OTTAWA–Canada has capitulated on copyright policy in the new trilateral North American trade deal, experts say, with a new “digital trade” chapter that could have wide-ranging implications on everything from Canadian content online to personal privacy. The new United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), announced late Sunday night, commits Canada to extending the term of copyright by two decades, from 50 years after the author’s death to 70 years. While that sounds like a relatively minor change, University of Ottawa professor Michael Geist said the costs associated with it could be significant. Though experts were still examining the deatails of the USMCA, its extension of patents on biologics to 10 years could have an “enormous” cost on the health care system. “We’ll find that Canadian culture and heritage is locked down, out of the public domain for an extra two decades.

Source: thestar October 01, 2018 19:20 UTC