Post Tagged with: "warman"

CC0 Creative Commons https://pixabay.com/en/news-daily-new-information-1703959/

Fair Dealing Support for News Reporting and Public Debate: The Case of Warman and National Post v. Fournier

Having examined the importance of fair dealing for creators and freedom of expression, the fair dealing week posts continue with fair dealing and its support for news reporting and public debate. In recent months, some news organizations have taken aim at fair dealing, arguing that it is a detriment to […]

Read more ›

March 1, 2018 Comments are Disabled News

Warman v. Fournier Copyright Case Appealed

An appeal has been filed in the Warman v. Fournier, a notable federal court copyright case that addressed liability for linking and insubstantial copying. I wrote about the earlier decision here.

Read more ›

September 24, 2012 1 comment News

All the News That’s Fit to Post and Link: Federal Court Clears Up Legal Risks

Appeared in the Toronto Star as All the News That’s Fit to Post and Link: Federal Court Clears Up Legal Risks Free Dominion is a Canadian-based political news website where users regularly post articles or link to online content for the purposes of political debate. On January 10, 2008, an […]

Read more ›

July 3, 2012 Comments are Disabled Columns Archive

Cdn Fed Court Says No Copyright Infringement For Linking, Posting Several Paragraphs from Article

The Federal Court of Canada has issued an important decision involving copyright and posting content online. The case involves a lawsuit launched by Richard Warman and the National Post against Mark and Constance Fournier, who run the FreeDominion website. Warman and the National Post sued the site over the appearance of two articles and an inline link to photograph that appeared on the forum. The court dismissed all three claims.

While the first claim (Warman’s article) was dismissed on the basis that it took too long to file the lawsuit, the legal analysis on the National Post claim involving an article by Jonathan Kay assesses the copyright implications of posting several paragraphs from an article online. In this case, the article was 11 paragraphs long.  The reproduction on the Free Dominion site included the headline, three complete paragraphs and part of a fourth. The court ruled that this amount of copying did not constitute a “substantial part” of the work and therefore there was no infringement. The court added that in the alternative, the reproduction of the work was covered by fair dealing, concluding that a large and liberal interpretation of news reporting would include posts to the discussion forum.  The decision then includes an analysis of the six factor test and concludes that the use was fair.

Read more ›

June 25, 2012 16 comments News

Ontario Court Sets Standard For Disclosing Anonymous Posters

The Ontario Superior Court of Justice has issued its appellate decision on whether the owners of the Free Dominion website can be ordered to disclose the identities of several anonymous posters accused of defamation. The original order covered email and IP addresses.  On appeal, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association and CIPPIC intervened to argue that the court should take free speech and privacy rights into consideration when assessing whether an order is appropriate.

Relying heavily on the Sony BMG v. Doe case (the file sharing lawsuit that CRIA now denies exists), the court notes that it "illustrates that a court must have regard to the privacy interests of anonymous users of the Internet before granting a Norwich Phramacal order, even where the issue involved pertains to property rights and does not engage the interest of freedom of expression." 

Read more ›

May 4, 2010 5 comments News