursuing not-for-profit music and video sharing by private persons is probably pointless under the Copyright Act as it stands, unless the plaintiff can use a small claims system to reduce his or her or its costs.