Earlier this year, the Ontario government made a big commitment to open textbooks, investing millions of dollars to create new open texts in fields such as history, finance, politics, the environment, engineering, and the sciences. The resulting open textbook library at ECampusOntario now features hundreds of texts that are free to use for everyone. The Ontario initiative follows leadership in the OER field from BC Campus and its open textbook project. The BC effort has saved students millions of dollars with adoptions by dozens of institutions putting them into use in hundreds of faculties for over 1600 courses.
Post Tagged with: "open access"
Framing the Copyright Review: Bains and Joly Reference the Public Domain, Flexibility, Open Access and Limits of the Law
The government launched its copyright review earlier this week with a Parliamentary motion to send the review to the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology. I wrote a preview of some of the likely issues, noting the efforts of lobby groups to restrict fair dealing, extend the term of copyright, and target intermediary liability. Yet the letter from Ministers Navdeep Bains and Melanie Joly to committee chair Dan Ruimy, which should be posted online shortly, confirms that the government appreciates the competing perspectives on copyright and the limits of what the law can (or should) do.
Closed by Default: Why is Prime Minister Trudeau Using Restrictive Terms for Flickr Image Use?
Yesterday’s post on the Canada, the TPP and intellectual property raised a concern unrelated to the content of the piece. Since updating my site several years ago, I use a Creative Commons licensed or public domain image for virtually every post, celebrating the remarkable creativity of people and organizations from around the world who make their work freely available for anyone to use. In searching for an updated image on the TPP, I encountered a problem that has arisen with increased frequency. Several governments posted relevant images from the meetings in Vietnam and the Philippines, but the Canadian images featured restrictive terms and conditions in the form of an all-rights-reserved approach.
Canadian Copyright, OA, and OER: Why the Open Access Road Still Leads Back to Copyright
It is open access week and this year I had the honour of delivering the keynote address at a terrific open access event co-sponsored by the Ryerson University Library and Archives and the University of Toronto Libraries. My talk – which can be viewed in full here or from the embed below – starts with a review of the remarkable success of open access over the past 15 years, but quickly shifts toward the continuing connection between balanced copyright and open access.
Toward a Canadian Knowledge Transfer Strategy: My Appearance Before the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology
The House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology recently launched a study on intellectual property and tech transfer, which it hopes will feed into the government’s national IP strategy. I appeared before the committee yesterday, which provided an opportunity to provide a perspective that shifted away from encouraging greater university patenting and instead emphasized that the real goal should be knowledge transfer, not just tech transfer. I noted that knowledge transfer certainly incorporates tech transfer but it also includes research papers, data trials, educational materials, and highly qualified students and personnel. My opening remarks also highlighted potential strategic reforms including emphasizing open access, crafting an anti-IP abuse statute, and expanding fair dealing with additional categories or adopting fair use provisions. The ensuing discussion touched on a wide range of issues, including patent and copyright trolls. My opening remarks are posted below.