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Recent Posts
- Research in Motion’s Opportunity to Promulgate Freedom
- Bill C-32: The Latest Attempt to Amend the Copyright Act
- Interpreting the NHL and the disallowed Sedin goal
- The Speciation of Web Sites
- Library Manifesto
- Technology (law) is everywhere!
- How to save a drowning business
- Information is the Good, the Currency, and the Era
- Opening the Scope of Employee Contribution
- On Virtual Travel
- Who carries your Web 2.0 banner?
- Laws for the Virtual Universe
- The Value of Liberal Arts in a Recession
- Richard Stallman came to Vancouver, and I upset him
- Does WOM or Social Network Marketing Create Agency?
Recent Comments
- Jeremy Costin on Research in Motion’s Opportunity to Promulgate Freedom
- Alexander Finger on Research in Motion’s Opportunity to Promulgate Freedom
- Fran on Research in Motion’s Opportunity to Promulgate Freedom
- Jeremy Costin on RIAA and MPAA hijack the border (or someone like them)
- Matthew Anderson on RIAA and MPAA hijack the border (or someone like them)
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Tag Archives: copyright reform
Software IP and Games – which model applies?
At the moment, video games, because they are software, are covered by copyright. But traditionally, games were covered by patent. Hmm. I’ve argued before that software should be sui generis, governed by a hybrid model of patent and copyright: The … Continue reading
Alternatives to C-61, part II
Here’s the rest of that post: GOALS The goal of any legislation is to balance concerns of interested but competing parties, and to approach this balance, as much as possible, with a public interest bias. The concerns were these:
Alternatives to C-61: Statutory concerns for the protection and encouragement of creative works
I want to suggest an alternative paradigm to the statutory regime for creative works as intellectual property, a.k.a. copyright. I’m not going to get into detailed explanations of the existing Copyleft and other alternative paradigms to copyright. But I’m going … Continue reading
Posted in Information Technology, Intellectual Property
Tagged C-61, copyfight, copyleft, copyright, copyright reform, public domain, user rights
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Hedy Fry’s Copyright Balance
Honourable Member of Parliament Dr. Hedy Fry responded to Bill C-61 in a letter to constituent Chuck LeDuc Diaz, which he published on his blog. I respond to Dr. Fry’s letter. She is correct on certain critiques of the Bill, but misses a crucial point in her statement about balanced rights between creator and consumer. Continue reading
Posted in Intellectual Property, Privacy
Tagged C-61, Canadian DMCA, copyfight, copyright, copyright reform, DMCA, hedy fry
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The “Deliverance” of C-61 Begins
Costin’s Analysis of C-61 begins: This bill is not a brave surge forward into the 21st century for Canada, embracing the Information Age and showing the world that we lead in promoting innovation and civil liberties, that we have the wisdom to strike balance where others are stricken with fear, and that we anticipate rather than kowtow.
This bill is instead sycophantic obsequiousness to groups that should be politically and legally notwithstood according to any definition of Canadian sovereignty or democracy. Continue reading
Of Words, and Acts, and Ministers
However, this post is not about the new copyright act directly, nor is it about consumer rights or even election promises. Rather it is about the drastic impact that a single word (or the absence thereof) can make, and the difference between what is said and what is written. Or, in other words, it is example how apparently commendable goals are implemented in dysfunctional ways.
Last week, the Vancouver Sun reported on the effect that 2003 amendments to the B.C. Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act have had on medical research in this province. Continue reading
DMCA-Free Canada: a land of opportunity
Technological Protection Measures (TPMs) are the fortresses of code, silicon, and/or law that enforce Digital Rights Management (DRM). By not criminalizing (as a per se offense) the circumvention of TPMs, Canada keeps the doors open to innovation. Period. Innovation is … Continue reading
Copyfight: it’s about use
Why does the history matter? From Stationers to Sony, it’s about use. In this discussion about the Canadian Copyright Reform Bill, we are really discussing several legal ideas, which though often conflated are subtly different. History demonstrates this conflation through … Continue reading
Posted in Communications, Information Technology, Intellectual Property
Tagged copyfight, copyright reform, DMCA, DRM, reverse onus
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Copyfight: the roots of the conflict
Here’s the irony of the thing: Our copyright regime, in Canada, is rooted in Crown monopoly in the 16th century – a monopoly created by charter to ease the Crown’s ability to censor published materials and prevent sedition. Two things … Continue reading
Posted in Communications, Information Technology, Intellectual Property
Tagged Canadian DMCA, copyright reform, legal history
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