www.jeremydebeer.ca

Michael Geist has drawn attention to CRIA President Graham Henderson’s recent statements in Billboard Magazine about Canada's private copying levy. It just happens that I’ve recently published an article in the Canadian Journal of Law and Technology on this exact issue.

Although I agree that the levy should not be expanded, and should perhaps even be narrowed or eliminated, my reasons for making this argument are very different from CRIA's. CRIA wants to drop the levy in order to remove a possible defence to file sharing lawsuits in Canada. It wants to facilitate individual licensing for all copying, using restrictive contracts and technologies.

My solution would be to promote and streamline voluntary collective licensing models, where necessary (i.e. where the copying is not already impliedly or expressly licenced, or is not fair dealing). Another option, as I point out in the paper, would be to allow consumers to transfer music they buy onto different formats under a right of fair use. Either approach should be supplemented with stable and generous public funding programs targeted directly at Canadian artists and music consumers.