Entertainment Software Association of Canada v SOCAN was one of two 5-4 split decisions of the copyright pentalogy decisions released on July 12. Online media and software producers and distributors won a major victory. The Supreme Court ruled that the “communication to the public by telecommunication” right does not apply to downloads of a musical […]
In June, Google, Inc. received some welcome news in France after the lawsuits instigated by the French Publishers Association (Syndicat national de l’édition) and the French Author’s Association (Société des gens de lettres) were withdrawn following a successfully agreed upon “framework” settlement. Google wrote on its European Public Policy blog that the new arrangement gives […]
Without a background in horse racing, I feel comfortable expressing today as a “Fivefecta”. Since Monday’s announcement that the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) would release judgments in five critically important copyright appeals heard on December 6 and 7, 2011, there has been a growing excitement in the Copyright community. The decisions from these appeals, […]
While North American IP enthusiasts had likely been pre-occupied with the controversy surrounding the stalled American anti-internet piracy bills known as SOPA and PIPA (covered by IP Osgoode here), Europe has been struggling to deal with the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). Even though it was designed to be an international framework for improved intellectual property […]
Edward Elgar Publishing has released a paperback edition of the book Copyright, Contracts, Creators – New Media, New Rules by Prof. Giuseppina D’Agostino. Copyright, Contracts, Creators evaluates the efficacy of current copyright law to address the contracting and use of creative works. It looks in particular at freelance works and argues that their copyright treatment […]
Brett Gaylor’s 2008 documentary RiP!: A Manifesto is, at heart, a defence of his “favourite band”, Girl Talk. It is therefore unsurprising that it does not appear to be a balanced look at the state of copyright law today, but rather a one-sided picture of current copyright law. Nonetheless, it succeeds in raising some interesting […]
After years of debate (almost 15, to be precise) and numerous revisions and cancellations (4, to be precise), Bill C-11 or An Act to Amend the Copyright Act, arguably the most controversial set of changes to the Canadian Copyright Act (R.S.C., 1985, c. C-42), has just been passed by a vote of 158 to 135. […]
In the past few years, policymakers, academic commentators, consumer advocates, civil liberties groups, and user communities have expressed grave concerns about the steadily increasing levels of enforcement of intellectual property rights. Many of these concerns relate to the “alphabet soup” of transborder intellectual property enforcement, which consists of the following: SECURE (Standards to Be Employed […]
On June 8th 2012, lawyers and artists will be converging in Ottawa for the Art + Law conference, hosted by CARFAC. One of the major topics of discussion will doubtless be the recently debated Artists’ Resale Right (ARR).
In November 2011, the Advocate-General of the European Court of Justice (ECJ), Yves Bot, issued an influential but non-binding legal opinion, positing that the functional aspects of computer programs should not be protected under copyright law. To do so would be against the interests of fair dealing, by preventing decompilation and reverse engineering, among other […]