New technologies and cultural policies : Nouvelles technologies et politiques culturelles : rapport synthese

In spite of the generally lower quality of the finished product, the financial advantages of the scenario are easy to understand: smaller upfront investment and debt, reduced risk inherent to the initial print run and the virtual elimination of unsold stocks of books. [...] DISTRIBUTION The combined effect of the introduction of new communications technologies and the selling of books over the Internet challenges the observance of territorial rights for book sales and raises a number of issues that affect the Canadian publishing industry, including: How to ensure that exclusive distribution rights for a territory are observed when the book is ordered from a virtual s [...] The development of a digitization policy would enable the ministers responsible for culture and heritage to get all of the stakeholders working together on the question of access to works and the enforcement of copyright, so as to stimulate the interest of publishers in placing their content on the Web without jeopardizing the viability of their operation. [...] At the core of the controversy is the desire of the Council of Ministers of Education, Canada, to build into the Copyright Act an exception that would allow Canadian students and teachers to reproduce free of charge for educational purposes all of the works available on the Internet. [...] The closing on July 1 of the legendary Sam the Record Man on Yonge Street in Toronto is indicative of the depth of the change.3 Over the past 200 years, the world of music has seen many technological innovations that helped to make musical works more accessible to the general public while making music reproduction more reliable and its distribution more portable.