Archive for September, 2010

From Rhetoric to Reality: The Key Issues in Bill C-32

This week the Hill Times ran my op-ed (HT version, homepage version) on the key issues in Bill C-32.  The column, based on a post from last week, focuses on digital locks, fair dealing, ISP liability, statutory damages, and the private copying levy. It is posted below.

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September 29, 2010 22 comments Columns

CMEC Seeks Leave to Appeal Fair Dealing Decision

The Council of Ministers of Education, Canada has announced that is seeking leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada this summer’s Federal Court of Appeal decision involving fair dealing in education.  I discussed the decision here.

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September 29, 2010 1 comment News

Spam Bill Debated in House of Commons

Members of Parliament spent over two hours yesterday debating Bill C-28, the anti-spam bill.  A full transcript of the discussion is available here.

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September 28, 2010 Comments are Disabled News

U.S. Uses Domain Names As New Way to Regulate the Net

Governments have long sought ways to regulate Internet activity, whether for the purposes of taxation, content regulation, or the application of national laws.  Effective regulatory measures have often proven elusive, however, since, unlike the Internet, national laws typically end at the border. Earlier this month, the United States began to move aggressively toward a new way of confronting the Internet’s jurisdictional limitations – the domain name system.

Domain names are widely used to ensure that email is delivered to the right inbox or to allow users to access a particular website.  The system includes a large database that matches the domain name (e.g. michaelgeist.ca) to a specific IP address (i.e. the location of the computer server).  The system is used billions of times every day to route Internet traffic to its intended destination. 

As every Internet user knows, inadvertently entering the wrong email or web address typically means that the email bounces back or takes the user to an unexpected destination. As my weekly technology law column notes (Toronto Star version, homepage version), legislators have now begun to consider the possibility of intentionally stopping access to certain sites by ordering Internet providers to block access to their domain names.

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September 28, 2010 33 comments Columns

Canadian Digital Music Sales Growing Faster Than U.S. in 2010

Nielsen Soundscan reports that Canadian digital music sales grew outpaced the U.S. during the first six months of 2010.  This continues a longstanding trend as Canadian sales have grown faster than the U.S. each year since 2006.

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September 28, 2010 2 comments News