Canadian DMCA Bill Within the Next Two Weeks?

[thebookpile]

Michael Geist seems to think that changes to Canada's Copyright Act will be tabled by the Conservative government within the next two weeks. Some highlights from his post:

• "While Prentice continues to claim that he is actively working on a bill that meets the needs of creators and consumers, the talk in Ottawa is that the bill is done."
• "Word is that the six months since the initial bill was shelved has yielded some changes, most notably reforms such as the legalization of time shifting (ie. recording television shows with a VCR/PVR) and possibly device shifting (ie. transfer a song from a store bought CD to an iPod)."
• "Neither of these provisions come close to meeting the concerns of the many groups that have spoken out on copyright over the past six months. (...) for copy-controlled CDs - try circumventing the copy-controls to shift the music onto your iPod and you're violating the law even with a device-shifting provision."

I guess we'll have to wait until the Bill tabled in the House until we know whether Prentice and the Conservatives really plan to screw digital media consumers. However, I think the bill will be dissected thoroughly enough to render futile any attempts to spin this positively.