Archive for June 26th, 2009

Copyright Board Releases Educational Copyright Decision

The Copyright Board of Canada has released its long delayed decision on photocopying in primary and secondary schools.  There are two ways of looking at these decisions – the dollar amount of the tariff and the reasoning.  The dollar amount in this case is big – jumping from the current fee of $2.45 per full-time student (FTE) to $5.16 per FTE.  Note that this goes back to 2005 (although the back pay will be set at $4.64 per FTE), so this represents a huge additional cost to Canadian education and a major source of revenue for Access Copyright.  The Board goes through a detailed analysis of how it arrived at this figure, but at the end of the day, it feels like that it simply split the difference between the two sides.  Access Copyright was seeking $8.92, while the schools argued for $2.43 – that averages to $5.67 per FTE and the Board's award is just below that figure. Whether this is just coincidental or by-design, the current system encourages big requests which set a framework for "reasonableness" that can result in major increases in royalties. 

The core aspect of the reasoning is the Board's assessment of fair dealing.  

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June 26, 2009 5 comments News
Rogers Again Injects Web Pages With Its Own Content

Rogers Again Injects Web Pages With Its Own Content

Canadian Internet watchers may recall a controversy in late 2007 when Rogers began experimenting with adding its own content to webpages that its subscribers visit.  The company used the technology to alert customers about their data usage.  Google was one of the targets of the experiments and the company reacted […]

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June 26, 2009 32 comments News