The Effects of C-11 ⇥ michaelgeist.ca

Reforms of Canadian copyright law have been proposed for the better part of the past decade, and most were absurdly restrictive to users. While they made explicit educational and satirical uses, these proposed bills made a number of logical, reasonable incidents of copying a felony. Even back to January of this year, the C-11 bill, as it was known, required termination of internet access by ISPs when a complaint was made against a user. In an email to my Member of Parliament, I raised my concerns with the proposed bill, and urged a revision.

I’d like to think that similar complaints from Canadians caused the bill to be extensively modified because, on Monday, a version of C-11 took effect which is vastly improved. It’s not perfect but, as Michael Geist explains, it provides some of the most expansive end-user rights of any copyright law in the world.