by SHANE SINNOTT

A couple of weeks ago, while conducting the rigorous research necessary for writing this column, I came across the following story, which I dutifully filed away for a rainy day. Today, friends, is that day—as I look outside, the sky is the colour of wet wood. So here it is: the RCMP, it turns out, has based its well-known money-lost-to-piracy figure on, basically, nothing. Back in 2005, Canada’s finest claimed in their Economic Crime Report that piracy and counterfeiting (in all sources, from music downloading to fake Gucci handbags) resulted in losses of $10- to $30-billion annually. Enter every anti-piracy group in the country and, the next thing you know, the figure is treated as gospel. U.S. Ambassador David Wilkins cited it in a speech critical of Canadian copyright law, and almost any “Canada has to clean up its act”-type argument is based on that figure.

After the sources for the figure were requested through the Access to Information Act, the Mounties responded that the figures were based on “open source documents found on the Internet.” In other words, no independent research was conducted. Someone at the RCMP Googled it, came across a high, baseless figure, and allowed it to enter an official report and assume a life of its own while staying mum. The figure, incidentally, comes from some brand owners who are of the opinion that 20 per cent of the Canadian market is “pirate product,” though a recent study by those more entrenched in reality, which randomly inspected shipments coming into the country, found 0.06 per cent of goods were counterfeit.

Finds this week: For those who can’t resist watching a train wreck, the new Britney Spears album Blackout is due at the end of the month, and has leaked—here’s “Get Back,” at tinyurl.com/2sq44h. A new Jay-Z track has surfaced as well, called “Roc Boys,” and being billed as “the happiest song ever about crack.” To wit: “first of all I want to thank my connec…/thanks to the duffel bag/the brown paper bag/the Nike shoebox for holding all the cash.” Hear it at tinyurl.com/3bqq5a.