Canadian Businesses Speak Out Against Canadian DMCA

The entertainment industry has been pushing on Canada to introduce a version of the DMCA up north for years. Late last year, it looked like the effort was going to pay off in extremely one-sided legislation that was basically a wish list from Hollywood for changes in copyright law that clearly favored that industry over consumers' rights. While the Canadian politicians backing the proposal tried to push it through without too much scrutiny, Michael Geist's efforts to call attention to the effort helped get it postponed.

However, since then, the supporters of the bill keep looking to reintroduce it at a time when most folks are looking elsewhere. When pressed on the bill, they try to defend it, though the defenses are usually easily debunked. One of the main talking points in that link is that businesses are demanding these changes. However, Geist is now pointing out that a huge number of big businesses have now formed the Business Coalition for Balanced Copyright in order to publicly speak out against the Canadian DMCA. The group includes a bunch of Canadian telcos, broadcasters, cable companies, retailers and internet firms -- all basically saying that the Canadian DMCA isn't what they want. So, what businesses are actually demanding these changes? Oh yeah, just a few big entertainment companies based in the US.