Copyright Legislation, a shot in the foot

Oct 28, 2018 Letters

Dear Editor,
I hope the intention behind these laws is to protect local content producers and not to prostrate to some external force like the Motion Picture Association of America.
Intentions aside, in my humble opinion it is extremely short sighted. Foreign sourced movies and music represent 99 percent of the entertainment media circulating Guyana. I challenge anyone to show me how enforcing copyright will make local producers any significant gain. If anything, it will be damaging to them, piracy has proven to be a big driver in increasing audiences and mind-share across the industry. In fact, movie companies leak movies to tantalize audiences, and increase their box office returns.
Economically, it is converting all the DVDs, CDs into massive profits for foreign companies and exporting even more of Guyana’s wealth outside the borders where it will not circulate to profit a Guyanese. On average a DVD or CD is twenty (20) USD, which translates to $4000.00 GYD. Is the Guyanese public now paying taxes to pass laws and pay enforcement officials to fill the coffers of first world companies? This is extremely harmful to the Guyanese people.
Another extremely troubling scenario is the extent of the copyright legislation. Will it extend to software? Leaving out the private sector, I know government agencies that run pirated software. Will they be paying all the licence fees for all their users now? This is the government shooting itself in the foot.
To the ethics of this matter, we should remember not too long ago when Guyana had a trademark case against a US sugar company about the use of the name “Demerara Gold”. Guyana lost that case when in fact, “Demerara” is the actual description of the source of the sugar in Guyana and the foreign company had no such basis. The world is governed like a business and we should reflect on the fact that while the US was in its developing phase, they paid no respect to intellectual property rights of others and they stole inventions to advance themselves. Now they find themselves in the driver’s seat, they changed rules of the game to suit their pockets and are belligerent in getting every penny for any intellectual property they deem is owed to them.
I implore the runners of this country to be practical and not shoot Guyana in the foot.
Sincerely
Yogistra Anderson

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