Canadian science fiction writer, journalist, and blogger Cory Doctorow has published a new book on Copyright and Digital Rights Management (DRM) reform Information Doesn't Want to Be Free. The book approaches these subjects from a content creator's perspective, and is a succinct and thoughtful piece that explores the challenges of Copyright and the use of Digital Rights […]
In my previous post, I detailed how a single digital spin of a song can trigger multiple webcasting tariffs. I also mentioned that royalties are not always paid wholly and directly to a single “creator” of music, but rather distributed on a percentage basis, depending on the various roles in the creation of the musical recording. […]
Giuseppina D’Agostino is the Founder and Director of IP Osgoode, the IP Intensive Program, and the IP Osgoode Innovation Clinic, the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of the IPilogue, the Deputy Editor of the Intellectual Property Journal, and an Associate Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School. 2014 was another exciting year in intellectual property (IP) law. […]
It’s hardly surprising that politicians and members of the press often find themselves at odds with one another, as the two have a long history of conflicting priorities and mandates. Yet the two entities occupy complementary and at times oppositional roles in serving the public good. The recent debate surrounding leaked information about possible copyright […]
On October 23rd and 24th, inventors, law students, lawyers, patent agents, patent portfolio managers, policy analysts, Canadian Intellectual Property Office’s (CIPO) patent examiners and other stakeholders of the patent system convened at Osgoode for the IP Hackathon. Inspired by similar events at Stanford, Professor Giuseppina D’Agostino, the Founder and Director of IP Osgoode, decided to […]
Under the Patent Act, an invention must be useful to be patentable. While in Canada the inventor does not need to describe the utility of the invention in the patent, where the patent makes a promise of utility, utility is measured against that promise. If the inventor does not make an explicit promise of a […]
This past spring, the Copyright Board of Canada issued its decision certifying Re:Sound’s Tariff 8 and setting the royalties collected for webcasting in Canada. Many parties of interest were incensed by the proposed rates, which are difficult to understand without the context of the entire royalty system in Canada.
With the rising popularity of video and computer games, a new form of user generated content ("UGC") and a whole new set of intellectual property issues is emerging. Science fiction web series such as Red vs. Blue use copyrighted graphics and characters from the popular Xbox video game Halo to create new comedic content parodying first person shooter […]
On September 4, the Supreme Court of Canada granted leave to appeal from the Federal Court of Appeal in CBC v SODRAC 2003 Inc which considered the issue of whether broadcasters must pay royalties on ephemeral or incidental copies of an audiovisual work created during the preparation of that work for broadcast. The case arose out […]
The culture industries appear to be at a crossroads. Shifting advertising practices as well as audience viewing and consumption habits continue to contribute to new challenges and opportunities for media and entertainment providers throughout the world. With its new “A Space for All of Us” strategy, Canada’s national public broadcaster – the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation/Radio-Canada […]