The Globe’s Derek DeCloet has a terrific piece on the fat profit margins for Canadian cable giants – bigger than those in the U.S. due to massive price increases and no foreign competition.
Archive for March, 2011
The UBB Deception
Francois Caron has produced The UBB Deception, which does a nice job of explaining UBB and some of the reasons behind it.
CRTC Makes It Easier To Switch Providers
The CRTC announced new rules on Friday that should make it easier for consumers to switch providers. The new rules allow consumers to switch TV, home telephone, wireless or Internet services in a single call and require providers to comply with 2.5 hours.
Same As It Ever Was: Canada’s New Open Data Portal and Restrictive Licence Terms
That too is good news, but I think it is important to identify the source of the licensing language and the larger issue at play. First, the licensing terms, including the disrepute provision, have been used by the government for several years. The licence terms at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, which has offered open data for several years, features the same language on a webpage that was last modified in 2008. In fact, the GeoConnections program, which disseminates geographic data, published a 184 page best practices guide in 2008 (and that was version 2) that discusses licensing terms in great detail and includes several samples. In each case, the licence includes the disrepute provision. While it may be true that few people ever read the licence – Transport Canada published the new GC Open Data Portal licence weeks before yesterday’s launch and no one seemed to notice – the terms are important both because they can be used to later restrict activities and because they reflect the government’s view of the rights of Canadians to their data.
The government may revise the licence by removing the disrepute term, but I think a larger issue will remain.
EU Report Says CETA IP Provisions Would Increase Consumer Prices, Royalty Deficit
Most scientific studies “fail to find evidence of a strong positive response by domestic innovators that could be reasonably ascribed to the effect of stronger IPR.†To clarify, it is undisputable that R&D spending is associated with higher GDP growth and, given current business models, a certain level of IPR protection is essential for investment in innovation and creativity. Incremental IPR reforms in OECD countries, however, do not seem to increase domestic spending in R&D. Some stakeholders interviewed for this study and several academics consider that excessive IPR could actually harm economic growth, even in OECD countries, if their holders can block followâ€on research.
As for the costs of the CETA IP provisions, the report notes that more dollars will flow to Europe, but Canadian IP holders would not see increased revenue flow back. In fact, it is Canadian consumers that will pay the price with “inflationary pressure” on consumer prices:
Recent Posts
Debating the Online Harms Act: Insights from Two Recent Panels on Bill C-63 
The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 199: Boris Bytensky on the Criminal Code Reforms in the Online Harms Act 
AI Spending is Not an AI Strategy: Why the Government’s Artificial Intelligence Plan Avoids the Hard Governance Questions 
The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 198: Richard Moon on the Return of the Section 13 Hate Speech Provision in the Online Harms Act 
Tweets Are Not Enough: Why Combatting Relentless Antisemitism in Canada Requires Real Leadership and Action
