Bill C-11 committee  Yes, we are. It's an expensive proposition, as you can imagine, and we've invested millions of dollars in it. Even in digitizing any feature films, we correlate everything to the provincial curriculum standards. It's very, very expensive.

Bill C-11 committee  There are trainers out there who do programs and put their stuff up on the Internet. They do it on YouTube, and teachers want to be able to access that resource, but they're afraid they can't, because they don't know if they're violating the copyright law. I think the point is to free it up so they have access to this rich resource, but not to punish us in the interim, and not to punish the educational community as a whole, because in ten years they're not going to find these resources.

Bill C-11 committee  Yes. And we charge different prices. If they just want the public performance rights because it is commercially available, it would be a different fee from what it would be if we were actually supplying a hard copy to them.

Bill C-11 committee  No, they would be exempt from copyright from our products.

Bill C-11 committee  Let's take a program that we distribute on the Canadian prairies. We charge a public performance fee for it, and a good chunk of what we charge goes back to the producer. So let's say about 50% goes back to the producer.

Bill C-11 committee  It can be in any format. We distribute it on DVD. We offer streaming, and we offer duplication rights for school districts. We also put it on a digital platform that can go on the Internet. So there isn't a format we do not cover. We will no longer be able to charge those fees to the school districts for the public performance, because they'll be exempt from it.

Bill C-11 committee  Yes. So our argument here is that if we're only able to charge $9.99, who is going to produce Canadian content? How are producers going to create anything on the Canadian prairies or the maritimes? Who is going to create it in both official languages?

Bill C-11 committee  Yes.

Bill C-11 committee  I'm going to defer to John, because I'm not sure I understand.

Bill C-11 committee  Essentially I think we'd be quickly out of business even if we could adapt a new business model over two or three years. I don't think we would survive in the interim.

Bill C-11 committee  For us, 60% of our business is sold to the educational sector in public performance rights. I also want to add to what John said. Bill C-11 also allows them to duplicate. So right now a school district would pay us $5,000 to duplicate 1,000 copies of a title. Now they will be able to buy it once for $49, or whatever the fee is, and duplicate it as many times as they want.

Bill C-11 committee  I just want to say that our understanding is that the educators just want to be able to access the rich resources that are on the Internet without fear of infringement. They are not wanting to avoid paying people for the copyright material they have created. The amendment we proposed in section 29.5 simply provides them with the access they want to materials on which there isn't a collective society collecting copyright, but also protects our businesses by enabling us to collect the fees on the intellectual property we represent.

Bill C-11 committee  We recently spent millions of dollars creating a K-to-12 digital delivery platform to meet those needs. They no longer wanted hard copy. We took all of these programs and correlated them to the curriculum for all provinces. We clipped them. We also added software onto our platform that enabled them to take this content and build lesson plans around it, create tests, and provide students with access at home.

Bill C-11 committee  Absolutely.

Bill C-11 committee  A 16-millimetre print back in the day was $1,500. Now they have access to these 25,000 audiovisual clips for $795 a school per year, unlimited access.