There are several media reports this morning (including an excellent piece in the Tyee) on the launch of Open Medicine, a new Canadian open access medical journal, conceived in the aftermath of the editorial firings at the Canadian Medical Association Journal.
Articles by: Michael Geist
Blame Canada, China Edition
What happens when you get a steady stream of unfounded claims from the U.S. government and U.S. lobby groups on the state of Canadian copyright law? What happens when Canadian lobby groups representing largely foreign interests try to convince Canadians that they are a "pirate nation"? What happens when the […]
Rogers and Net Neutrality
My weekly Law Bytes column (Toronto Star version, homepage version) focuses on the Rogers traffic shaping issue and the resulting impact on consumer rights, competition, and non-P2P applications. If you read my original posting and the many comments that followed, the column covers similar terrain. I therefore think it might be more useful to respond to an interesting posting from Matt Roberts on the Rogers issue. Roberts confirms the Rogers shaping (as does Mark Evans in a posting that refers to it as bandwidth management, a distinction without a difference in my view) but then takes me to task for wrapping it into the net neutrality debate.
The post raises an interesting and important question – is throttling/traffic shaping a net neutrality issue? I should note that regardless of the answer, I believe there is no question that there are problems with the current Rogers approach. The lack of transparency, the misleading service claims, and the inclusion of bandwidth caps that are rendered difficult to achieve all point to an issue that should attract the attention of regulatory agencies (and perhaps class action lawyers).
As for whether there is a net neutrality problem, that likely depends on your definition of net neutrality.
OECD on User Generated Content
The OECD has just issued an important and insightful report on user generated content and the policy issues it raises.
BBC To Make Million Hours of Archive Freely Available
The BBC has announced plans to make one million hours from its television and radio archive freely available to UK residents. Moreover, it will add scripts, supporting documentation, and letters related to the show in a classic illustration of what a public broadcaster should be doing in the public interest.
Recent Posts
The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 232: What Will Canadian Digital Policy Look Like Under the New Liberal Carney Government? 
The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 231: Sara Bannerman on How Canadian Political Parties Maximize Voter Data Collection and Minimize Privacy Safeguards 
The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 230: Aengus Bridgman on the 2025 Federal Election, Social Media Platforms, and Misinformation 
The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 229: My Digital Access Day Keynote – Assessing the Canadian Digital Policy Record 
Queen’s University Trustees Reject Divestment Efforts Emphasizing the Importance of Institutional Neutrality
