Clare Curran, Communications and IT Spokesperson for Labour, recently held a meeting in Auckland to discuss broader issues with Copyright in NZ. One purpose of the meeting was to encourage discussion that would feed into a policy on copyright that Labour are developing.

Many key stakeholders involved in the current Copyright debate in NZ attended, and CFF were among them. We found it to be a very positive experience with some surprising common ground. Participants were respectful and a general consensus was reached that technology is radically shifting the way people engage with media. Business models need to be updated to keep up with the change, but education and awareness around respecting the rights of copyright owners is also important.

Some time was spent discussing the questionable and unproven "statistics" that have been given by rights holders as an attempt to paint illegal downloading as a major revenue threat. It was even admitted by one party that recent claims of internet traffic being significantly reduced around the time of the Internet Blackout, and subsequent increases following the suspension of s92A, were entirely fabricated.

All in all, we found Curran's comprehensive grasping of the key issues to be encouraging and greatly look forward to seeing her further progress. Due processes worthy of respect from the public, and Fair Use are essential to New Zealand's future creative sector and it was great to hear these issues given the time they deserve.

Curran's response to the meeting is here and her longer post about Copyright issues is here.

Bronwyn Holloway-Smith wrote

It was even admitted by one party that recent claims of internet traffic being significantly reduced around the time of the Internet Blackout, and subsequent increases following the suspension of s92A, were entirely fabricated.

This claim was made on the Insight programme about copyright, wasn't it? You should tell Radio NZ, since the programme is still downloadable. They could make a note on their website about the apparent misinformation. They could also make a note about the trustworthiness of that source of information, for future reference. And they could apologize to listeners of the programmes in which it was broadcast. (In fact, I'm not sure whether it was repeated last night, or whether there's a week's delay between the first broadcast on Sunday Morning and the one on Nights. And there might be other repeats during the early hours of the morning some time in the next couple of weeks, too.)