The Hill Times has a good article on Canadian lobbying over the proposed WIPO Broadcast Treaty.
Fair Dealing by Giulia Forsythe (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0) https://flic.kr/p/dRkXwP
Copyright
NY Times on Monetizing P2P
The New York Times looks at firms trying to develop ad-based P2P models, with news that Nettwerk is seeding songs with ads in P2P networks.
Australian Court Issues Fair Dealing Ruling
Interesting report this morning from Australia where a court has ruled that showing two minute clips of rugby highlights within a news report qualifies as fair dealing.
Telus Claims Unlocking Cell Phones Constitutes Copyright Infringement
Several readers have pointed to a new CBC article on locked cellphones that includes the following comment from a Telus executive:
"In our world, we don't honour unlocked handsets," said Chris Langdon, Telus vice-president of Network Services. "Unlocking a cellphone is copyright infringement. When you buy a handset from a carrier, it has programming on the phone. It's a copyright of the manufacturer."
The issue of locked vs. unlocked cellphones is an important one, particularly in light of the recent introduction of wireless number portability (which theoretically facilitates consumer movement between providers) and the possible introduction of anti-circumvention legislation that could indeed render unlocking a cellphone a matter of copyright infringement. At the moment, I think the Telus position is simply wrong. Leaving aside the fact that many cellphones are available unlocked (or unlocked by the carrier after the initial contract expires), I am not aware of anyone who has argued that conventional copyright law would prohibit unlocking a cellphone and Canada does not [yet] have anti-circumvention legislation.
In the U.S. there was concern that unlocking a cellphone would violate the DMCA by constituting a circumvention of technological protection measure.
Canadian DMCA To Be Introduced This Spring
The Hill Times reports this week (issue still not online) that the Conservative government will introduce copyright reform legislation this spring provided that there is no election. The paper points to two main changes from the Liberals Bill C-60 – tougher anti-circumvention legislation (ie. DMCA-style laws that ban devices that can be used to circumvent as well as provisions that block all circumvention subject to the odd exception) and an educational exception that will provide for free access to web-based materials.
If this report is true, the bill will be remarkable in its ability generate more opposition than any prior copyright bill in Canadian history. From a policy perspective, it is a disaster – dangerous and unnecessary laws to support DRM and an educational exception that does little to address the needs of the education community while encouraging even greater use of DRM.
From a political perspective, it is even worse. Who will oppose the bill? For starters:
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