By Dan Glover
Last week, a dispute arose about the scope of the “fair dealing for the purpose of … education” language proposed in Bill C-32, an Act to Amend the Copyright Act. This dispute was captured in a February 16 blog by John Degen, in which he discussed a running battle with the writer Cory Doctorow about what the Copyright Act currently allows in respect of fair dealing, and what it would allow under the proposed regime. Doctorow’s views are contained here in a responding blog.
Par Dan Glover,* 9 janvier 2011 (version originale en Anglais)
Résumé
Here is a copy of the slides I used today at the Law Society of Upper Canada’s Intellectual Property Year in Review conference. The associated paper prepared in collaboration with Glen Bloom, and with the help of others, is available here.
My slides summarize the following copyright cases from Canada, Australia, UK, Ireland, Singapore, Europe and the USA:
Canada
Alberta (Education) v Access Copyright 2010 FCA 198
Bell Canada v SOCAN (Tariff 22) 2010 FCA 220
Canadian Private Copying Collective v. J & E Media Inc., 2010 FC 102
Cheung v. Target Event Production Ltd., 2010 FCA 255
Posted in Copyright, Fair Dealing, Presentations, Reproduction, authorization, communication to the public, fair dealing for education, human rights, idea expression dichotomy
Tags: authorization barry sookman communication to the public Copyright fair dealing Fair Use idea expression dichotomy Reproduction
Abstract*
· The creation of copyright works for educational uses is a complex and substantial endeavour, particular in a country as large, diverse and sparsely populated as Canada. Careful thought should be given before adopting fair dealing rules that threaten the health of educational publishing.
· “Fairness” is an eye-of-the-beholder concept that must be revisited on the facts of every new case. Only six years after the landmark CCH case on “fair dealing”, this issue is returning to the Supreme Court for a second review!
Here are slides from the speech I gave earlier today at Osgoode Hall Law School’s professional development program on understanding Bill C-32. The speech focused on the proposed fair dealing exceptions including the new exception for education, exceptions for individuals including the UGC, format shifting, time shifting, and back-up copy exceptions, and the new exceptions for developing interoperable programs, encryption research, network security testing, and technological processes.
Last week there was lots of interesting debate in the House of Commons about Bill C-32 leading up to a vote at Second Reading to refer the Bill to a legislative committee for further study.
All of the political parties agreed that copyright reform is important. They concurred with the objectives behind the Bill including the goals of creating a legal climate in which creators can both safely invest in and get paid for their content and at the same time ensure access by users to their works. They recognized the need to modernize the Copyright Act to address the challenges of the 21st century.
Some anti-copyright critics compare the proposed copyright amendments in Bill C-32 with the copyright laws of the US to argue that Canadian copyright law with Bill C-32 passed would be more restrictive than in the US. International comparisons of copyright laws can be a very useful tool to gauge how Canadian laws stack up with international standards and norms. Regrettably, anti-copyright advocates often make their case by inaccurately and misleadingly describing US law to make it look more permissive than it is and by describing Bill C-32 in ways that makes it appear more restrictive than it is. This makes it difficult for the vast majority of the public to really assess Bill C-32 and to make properly informed judgements about it.
The Toronto Star published an editorial today on C-32. In it the Star expressed concern over the proposed inclusion of education as a new fair dealing allowable purpose exception. According to the Star:
Writers and publishers are worried that a broad interpretation of “education” could lead to rampant copying of textbooks, instructional manuals and even novels. Would a school board be allowed to buy just one copy of a new textbook and copy it for all its students? Would universities be allowed to copy bits and pieces of 20 different books to compile reading material on a certain subject for their students? Indeed, would a monthly book club be considered an “educational” activity and be allowed to copy novels on its reading list?
Posted in Copyright, Fair Dealing, Fair Use, c-32
SOCAN has filed a motion for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada in the Tariff 22 case. It is arguing that the Federal Court of Appeal erred in not reversing the Copyright Board which had held that offering an online preview can be a fair dealing. The Application Record in the leave motion is below.
SOCAN Application Record in Tariff 22 Case (PUBLIC)
Last week the Federal Court of Appeal released an important decision on the scope of the fair dealing exception in the judicial review in the SOCAN Tariff 22 case (2010 FCA 123). The issue before the Court was whether online music services have the benefit of the fair dealing exception in section 29 of the Copyright Act when they offer customers previews of music files of up to 30 seconds to help them select music to purchase. The Court, following the decision of the Copyright Board, ruled they do.
Posted in Copyright, Fair Dealing, Fair Use
Tags: barry sookman Copyright fair dealing Fair Use internet previews
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