This morning the Federal Court of Appeal issued its much-anticipated decision on music file sharing. The court upheld the lower court decision by denying CRIA's request for the identities of the 29 alleged file sharers. The reason for upholding the decision was straightforward – CRIA's evidence contained a wide variety of shortcomings and the appellate court was not about to issue a disclosure order in the face of bad evidence.
News
Culture Imports and Exports
Statistics Canada this morning released its annual report on Canada’s culture goods trade balance. This data covers cultural goods such as books, CDs, films, and art (royalty payments are included in the numbers).
CRTC Adopts Strong Regulatory Approach in VoIP Decision
The CRTC issued its much anticipated VoIP decision earlier today. Much to the chagrin of the major telcos, the Commission has adopted a strong regulatory approach. While it exempts P2P VoIP providers such as Skype, the traditional providers face a VoIP framework that looks a lot like the current local regulatory framework.
The Commission reasons that for consumers, local VoIP service looks a lot like (and is marketed like) traditional local phone service. Accordingly, the Commission has set a regulatory framework that addresses everything from reseller registration to phone directory listings to privacy protection.
Up to this point, I’d argue that Commission is on solid ground. Robust competition requires a level playing field and ensuring that all providers can offer equivalent services that consumers rely upon may require regulatory intervention of this kind.
Five Months
The Privacy Commissioner of Canada yesterday released the summary of her finding in my spam case launched against the Ottawa Renegades. My case is now Finding #297 and, true to form, the Renegades are now just an unnamed sports organization. While I am pleased with the outcome of the case […]
E-commerce and the Law
I’ve been quoted in several news articles this week that highlight interesting e-commerce legal issues
The Wall Street Journal assessed typo pricing on e-commerce sites and the extent to which sites are bound by the errors. I noted that many sites now include provisions that seek to protect them against obvious pricing errors.
Recent Posts
The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 200: Colin Bennett on the EU’s Surprising Adequacy Finding on Canadian Privacy Law 
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
