[A2k] IIPA's proposed countries for US S301 list include Canada

[Michelle Childs]

http://www.cbc.ca/arts/story/2008/02/12/tech-copyright.html
Last Updated: Tuesday, February 12, 2008 | 1:29 PM ET
CBC News

Canada has joined Russia and China as the biggest violators of U.S.
copyright law, according to the U.S.-based International Intellectual
Property Alliance.

In a report filed to U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab on Monday,
the group recommended that Canada join the other two countries on the
USTR's Priority Watch List.


Countries on this list are subject to accelerated investigations and
possible trade sanctions.

The IIPA said Canada is the only country in the 30-member Organization
for Economic Co-operation and Development that has yet to modernize
its copyright law or meet the minimum global standards set out in the
World Intellectual Property Organization treaty signed in 1996.

"Canada has taken no meaningful steps toward modernizing its copyright
law to meet the minimum global standards of the WIPO internet
treaties, which it signed more than a decade ago," the report said.

"In 2007, parliamentary leadership and the government, at its highest
levels, acknowledged many of these deficiencies and the government
listed copyright reform among its top legislative priorities. But
these encouraging statements have not yet evolved into anything more
concrete."

Other countries named

The group also recommended that 10 other countries be placed on the
Priority Watch List, including Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Egypt,
India, Mexico, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Thailand and Ukraine.

It also recommended that 29 other countries, including Spain, Sweden
and Israel, be placed or maintained on the less critical Watch List. A
total of 51 countries were named as significant violators.

Schwab's office will release its annual watch lists at the end of April.

Canadian copyright experts said the IIPA's recommendations should be
taken with a grain of salt, since the organization has singled out a
good number of countries that have trade dealings with the United
States.

"It's little more than a lobbying exercise which lacks reliable and
objective analysis," said University of Ottawa internet law professor
Michael Geist. "With 51 countries, some of which are leaders in Europe
and Asia, Canada is in very good company. It almost begs the question
=97 who's the one that's really offside here?"

The IIPA, which says it represents the copyright interests of 1,900
U.S. companies, estimated the United States lost more than $18 billion
U.S. in trade through copyright piracy in 2007, up 20 per cent from
$15 billion a year earlier.

According to the group, Canada contributed about $511 million of that
loss =97 up from $494 million in 2006 =97 while China led the pack with a
$2.9-billion contribution, up from $2.4 billion.

The group's report is the latest to urge the U.S. government into
pressuring Ottawa to reform copyright laws. U.S. ambassador to Canada
David Wilkins has repeatedly said Canada's laws are the most lax among
G7 nations, while the recording industries on both sides of the border
have called for tougher rules.

Minister of Industry Jim Prentice was to introduce a draft bill in
December but backed off because of widespread public opposition.

Geist, who has led the opposition against a U.S.-style bill, said the
legislation may be introduced as early as this week. Given the
government's other priorities, including the upcoming budget and
debate over Canada's military involvement in Afghanistan, he said it's
unlikely much time has been spent on revising the bill.

"It's more likely they've revised their communications strategy on how
to sell it," he said.

Teachers, musicians, artists, telecommunications companies, retailers,
privacy commissioner Jennifer Stoddart, as well as more than 40,000
members of a Facebook group devoted to the issue have voiced their
opposition to what they say was the overly restrictive, U.S.-style
legislation that Prentice was expected to table.



---------
Michelle Childs
Head of European Affairs
Knowledge Ecology International
michelle.childs@keionline.org

"The world we have made, as a result of the level of thinking we have
done thus far, creates problems we cannot solve at the same level of
thinking at which we created them=94  Albert Einstein