Yeah, I’m comparing Google to the AAs of the world. I’m not jumping on the “Google’s evil” bandwagon just yet, but there’s an analogy here, if you’re allow me:

Google is an advertising company. This is not news. They’re not a search engine company, they’re an advertising company. That’s what they do, and it’s where they make their money.

When you go to a website, you’re, essentially, paying Google for the privilege of viewing the content because, guess what, if it’s on the internet, chances are it’s got Google ads on it.

But, as we all know, when you do a generic search, odds are good that the first result will be for a Wikipedia page. And those don’t have Google ads on them.

Read the rest of this entry »

“How did copyright become cool?” is perhaps one of the most well-informed and thought-out articles in the mainstream press on the subject. Sadly, it appears to be web-only, so I guess it didn’t make it into the real paper. But this is a start!

The Globe and Mail is, essentially, Canada’s New York Times. It’s based in Toronto, but available throughout the country. The fact that such a major source has, not only covered the issue, but considered it, is something of a big deal, web-only or not.

“Maybe he just didn’t think that copyright legislation could capture the public imagination. It would be hard to blame him if that were the case; at politician school, they don’t teach you to watch out for that third rail of Canadian politics, “anti-circumvention legislation.”

Suddenly, though, circumvention is a word that people are getting hot and bothered about. As anyone who has bought music from Apple has learned the hard way, companies are in the business of putting technological locks on their content. The classic example is songs bought on iTunes, which have built-in limits on where they can be played (iPods only!) and how they can be copied (hardly at all). The happy euphemism for this technique is Digital Rights Management, or DRM.”

Read the rest of this entry »

“The Industry Minister’s press secretary has advised journalists that the bill will not be introduced today or tomorrow. Since the House of Commons will break at the end of the week, the Canadian DMCA will not be introduced until at least late January.” Link.

This sounds to me like the Minister is hoping to delay long enough so that the intense opposition to the bill will wane, get distracted, and forget about it.

Which isn’t going to happen. This is the internet. Not TV. Not newspapers. When this gets brought up again in January, as long as Cory makes a few posts on BoingBoing, everybody will wake up, again.

The mainstream press probably won’t talk about it again. They’ve done their stories, they’ll forget.

But a month or so from now, when this rears its ugly head again, the opposition will be as fierce as ever.

As Cory said earlier today, “this thing won’t die until we cut off its head, sew its mouth full of garlic, and bury its head at a crossroads.” And activists aren’t going to give up until that happens.