Bob Young Weighs in on Copyright Reform in Canada

Bob Young, founder of Red Hat Software and owner of the Hamilton Tiger Cats, has come out against proposed changes to Canada's Copyright Act. He was the CEO of Red Hat (a U.S. company) when the DMCA was signed into law in the U.S.

"The copyright philosophy behind the U.S. DMCA is that it's illegal to do what software engineers do every day of the week and what they'll have to continue to do in order to build better technology for all companies," Bob Young, spokesperson for the Canadian Software Innovation Alliance (CSIA) and a former founder and CEO at Red Hat Inc., said.

"The biggest concern is we're going to have law substitute for good technology. We're crafting these laws without having anyone from the technology industry engaged in the process."

"Software development requires access to computer programs for many reasons, including the need to develop innovative functionality extensions or follow-on software, to undertake security research, to make code interoperable, and to research functionality, including reverse engineering code to identify functionality," the letter stated. "Sound copyright policy requires a proper balancing of these rights and restrictions, giving creators some control over their creations while ensuring that others can work with and build upon them without prohibitive or unfair restrictions."

Young said the proposed bill will cater too heavily to the content industry and not to the engineers and software developers that are going to be most severely impacted by the new laws. The proposed anti-circumvention legislation, he said, is similar to making the use and ownership of screw-drivers and pliers illegal because they can be used to commit crimes such as burglary.