Knopf on more excess r copyright rhetoric

Knopf on more excess r copyright rhetoric in Canada.

“Piracy” is a word that should be used carefully and properly and applied only to harmful intentional commercial scale infringement. It is wholly inappropriate to apply the word to teenagers who engage in downloading music that they love, or their grandmothers who provide them internet access on occasion, or to law professors who have the temerity to believe in the inconvenient fact (as seen by the corporate and collective point of view) that there are also users’ rights in copyright law.

Overuse of the rhetoric of piracy is at best crying wolf. At worst, it is crude propaganda that has fooled some of the politicians some of the time in Canada and elsewhere but won’t work in the long run.

If there is going to be a meaningful debate about this in Canada, the Creators' Copyright Coalition and their friends should apply their creative and communication skills in a less hysteric and more constructive manner.