I’ve written about copyright several times before. Now I write more.

The Harper Government, now in a substantially more powerful majority position in the House of Commons, are poised to reintroduce the copyright legislation that died on the table last May. According to Michael Geist, the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-Commerce Law, the bill will be introduced in the exact same form it was left in before the election.

This is a problem.

To be fair, the most recent incarnation of the Conservative’s copyright reform has been, by far, the most balanced we’ve seen out of that government. They’ve tried before, several times, to introduce copyright reform legislation and always met with an enormous backlash of public opinion. After the latest bill was introduced Industry Minister Tony Clement made a concerted and very public effort to consult with groups that had expressed concern and hear them out. He heard them out and it seemed that he was really listening, but then the election was called, the writ dropped, and the bill met an untimely death.

The problem with the bill being reintroduced in the form it was last left in is that there were glaring—enormous(!)—issues with that bill. Through concerted consultation Mr. Clement discovered these issues. But this time around, according to the Harper Government, no consultations will be made.

In other words, they know the bill is broken, their previous consultations told them so, but they aren’t fixing a thing. Not a thing. Nothing changed or reworded or rejigged after all those consultations. Which really makes you wonder if it wasn’t all just window dressing from a government that, as a minority, really didn’t have a choice. They acted to appease; when push comes to shove, they don’t have to act anymore.

So the bill is broken. While it’s protections are, for the most part, fair and reasonable, the “digital locks” provision which has been in the legislation since the beginning is a fatal flaw.

To put it simply, despite any protections and provisions for consumers that exist in the law, if a piece of media is protected by a so-called digital lock, all consumer rights are null and void.

However, it gets much worse. In the midst of the Conservative’s last push for copyright reform cables released by Wikileaks reveal that the Harper Government actually lobbied to be put on a U.S. copyright watch list. Yes, if you can believe that. The Harper Government actually requested that we be put on an American copyright watch list—a list of prolific copyright violaters—that includes countries like China and Russia. We are on that list, at the request of the Harper Government, under the assumption that public pressure from the Americans would perhaps help pass the legislation through to law. Our government, lobbying a foreign government, to put pressure on our citizens. It seems pretty unreal.

So, there is a lot to worry about. We have a bad bill coming down the pipe. One that was introduced before, protested against strongly, and despite consultation was not amended in any form. And we have a government that, if the cables indicate anything, will do whatever it takes to push through this reform into law. For what it’s worth, both the Liberals and the New Democrats were opposed to the legislation the last time around. There’s also an enormous, well-organized protest movement that mobilized in the past and remains very active and energized. So, if nothing else, we can at least hope that the passage of this bill won’t exactly go quietly.

I apologize to readers who are bored to death by two politically-minded articles in a row, I promise to provide you with the lighter stuff tomorrow.

A little over a month ago I warned you of the upcoming copyright reform proposed by our politicians. I warned you that it imposes certain restrictions on how you own things and what you can do with those things. I mentioned, too, that it wasn’t the first time that the Conservatives tried to pass this kind of reform legislation,

The last time the Tories tried to pass new copyright legislation was two years ago. Jim Prentice was the Minister in charge back then and he was widely seen as being in the pocket of American interests. In fact, the Bill he originally introduced was so backward, so heavily favoured towards huge American media conglomerates that the public outcry was simply impossible to ignore. As a result of the outcry, the Conservatives put the legislation on the back burner and, last summer, went on a whirlwind tour across the country soliciting public opinion and feedback on copyright.

That Bill died, on the table, after Parliament adjourned for the summer because it had no support, because it wasn’t the result of consultation with the public, because it was seen as merely pandering to American big media, and because the government clearly underestimated the powerful and vocal grassroots fair copyright movement in Canada.

Well it appears that this second attempt at copyright reform is also going the way of the Dodo.

After declaring war on the “radical extremists” who were opposed to the new reform bill, Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore is now refusing to comment on the legislation according to copyright watcher, author and blogger Cory Doctorow.

Is this a sign of what happens when an unpopular bill is introduced, and introduced again, largely ignoring public consultation?

Like many, I agree that this most recent reform bill included some of the aspects that came out of the public consultation but at the same time it ignored many important aspects as well. The legislation, like its predecessor, still includes significant rights-impeding digital lock provisions—the same kind of provisions which were protested in the last incarnation of the bill. But despite all that consultation, the Conservative government chose to ignore the rights and requests of the Canadian population and again include those provisions. And again the ground swell of support for fair copyright reform has grown and immediately after announcing the bill, and in the time since, media focus has largely centred around the controversial digital locks.

But, if Moore’s refusal to comment is any indication, this bill is fit for the same destiny as its fore bearer. Let’s just hope that, if this is truly the case, the next time around the government will get things right. This second time around, the media was well informed on how and what to report—they got their focus right by honing in on the digital lock provision—and, as a result, the public has been kept up to date, and kept well informed themselves. If the Conservatives tried to sneak a copyright bill through the House of Commons the first time, they failed. This second time the media and copyright watchers the world over were ready, and they spoke loud and clear. If this bill dies there will be a third attempt, no doubt, and maybe then they’ll finally get it right.

This afternoon the Conservative government introduced a new copyright bill in the House of Commons.

The last time the Tories tried to pass new copyright legislation was two years ago. Jim Prentice was the Minister in charge back then and he was widely seen as being in the pocket of American interests. In fact, the Bill he originally introduced was so backward, so heavily favoured towards huge American media conglomerates that the public outcry was simply impossible to ignore. As a result of the outcry, the Conservatives put the legislation on the back burner and, last summer, went on a whirlwind tour across the country soliciting public opinion and feedback on copyright.

Lots of us spoke out, hundreds of thousands, during these public hearings and it seemed like the government was truly listening. However, today’s Bill indicates that while some of what we said got through, serious and fatal flaws remain in the law.

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Even if you only have a pedestrian interest in copyright law or the Internet this is a very enjoyable read. Heck, even if you’re only a casual YouTube user, you’ll probably get a kick out of it. It’s YouTube’s opening briefs in the lawsuit that Viacom has brought against them.

Viacom is suing YouTube for not removing copyrighted videos from its website, videos that Viacom held the copyright to. It sounds straight forward enough except for a couple of important factors. First, under international copyright laws it’s the responsibility of the copyright owner (Viacom) to notify YouTube of infractions—not YouTube’s responsibility to remove videos of its own volition. And second, as it turns out, Viacom filed this suit all the while uploading its own videos to YouTube surreptitiously.

Here’s what YouTube Chief Counsel Zahavah Levine had to say,

For years, Viacom continuously and secretly uploaded its content to YouTube, even while publicly complaining about its presence there. It hired no fewer than 18 different marketing agencies to upload its content to the site. It deliberately “roughed up” the videos to make them look stolen or leaked. It opened YouTube accounts using phony email addresses. It even sent employees to Kinko’s to upload clips from computers that couldn’t be traced to Viacom.

And as if that wasn’t enough, YouTube alleges that some of the videos included in Viacom’s lawsuit against them were actually uploaded by the company itself,

Viacom’s efforts to disguise its promotional use of YouTube worked so well that even its own employees could not keep track of everything it was posting or leaving up on the site. As a result, on countless occasions Viacom demanded the removal of clips that it had uploaded to YouTube, only to return later to sheepishly ask for their reinstatement. In fact, some of the very clips that Viacom is suing us over were actually uploaded by Viacom itself.

The waters get exceptionally muddied at this point and you really have to wonder what Viacom was thinking. Remember, this was a company that tried several times to buy YouTube.

As clear as the result may seem, from the outset, it’ll be an interesting case to follow.

The brief goes on to explain that now, in the 21st century, most media corporations are working with YouTube and even finding monetary value in putting their clips up online. Of course. I guess, ever the evolution of technology marches on. But there’s a big difference between fighting against an emerging media platform and sneaking your videos up on there, and then suing over them.