I No Longer Support the Conservative Party of Canada

June 12th, 2008

Yes, you read that right. I, Robert Phillips, long time conservative supporter who went door to door in the last three elections, stood behind Stephen Harper on a few stages, and former executive of the Brock Conservative Club, no longer supports the Conservative Party of Canada. Why? One simple reason. Introduction of Bill C-61, aka, the DMCA of Canada. You can read the entire bill here and read the comments from Michael Geist here.

In essence, the government is bowing to american and industry pressure to introduce backwards legislation that does nothing but inconvenience consumers and restrict innovation in digital media. It will not, by no means, reduce or eliminate piracy; you only need to visit the infamous Pacific Mall to witness this.

This bill will prevent me from unlocking my cell phone, modding my xbox, watching a dvd from another continent, or changing my legally purchased song from iTunes into a regular mp3 file so I can play it on the mp3cd player in my car. While the bill ‘limits’ damages in any lawsuit to $500 per song, if you’re an average teenager with 1000’s of songs on your iPod that you downloaded, it doesn’t really matter whether they are suing you for a million or a few hundred thousand, it’s going to ruin things.

What they should have done is enacted a bill that punished those who break copyright for financial gain (ie. the piraters who sell thousands of copies of pirated dvds, games, cds), and not those who may download an album or dvd that they would not have bought otherwise. Unfortunately, unless the NDP/Liberals/Bloq band together to shoot this down (and I pray that they do), this backwards legislation will probably be passed before the end of the year.  Whether it does or does not pass, the fact remains that the party and whatever candidate happens to be in my riding will receive one less vote come the next election

Entry Filed under: Announcements, Canadian Politics