Aaron Dishy is a 3L JD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School. This article was written as a requirement for Prof. Pina D’Agostino’s IP Intensive Program.

In completion of Osgoode Hall’s Intellectual Property & Technology Law Intensive Program (), this semester I participated in a ten week placement with the of Patrimoine canadien - Canadian Heritage (). This short reflection will emphasize the value of this experiential opportunity and help anyone interested in an IP Intensive placement with PCH to get a sense of what to expect.

PCH: the whip-smart analysts supporting Canada's copyright framework

PCH is a federal department that supports cultural production in Canada. It has a diverse portfolio that considers subjects like arts markets in Canada, author and publisher rights, GLAM institutions, and the preservation of our official languages.

The Copyright Policy Branch is made up of legal and policy analysts responsible for ensuring that our copyright framework supports creativity, innovation, and access. To fulfill this mandate, the branch conducts dynamic research and consultation. They collaborate with government departments, artists, authors, equity-deserving groups as well as the public.

Beyond a new appreciation for acronyms, a placement with any PCH team is sure to provide you with a chance to view processes in action. This may be of great interest to those of you looking to practice law at the intersections of art, authorship, and technology.   

The IP Intensive: a critical resource for young IP professionals in Canada

The IP Intensive is different from other courses. It is a bilateral effort that involves our law school and government stakeholders interested in safeguarding IP innovation in Canada. The idea is simple. Law students are provided with educational opportunities in sectors that engage IP. Those students then increase access to IP legal expertise and amplify public awareness of IP issues.

In this way, the IP Intensive is a rare opportunity. Students are entrusted with the valuable knowledge and networks required to succeed, but also provided with an opportunity to apply those developing legal skills. It is a meaningful academic capstone for any student pursuing IP law in Canada.

Key Recommendation: Bring Your Whole Self to the Job

The key recommendation I have for a student entering a legal internship at PCH is that you bring your whole self to the position. Departments like PCH make space for individual perspectives and research interests. If those interests include the realities of a specific arts market or equity-deserving group, do not hesitate to share your valuable insights.

In my case, I found PCH very accommodating, in allowing me to incorporate my past professional experience as an archivist within some of the legal research I pursued.

It led me to develop (what I believe is) a specialized legal response to the question at hand.

Conclusion

Osgoode Hall’s IP Intensive is an invaluable summative experience for law students interested in IP in Canada. Its focus on experiential learning is complimented by enriching placements at departments like PCH.

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Aaron Dishy is an IPilogue Writer and a 3L JD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School.

Web resources survive only if a third party preserves them, and not all third parties initiate the preservation of web-based content. A website owner may abandon one hosting platform for another, or an author might remove content on their own accord. As content changes or is removed, hypertext links that direct a user to a resource are disrupted. In each case, hypertext vulnerability threatens the integrity of resulting scholarship, as footnotes may no longer support the claims they purport to.

This phenomenon is known as link rot or reference rot. Link rot occurs when URL hypertext fails to direct an individual to a targeted file, webpage, or server, due to that resource being relocated or unavailable. Colloquially, these links are broken or dead. occurs when a hypertext link remains active, but the information referenced by the citation is no longer present or has been modified. There are limited surveys on the nature of link rot in Canada. However, of Electronic Thesis Dissertations deposited between 2011-2015 at Concordia University, determined that nearly a quarter of hypertext links cited exhibited linkrot.

, developed by the , is the largest caching solution to link rot used by authors and journal editors to integrate the preservation of cited material with the act of citation. Although used primarily by American institutions, the tool has also been adopted by some Canadian universities. When a user creates a Perma.cc link, Perma.cc archives the referenced content and generates a link to an archived record of the page. Notwithstanding changes to an original source, the archived record is always available through the Perma.cc link.

However, Canadian institutions might be wary of the adoption of Perma.cc for two reasons. First, Canadian “data sovereignty” — Canada’s right to control the access and disclosure of its digital information subject only to Canadian laws — is at increased risk if the preservation of our academic output is subject uniformly to American intellectual property law. Similarly, Canadian citations and reference information could be shared with foreign governments, potentially without fair notice.

Second, federal, and provincial governments have gone to lengths to promote Canadian “.” Data residency aims to ensure that valuable information is stored within and accessed from inside of Canada. This protects information by making reasonable and localized security arrangements to prevent unauthorized access, collection, use, disclosure, or disposal. Additionally, it also better allows for data to be kept under the laws and policies of any province or territory.

It must be acknowledged that several attempts have been made to address link rot in Canada. For example, programs like provided an on-demand archive site, designed to digitally preserve scientific and educationally important materials. However, such endeavors , institutional backing, and effective monetary resources to sustain themselves long-term. For Canadians to better preserve academic output, the creation of a Perma.ca may be our best bet.

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Aaron Dishy is an IPilogue Writer and a 3L JD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School.

Pope Francis’ “” followed the spiritual leader during a week-long trip across Canada. He apologized on behalf of the Roman Catholic Church (the “Church”) for abuse that Indigenous children and communities endured (and ) at church-run residential schools. The tour, and the it garnered, confronted Indigenous and Settler Canadians with the ongoing relevance of that Church in informing the lived experiences of Indigenous Peoples in Canada.

Legal professionals acting on behalf of residential school survivors and their communities may require awareness of the primary sources that drive Church action. Those documents are collected, digitized, and (on some occasions) made accessible by the (“VAL”) and its affiliated . Their digital collections encompass millions of manuscripts, printed materials, incunabula, visual materials, and photographs. Although only a small fraction of those records are publicly available - with many records considered - the capacity to navigate those resources may be valuable for legal context and understanding for afflicted individuals and communities. 

In-house digitization began at VAL with the launch of the in 2010. This project looks to digitize VAL’s entire manuscript collection, as well as 80,000 Church codices within 40 million scanned records. Those records are archived for long-term preservation using the and for metadata preservation. VAL’s digitized manuscripts are then organized by fond - archival-speak for a subcollection. Some fonds, such as the “”, are brought from collections by smaller libraries and archives within the overall Papal organization. Others, such as “” are donated by persons external to VAL.

Apart from the digital records made available on , databases outside of the Church also play an important role in navigating VAL’s records. For example, thousands of Latin manuscripts are digitized and made accessible online only through of the Heidelberg University. Similarly, the based in Frankfurt, Germany, provides comprehensive information about Vatican records that concern Roman and Feudal law. Further, founded by the late Jean-Baptiste Piggin and scholar Aaron Marks, tracks the manuscripts that are added to VAL’s digital collections each week.

Each archival effort helps to develop an increasingly comprehensive account of the documentary heritage of the Church and its detrimental impact on diverse spiritual communities. Legal professionals would be wise to harness these resources when helping individuals and communities understand their own history with the Church.

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Aaron Dishy is an IPilogue Writer and a 3L JD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School.

The proposed Artificial Intelligence and Data Act (AIDA) would introduce greater regulation of the use and development of artificial intelligence (AI) in Canada’s private sector. On June 15^th, 2022, the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, François-Phillippe Champagne introduced Bill C-27, or the . Bill C-27 reiterates much of , tabled in 2020, reintroducing a modified Consumer Privacy Protection Act (CPPA) and Personal Information and Data Protection Tribunal Act (PIDPTA). However, Bill C-27 also introduced newly proposed legislation like AIDA which, if enacted, would make long advocated-for changes to Canada’s AI regulatory landscape.

AIDA would create new assessment and risk-mitigation tools for the use and transparency of high-impact AI systems. It would establish persons responsible for monitoring AI systems, such as the Artificial Intelligence and Data Commissioner — their role is to assist the Minister in the administration and enforcement of AIDA. Monetary penalties for the AIDA contraventions are also set out to enforce trust and deter the reckless and fraudulent uses of AI. In this way, Bill C-27 and AIDA would direct Canada towards harmonization with international regulatory frameworks, like that of the .

With that being said, AIDA would be more limited in scope when compared to its EU counterpart. For example, unlike EU legislation, AIDA would not apply to both public and private sectors, and all federal government institutions would be exempt.^[1] Further, EU legislation sets out specific prohibited AI practices, alongside criteria for determining the degree of risk presented by any AI system. AIDA establishes no specific prohibited AI practices and distinguishes only between high-risk AI and all other systems; complex and salient matters are left to incoming regulation.

Beyond its limited scope, AIDA may be uncertain in its delineation of provincial and federal responsibilities. For example, AIDA’s consideration of “regulated activity,” would capture many elements of AI development and use, including “designing, developing or making available for use an artificial intelligence system or managing its operations.”^[2] This language indicates the legislation is pursuant to Parliament's trade and commerce power under section of the Constitution Act, 1867. However, the federal government may also intend provinces to legislate on intraprovincial uses of AI, notwithstanding the rarity of circumstances under which such AI systems would be developed.

Lastly, attention is required of the breadth of persons AIDA considers “responsible” for an AI system in the course of trade.^[3] It holds designers, developers and managers of AI systems subject to AIDA’s administrative and operational requirements. If those parties are expected to monitor or conduct audits of consumer deployment of AI systems, assessments must be made of risk potentials and mitigation from both perspectives. Additional regulation may be required in the full consideration of such perspectives.  

AIDA remains proposed legislation and may be modified prior to implementation. However, it represents a much larger move by international legal bodies to regulate the development and use of AI. Businesses must be prepared for greater AI regulation in Canada. Thankfully, informative and responsive policy for the consideration of AI systems is also being developed, such as a by the Law Commission of Ontario. If correctly applied, AIDA should empower more Canadians to engage with trustworthy and transparent AI systems.

^[1] This may be extended to exclude provincial departments or agencies by regulation as set out in s.3 of AIDA.

^[2] See s.5(1) of AIDA.

^[3] Ibid at s.5(2).

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Aaron Dishy is an IPilogue Writer and a 3L JD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School.

Identification with LGBTQ2IA+ communities is a social determinant for broad health inequities. These inequities can limited access to health care services and a corresponding lack of access to relevant health information. The Government of Ontario recognizes the collection and use of data from minority populations as a critical step in improving social, economic, political, and financial inequities. But this recognition raises questions about the scope and standards to be applied to the province’s legal obligation to collect data about the health of LGBTQ2IA+ communities.

There are many for the lack of LGBTQ2IA+ health information in Ontario. Community size, problematic surveys, concealment, and stigma all prevent the accurate representation of LGBTQ2IA+ communities and their needs. Sexual orientation and gender identity are also complex topics that are challenging to account for in survey and census style information collection. For example, other dimensions of sexual orientation, such as sexual behaviour and sexual attraction, are often unaddressed in the literature. Surveys also rarely allow for intersectional analyses by collecting data about the health of Indigenous or racialized gender and sexual minorities. Canadian scholars continuously for improved population-based surveys to include direct questions on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Even with the gaps in information, statues and case law extensively detail the government’s obligations to collect and provide equitable public health information to diverse subject communities. For example, the defines personal health information to include “information [that]... relates to the physical or mental health of the individual.” This Act seeks to provide individuals with a right of access to personal health information about themselves, subject to limited and specific exceptions. The requires government actors to ensure “health promotion, health protection and disease and injury prevention, including the prevention and control of cardiovascular disease, cancer, AIDS and other diseases.” It similarly requires the release of personal health information by the Chief Medical Officer of Health if there is “ to the health of persons anywhere in Ontario.”

Recent case law in Ontario courts affirms an ongoing commitment to the collection and availability of information as it relates to LGBTQ2IA+ communities in Canada. In , access to records of “personal health information” about individuals and their communities is considered a requirement to ensure self-determination and autonomy in healthcare decisions. The decisions in and affirmed a broad scope of the government’s obligation , permitting provincial actors to collect personal health information from medical and information institutions in their capacity as prescribed entities under the .

Despite the need for improvements, the government is still taking some action to collect and make accessible health information as it relates to LGBTQ2IA+ communities. Surveys the Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS), Census of Canada and National Household Survey, and the Public Service Employee Survey collect and make accessible a growing body of public health information which details sexual orientation and gender identity. However, the evidence demonstrating a lack of information about the health of LGBTQ2IA+ communities and an affirmed legal obligation to make such information publicly and equitably available suggests a legal argument that more should be done.

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