Post Tagged with: "content regulation"

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The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 134: Monica Auer on CRTC Governance, Content Regulation and the Radio-Canada Decision

Over the past couple of weeks, there has been mounting outrage over a CRTC decision involving Radio-Canada and a broadcast segment from 2020 in which the N-word was used multiple times as part of a discussion of a book that contains the word in its title. That decision has sparked cries of censorship and concerns about the CRTC. Given that Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez and the government want to give the Commission even more power over Internet content as part of Bill C-11, the implications extend beyond this case. Monica Auer, the executive director of the Forum for Research and Policy in Communications, joins the Law Bytes podcast to discuss the latest developments, the broader concerns with CRTC governance, and whether assurances regarding Internet speech safeguards stand up to careful scrutiny.

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July 11, 2022 1 comment Podcasts
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The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 77: The Complexity of Internet Content Regulation – A Conversation with CIPPIC’s Vivek Krishnamurthy

Canadian Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault seems set to table another bill that would establish Internet content regulations, including requirements for Internet platforms to proactively remove many different forms of content, some illegal and others harmful or possibly even “hurtful.” Few would argue with the proposition that some regulation is needed, but venturing into government regulated takedown requirements of otherwise legal content raises complex questions about how to strike the balance between safeguarding Canadians from online harms and protecting freedom of expression.

Vivek Krishnamurthy, is a colleague at the University of Ottawa, where he is the Samuelson-Gluschko Professor of Law and serves as the director of CIPPIC, the Samuelson-Glushko Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic. He joins the Law Bytes podcast to talk about the complexities of Internet content regulation and the risks that overbroad rules could stifle expression online and provide a dangerous model for countries less concerned with online civil liberties.

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February 22, 2021 5 comments Podcasts
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The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 74: Heidi Tworek on the Challenges of Internet Platform Regulation

The Law Bytes podcast took a breather over the holidays and into early January, but there seemingly is no break for digital policy issues. Over the past few weeks, Internet platforms have found themselves squarely in the public eye as company after company – from Shopify to Twitter to Facebook de-platformed former US President Donald Trump in response to the events in Washington earlier this month. Dr. Heidi Tworek of the University of British Columbia is one of Canada’s most prolific thinkers on Internet platform policies. She joins the podcast for a conversation about the role and responsibilities of Internet platforms, proposals for payments in the news sector, and insights what governments should be doing about better communicating with the public about the COVID-19 global pandemic.

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January 25, 2021 6 comments Podcasts
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The LawBytes Podcast, Episode 53: Welcome Development or Waste of Time? – A Conversation With Facebook Oversight Board Member Nicolas Suzor

Last month, Facebook revealed the names of the first 20 members of the Facebook Oversight Board, a body charged with conducting independent reviews of content removals. The group includes many well-known experts in the fields of human rights, journalism, law, and social media. The announcement received at best a mixed greeting – some welcomed the experiment in content moderation, while others argued that the board “will have no influence over anything that really matters in the world.”

Professor Nicolas Suzor of the Queensland University of Technology in Australia was named as one of the first 20 members. The author of Lawless: The Secret Rules that Govern our Digital Lives, Nicolas has been critical of Facebook and other Internet platforms and raised concerns about the oversight board when it was first announced. He joins me on the podcast to discuss the oversight board, the initial criticisms, and his views on how the board can have a positive impact in addressing complex issues that strive to balance freedom of expression with concerns about online harms. Note that our conversation was recorded before President Donald Trump issued an executive order targeting Internet platforms after Twitter fact-checked one of his tweets and issued a warning on another. The podcast will examine those latest developments in a future episode.

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June 1, 2020 Comments are Disabled Podcasts
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The Case Against the Bell Coalition’s Website Blocking Plan, Part 16: The CRTC as the Internet Content Regulatory Authority

In Canada, services that broadcast over the Internet don’t need a licence from the CRTC, as we exempted them from this obligation. We do not intervene on content on the Internet.

This statementwe do not intervene on content on the Internet – appears on the CRTC site at the very beginning of a page devoted to TV shows, movies, music and other content online. It may not be a regulatory statement, but it reflects how the CRTC sees itself and how it wants to be seen. Bell and other companies associated with the coalition have regularly tried to drag it into various forms of content regulation under the Telecommunications Act. Yet the Commission has rightly rejected those efforts, emphasizing that it does not licence or judge Internet content nor is it empowered by legislation to do so.

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March 7, 2018 2 comments News