Would You Believe That Microsoft Has Been Caught Exaggerating Concerning Copyright?

Overhype

from the no,-really? dept

Microsoft has a decently long history of exaggerating the impacts of copyright infringement on its business, even as there’s a fair bit of evidence that the company has benefited greatly from lax enforcement of copyright. However, now the company has taken to exaggerating what copyright law actually says up in Canada. Michael Geist does a nice job picking apart a recent Microsoft-penned editorial claiming that copyright law in Canada just isn’t strong enough. Even better, he does so using examples of Microsoft’s own actions to prove the company wrong. For example, the editorial claimed that current Canadian copyright law didn’t protect a content creator from someone using their content for commercial purposes. Yet, as Geist points out, Microsoft itself won just such a lawsuit a year ago, trumpeting the results in a press release. Perhaps Microsoft saw how the movie industry was able to lie about existing copyright law in Canada — which convinced politicians to pass unnecessary new legislation — and figured that Canadian politicians seem mighty gullible on the subject.

Filed Under: canada, copyright, exaggeration
Companies: microsoft