Tag: EU

Copyright law 2014: the year in reviewCopyright law 2014: the year in review



As the creative industries continued to grow economically in importance in 2014, so have the stakes in copyright litigation. Increasingly, the courts have been challenged to resolve complex disputes arising from new uses of works and other subject matter brought about by innovations in technology. While content is often a core and indispensable element of new and innovative services, products or offerings, frequently parties dispute whether the use requires permission and payment to rights holders or can be engaged in without permission or payment.…

Copyright law 2012: the year in review in Canada and around the worldCopyright law 2012: the year in review in Canada and around the world



Yesterday, I gave a talk at the Law Society of Upper Canada’s 17h Annual Intellectual Property Law: The Year in Review program. My talk canvassed developments in copyright in Canada and around the world in 2012. My slides are shown below. The associated paper prepared in collaboration with Glen Bloom, with the help of others, is available here.

The following copyright cases from Canada, the USA, UK and Ireland, Australia, and  Europe are dealt with in the paper and slides.…

Most popular intellectual property and technology law blogsMost popular intellectual property and technology law blogs



One of the best ways to stay on top of IP/Tech legal developments is by subscribing to blogs. In the IP/Tech field, there are many very good ones to choose from. Justia’s BlawgSearch lists and ranks many of them. I subscribe to over 90. Over the holidays, and with the help of McCarthy Tetrault articling student Addison Cameron-Huff, I ranked them by popularity.

There is no perfect tool for conducting this type of evaluation. I relied on RSS subscriber counts using the RSS subscriber base of Google Reader, iGoogle and Google Desktop as a proxy.…

EU Commission proposes comprehensive reform of data protection rulesEU Commission proposes comprehensive reform of data protection rules



Yesterday, the European Commission proposed a comprehensive reform of the EU’s 1995 data protection rules to strengthen online privacy rights and boost Europe’s digital economy. Highlights of the reform plan are described by the Commission as follows:

  • A single set of rules on data protection, valid across the EU. Unnecessary administrative requirements, such as notification requirements for companies, will be removed. This will save businesses around €2.3 billion a year.
  • Instead of the current obligation of all companies to notify all data protection activities to data protection supervisors – a requirement that has led to unnecessary paperwork and costs businesses €130 million per year, the Regulation provides for increased responsibility and accountability for those processing personal data.

DNS blocking and filtering in the EUDNS blocking and filtering in the EU



Crowell & Moring LLP, a law firm with offices in the US, Brussels and the UK released a white paper that describes the legal mechanisms available to copyright holders in the EU to prevent ISP systems from being used for online file sharing. Published by the US based Copyright Alliance, the paper provides a summary of  European laws which have been used to grant injunctive relief to prevent online file sharing including injunctions requiring ISPs to implement DNS blocking. The paper also summarizes the recent ECJ Scarlet case which dealt with the power of EU courts to grant orders requiring ISPs to filter peer to peer traffic over their networks.…