Fair Dealing by Giulia Forsythe (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0) https://flic.kr/p/dRkXwP

Copyright

Access Copyright Urges Copyright Board to Ignore Supreme Court Ruling on Fair Dealing

Access Copyright has filed its response to the Copyright Board of Canada’s series of questions about fair dealing and education in the tariff proceedings involving Canadian post-secondary institutions. I have several posts planned about the 40 page response, which continues the copyright collective’s longstanding battle against fair dealing. This one focuses on Access Copyright’s astonishing effort to urge the Copyright Board to reject the Supreme Court of Canada’s clear ruling on the relevance of licensing within the context of fair dealing.

Access Copyright has frequently argued that the availability of a licence should trump fair dealing. For example, in the 2001 copyright consultation it stated:

As a rule, where collective licensing is in place there should be no exception or limitation to a right for which the holder has a legitimate interest. As defined in the Act, anytime that a licence to reproduce a work is available from a collective society within a reasonable time, for a reasonable price and with reasonable effort, it is commercially available.

Access Copyright reiterated its position in its 2003 intervention in the Law Society of Upper Canada v. CCH Canadian case. It argued:

April 16, 2014 — 4 comments — News

U.S. Calls Out Canadian Data Protection as a Trade Barrier

The U.S. Trade Representative issued its annual Foreign Trade Barrier Report on Monday. In addition to identifying the geographical indications provisions in the Canada – EU Trade Agreement, telecom foreign ownership rules, and Canadian content regulations as barriers, the USTR discussed regulations on cross-border data flows. I wrote about the […]

April 2, 2014 — 11 comments — News

Canadian Authors & Publishers: We Demand Education Talk To Us As Long As It Leads to New Payments

The Canadian Copyright Institute, an association of authors and publishers, has released a new paper that calls on the Canadian education community to stop relying on its current interpretation of fair dealing and instead negotiate a collective licence with Access Copyright. The paper was apparently published in the fall but is being released publicly now since Canadian education groups have refused to cave to Access Copyright’s demands.

The CCI document, which raises some of the same themes found in an Association of Canadian Publisher’s paper that distorts Canadian copyright law (thoroughly debunked by Howard Knopf), features at least three notable takeaways: the shift to threats of government lobbying, long overdue admissions that the value of the Access Copyright licence has declined, and emphasis on arguments that have been rejected by the courts and government. There are also three notable omissions: the fact that the overwhelming majority of copying in schools is conducted with publisher permission, the role of technological neutrality, and the relevance of other copyright exceptions. By the end of the document, the CCI and Access Copyright work to fabricate a new fair dealing test that is inconsistent with Supreme Court of Canada rulings as they call for dialogue so long as it leads to a new collective licence.

March 14, 2014 — 6 comments — News

Canada – South Korea Trade Agreement Demonstrates Deals Possible Without Increasing IP Protections

Canada and South Korea announced agreement on a comprehensive trade agreement earlier today. The focus is understandably on tariff issues, but the agreement also contains a full chapter on intellectual property (note that the governments have only released summaries of the agreement, not the full text, which is still being drafted). The IP chapter is significant for what it does not include. Unlike many other trade deals – particularly those involving the U.S., European Union, and Australia – the Canada-South Korea deal is content to leave domestic intellectual property rules largely untouched. The approach is to reaffirm the importance of intellectual property and ensure that both countries meet their international obligations, but not to use trade agreements as a backdoor mechanism to increase IP protections.

Yesterday I noted that Canada might be asked to increase the term of copyright protection given that South Korea had agreed to longer copyright terms in its recent agreements with the European Union, Australia, and the U.S. In fact, the U.S. agreement contains extensive additional side letters on Internet provider liability, enforcement, and online piracy. The Canada – South Korea deal rejects that approach with copyright, trademark, patent, and enforcement rules that are all consistent with current Canadian law (plus the coming border measures provisions in Bill C-8).

March 11, 2014 — 4 comments — News

Will the Canada – South Korea Trade Agreement Include Copyright Term Extension?

Prime Minister Stephen Harper is currently in South Korea reportedly to finalize agreement on the Canada – South Korea trade agreement. The proposed deal has been the subject of a decade of negotiation with opposition from the auto industry resulting in significant delays. While the focal point of the agreement […]

March 10, 2014 — 1 comment — News