Latest Posts

World Bank Says Digital Divide Is Closing

The World Bank says that the digital divide between rich and poor nations is closing fast. Last week it issued a draft report that found that telecommunications services to poor countries were growing at an explosive rate. s 

Read more ›

March 1, 2005 Comments are Disabled News

The Continuing Saga of Internet Jurisdiction

The Financial Times runs a story on the continuing saga of Internet jurisdiction with a particular focus on the Yahoo! France case, which the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals recently agreed to rehear. While the business community argues that the case could have a devastating effect on e-commerce, I'm quoted as saying that the world has moved on since the case was brought and most big companies now understand that they risk foreign judgments based on their web presence.

Read more ›

February 24, 2005 Comments are Disabled News

Copyright and Faith in the Free Market – Now in the Ottawa Citizen

The Ottawa Citizen features my column which focuses on the Canadian recording industry's rejection of alternative compensation systems on the grounds that it prefers to rely on the free market. The column notes that the industry has been a leading proponent of government involvement, consistently seeking both financial support and legislative intervention.

Read more ›

February 24, 2005 Comments are Disabled Columns

Lawful Access Back on The Canadian Agenda

The Toronto Star today reports what has been an open secret for a couple of months now — the Canadian government is moving forward with its lawful access agenda. For those new to the issue, lawful access would require network providers to establish new capabilities to allow for real-time network surveillance.

Read more ›

February 22, 2005 Comments are Disabled News

Copyright and Faith in the Free Market

My weekly Law Bytes column (Toronto Star version, HTML backup article, homepage version) in the Toronto Star focuses on the Canadian recording industry's rejection of alternative compensation systems on the grounds that it prefers to rely on the free market. The column notes that the industry has been a leading proponent of government involvement, consistently seeking both financial support and legislative intervention. It concludes that as Canada heads toward yet another round of copyright reform, policymakers and politicians should be mindful that they have already used legislative intervention to establish many rights and protections that have tilted the copyright balance heavily toward creators at the expense of users.

Read more ›

February 21, 2005 Comments are Disabled Columns