tribedude
Active member
This thread is of interest to Canadian forum operators and those who have cloud, leased, or owned servers in Canada.
If Bill C10 and C36 become law in Canada, it will have massive impact on our communities. We'll have an Internet with rigid Chinese-style controls.
Over the last year, our Liberal government under Justin Trudeau and his Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault have repeatedly tried to push through online speech control laws to gain control of Canada's information space for their own purposes. At first I was surprised and shocked by this, but they are terrified of social movements taking hold in Canada, and this is how they want to stop them.
The first Bill was called C10. Canadians are mostly trying to survive the pandemic and the government used this distraction to craft legislation to take full control of Canada's Internet space. They passed it in the middle of the night before the election was called. But Bill C10 got stalled in the Senate as our Senators began to understand what the bill was really about: information and content control.
THIS IS WHY OUR ELECTION WAS CALLED. Our Liberal government wants to get majority power to push these bills through.
Bill C10:
1) re-defines ALL online content as "broadcasting" or "programs"
2) puts all broadcasting under the regulatory control of a political appointee (the head of the CRTC, Ian Scott)
Regulatory remedies they have for content they don't like include:
1) 24 hour content take down orders
2) massive fines,
3) seizing and blocking domains
4) potential jail time
* When the election was called, this bill stopped dead, but the Liberal government wants to re-introduce it. It's in their platform.
Worse is Bill C36, which sets up an entire ministry and infrastructure to monitor online content and issue take down orders related to the content itself - hate speech or content that promotes social unrest, and as Mr. Guilbeault says - content that doesn't treat him with respect.
As Canadian forum administrators, there are some things we can do to make sure we don't get hurt badly or shut down by these laws:
1. Stay informed. I suggest you immediately follow Micheal Geist @mgeist on twitter. He is a Carlton law professor who has been very active in describing what the government has been trying to do. Read his historical tweet content. He's testified at committees against this bill. Follow him. You may also want to follow openmedia.ca who have also been defending our rights.
I've launched a 2 minute long daily podcast called The Daily Weasel on Spotify / Anchor FM, Google Podcasts , going for the next 15 days until the election. Follow me on twitter @tribemagazine because our political election stuff is there. I've also been using the tribe twitter feed to lampoon our politicians because our news industry has been hollowed or owned and only a few journalists are left. I don't care who you vote for, my focus is on good governance and free speech.
2. Inform Your Community If your users are Canadian, tell them about these bills right away and what they mean. I think if we focus our communities attention on them for a few moments they will understand how bad they are for Canada. I'm going to see if I can find a neutral information page about these bills to link to (probably at openmedia.ca) that I can share with my users and also create a 300x250 box public service ad to run as a house ad on slack ad space in my forum. If you want one for your forum I can send you one too. Message me.
Thank you for listening and I hope you are all well and safe,
Alex D.
If Bill C10 and C36 become law in Canada, it will have massive impact on our communities. We'll have an Internet with rigid Chinese-style controls.
Over the last year, our Liberal government under Justin Trudeau and his Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault have repeatedly tried to push through online speech control laws to gain control of Canada's information space for their own purposes. At first I was surprised and shocked by this, but they are terrified of social movements taking hold in Canada, and this is how they want to stop them.
The first Bill was called C10. Canadians are mostly trying to survive the pandemic and the government used this distraction to craft legislation to take full control of Canada's Internet space. They passed it in the middle of the night before the election was called. But Bill C10 got stalled in the Senate as our Senators began to understand what the bill was really about: information and content control.
THIS IS WHY OUR ELECTION WAS CALLED. Our Liberal government wants to get majority power to push these bills through.
Bill C10:
1) re-defines ALL online content as "broadcasting" or "programs"
2) puts all broadcasting under the regulatory control of a political appointee (the head of the CRTC, Ian Scott)
Regulatory remedies they have for content they don't like include:
1) 24 hour content take down orders
2) massive fines,
3) seizing and blocking domains
4) potential jail time
* When the election was called, this bill stopped dead, but the Liberal government wants to re-introduce it. It's in their platform.
Worse is Bill C36, which sets up an entire ministry and infrastructure to monitor online content and issue take down orders related to the content itself - hate speech or content that promotes social unrest, and as Mr. Guilbeault says - content that doesn't treat him with respect.
As Canadian forum administrators, there are some things we can do to make sure we don't get hurt badly or shut down by these laws:
1. Stay informed. I suggest you immediately follow Micheal Geist @mgeist on twitter. He is a Carlton law professor who has been very active in describing what the government has been trying to do. Read his historical tweet content. He's testified at committees against this bill. Follow him. You may also want to follow openmedia.ca who have also been defending our rights.
I've launched a 2 minute long daily podcast called The Daily Weasel on Spotify / Anchor FM, Google Podcasts , going for the next 15 days until the election. Follow me on twitter @tribemagazine because our political election stuff is there. I've also been using the tribe twitter feed to lampoon our politicians because our news industry has been hollowed or owned and only a few journalists are left. I don't care who you vote for, my focus is on good governance and free speech.
2. Inform Your Community If your users are Canadian, tell them about these bills right away and what they mean. I think if we focus our communities attention on them for a few moments they will understand how bad they are for Canada. I'm going to see if I can find a neutral information page about these bills to link to (probably at openmedia.ca) that I can share with my users and also create a 300x250 box public service ad to run as a house ad on slack ad space in my forum. If you want one for your forum I can send you one too. Message me.
Thank you for listening and I hope you are all well and safe,
Alex D.
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