This past Tuesday, I was on CJOB (a Winnipeg radio station) for a 2 hour discussion on copyright. The host – Richard Cloutier – initiated the show in reaction to the Copyright Consultations being held by the Canadian government (they even have a Twitter account set up). I tried to invite myself to the Winnipeg consultation. It was then that I discovered that consultation=you listen. It’s encouraging to see the government initiate consultations. But it’s disappointing that they have done so in a very closed manner. Yes, you can post your thoughts to the site. However, I would hardly call that a consultation. What’s that called again? Oh, wait, I know: it’s essentially email.
In some instances, closed roundtables make sense – but in this case, they are posting transcripts and recordings. Why not just make it an open forum? Let people attend, ask questions. I deem this feeble. And a really poor attempt at consultation. Why not a more accurate term like “You listen while we Talk Copyright”?
On a more positive note, Michael Geist has set up a site to encourage involvement in the Copyright Consultation.