I caught this on Boing Boing today and it makes me hopeful that the current state of music and DRM and other stupid things will soon be a thing of the past. Anyway a group of Canadian artists have formed a group to add their voice to this huge fiasco, I wish them well. They already have a decent showing of some Canadian artists on board, including the Barenaked Ladies. I had recently noted how fair and liberal they were with downloads of their shows, this is the obvious extension of that belief for them I suppose.

Strange that this news comes to my attention the same day that this also comes up; the newly revised proposal to the DMCA in the US is an utter disaster. Basically it elevates digital piracy to ridiculous criminal heights, and allows the government to prosecute pirates like they are terror suspects. Here’s a dry report on the changes. Here’s a better and more succinct critique that cuts to the chase on the penalties:

If you copy Craig David’s (editor: No idea who that is) CD you get ten years, but if you punch him in the face and pummel him into a seven day coma you will only get six. You are more likely to get the respect of the prison population with your six year sentence as well.

They go on to say that copying a DVD deserves the same penalty as distributing child pornography, for crying out loud. This certainly is a big change from the previous penalties, it’s more than a little out of whack with what I think most of the public would consider to be an acceptable penalty. I think that artists deserve to be paid, and copyrights are important, but they ARE NOT as important as children’s rights. What a load of crap.