This is The Songwriters Association of Canada’s proposal for monetizing file sharing of Canadian music. It lays out a voluntary collective licensing scheme similar to that proposed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The plan highlights its unobtrusive nature which will basically let consumers continue to download music as they wish but remove the legal risks and legitimize their actions. Consumers would have unlimited access to the world's music collection both preserving and fostering its growth. The association believes the voluntary collective licensing method will usher in a "Golden Age of creativity."

The background of the proposal provides some interesting statistics on music downloading. The estimate 98% of all music is shared and only 2% is actually purchased obviously indicating that sharing is the preferred method of the public at large to access music. The proposal also argues that legalizing file sharing would increase the amount of high quality virus-free music available as only 6mm of the 100mm recordings created are available on legal sites. Legitimizing file sharing will hence increase society's access to all music promoting the arts. It will also answer the most important dilemma: compensation for creators.  

The proposal is an amendment to the current copyright act instituting collective licensing and the payment by consumers of a monthly fee on internet and wireless accounts. This would basically be a government tax but with an opt-out option. Consumers could sign documentation stating they will not share files and face penalty for breaking their agreement. Creators could also opt-out. The proposal would not only benefit consumers, but also ISPs and the music industry. ISPs would receive an administrative fee and record companies would finally receive compensation for file-sharing. The collective would be responsible for tracking music file sharing and distribution of royalties and could be outsourced to firms currently doing similar work.

Overall, the system seems very reasonable and a solution to the secular downward trend facing the record industry. The proposal is broad in its strokes, but it is the details of voluntary collective licensing that make it difficult which are not addressed. Issues such as how royalty streams are fairly distributed, misuse for non-music materials, cheating by artists, impact on record companies and current providers of legal file sharing are not fully tackled. Still the proposal takes the next steps necessary to move the method forward.

Owner- and renter-occupied dwellings as a proportion of total dwellings, Canada, provinces, territories and health regions, 2001

By Doug Struck
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, February 27, 2007; Page A10

ON THE ICE ROAD, Northwest Territories -- Elden Pashovitz eased his big truck and 28 tons of aviation fuel onto the ice of Tibbitt Lake and set out in low gear for his destination, dozens of ponds and lakes away.

Ahead, the scene was bleak, white and flat. The temperature was minus 10. The ice crackled under the 30 tires of his tandem rig.

Pashovitz moved his vehicle to its place in a caravan of heavy trucks, one of many processions now crawling across frozen tundra and iced-over lakes in the grip of the Canadian winter. Their mission is to deliver a year's worth of supplies to remote sites -- mines and drilling rigs and small native villages -- that depend on the ice road for all their needs.