Archive for June 28th, 2011

Civil Society Groups Reject OECD Internet Policy Principles

The OECD is meeting this week in Paris for a meeting on the Internet economy. The meeting features many government leaders and is expected to conclude with a Communiqu̩ on Principles for Internet Policy-Making. This builds on the June 2008 OECD meeting in Seoul, Korea that not only placed the spotlight on Internet economy issues, but opened the door to participation of civil society groups in OECD policy making. That was a big step forward, but today there was a major step back as the civil society groups Рnow representing over 80 organizations from around the world under the name CSISAC Рannounced that it was withdrawing its name from support of the draft OECD communique.

A detailed explanation behind the decision can be found here, but a shorter release explains significant concerns behind language that would encourage steps toward filtering and blocking online content as well as the adoption of graduated response systems that could result in terminating Internet access.  As CSISAC notes:

The final Communiqué advises OECD countries to adopt policy and legal frameworks that make Internet intermediaries responsible for taking lawful steps to deter copyright infringement. This approach could create incentives for Internet intermediaries to delete or block contested content, and lead to network filtering, which would harm online expression. In addition, as has already happened in at least one country, Internet intermediaries could voluntarily adopt “graduated response” policies under which Internet users’ access could be terminated based solely on repeated allegations of infringement. CSISAC believes that these measures contradict international and European human rights law.

The release concludes:

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June 28, 2011 3 comments News

Cisco: Canada Below Asia, Europe on P2P Usage

Peter Nowak speaks to Cisco’s Thomas Barnett, who discusses miscontrued data on Internet use. Barnett says Canada actually ranks below the U.S. on per capita Internet use and that Canadians rank below countries in both Europe and Asia on peer-to-peer usage.

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June 28, 2011 3 comments News

Google Transparency Project: Canadian Takedowns & User Data Requests

Google has posted updated data from its Transparency Report project. It reports that during the period from July – December 2010, there were seven Canadian court order to takedown content (all related to defamation claims) and 38 requests for disclosure of user data from Google accounts or services.

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June 28, 2011 1 comment News

The Cost of Lawful Access for Small ISPs

ITBusiness looks at the costs of the proposed lawful access legislation for small ISPs, noting that they will face significant new expenditures on equipment and staff training.

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June 28, 2011 Comments are Disabled News

University of Saskatchewan To Drop Access Copyright Licence

The University of Saskatchewan has announced  that it plans to withdraw from Access Copyright as of August 31, 2011. The University will rely on a combination of site licences, fair dealing, open access, and transactional licensing. While this will undoubtedly require some adjustments, look for many other Canadian universities to […]

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June 28, 2011 7 comments News