My experience confirmed all the positive aspects of experiential learning. At The Globe I was lucky to be assigned a large project that bisected their entire business. It was a wonderful opportunity to peek behind the curtain and see how various departments work to make a newspaper. It also provided valuable insight into how a business works and the role of a lawyer within an organization.

One of the most interesting parts of my placement was talking to people throughout the building. I spent time contacting different departments to gather information and then processing it from a legal perspective. People from IT, advertising and finance think about legal issues differently than lawyers. Negotiating these differences (often through research and many, many questions) was the area where I feel I learned the most.

It was interesting to see how the law underpinned what went on but was rarely at the forefront of people’s daily activities (the legal department excepted). This repositioning of the law in relation to what went on contrasted with school significantly. Instead of spending each day trying to swallow legal disciplines whole and reconcile unsolvable legal dilemmas, the facts and issues were generally tangible. Instead of theoretical contracts, the contracts were real and reading them was often interesting.

It was a relief, once presented with questions particular to The Globe’s business, to find that my legal education so far has equipped me with the foundation and context sufficient to respond. ��After three months I definitely feel that the gap between what I have learned in school and what lawyers do in practice has shrunk.

Exposure to the practice of an in-house lawyer was also quite interesting. ��Having to make decisions while considering the law and the business at all times is a developed skill and requires detailed knowledge of both.

Everyone I met was lovely, helpful and took the time to explain things to me and seemed invested in ensuring I had a rich educational experience, which I certainly did.

Kalen Lumsden is a JD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School and was enrolled in Osgoode’s��. ��As part of the program requirements, students were asked to write a reflective blog on their internship experience.

The post In-House at The Globe and Mail: A Semester in Osgoode’s IP Intensive Program appeared first on IPOsgoode.

In late September the Supreme Court of Canada released AB v Bragg Communications Inc,, rev’d , rev’d in which a teenager sought to unmask her cyberbullies in order to pursue a defamation action, while preserving her own anonymity. At issue was the appropriate balance between the freedom of the press and open court principles on the one hand, and privacy and protecting children from cyberbullying on the other. This case is a good overview of what legal recourses are currently available to victims of online bullying and outline some of the difficulties they face in pursuing them.

In 2010, at age 15, A.B. discovered someone had created a fake Facebook profile of her, with a modified version of her name, a picture of her and other identifying details. On the profile were disparaging comments on her physical appearance as well as intimate and sexually explicit remarks. Within the month, the profile was taken down (interestingly, none of the judgments explain how this was done).

A.B., along with C.D., her father as litigation guardian, brought an application under Nova Scotia’s Civil Procedure Rules, NS Reg 370/2008 for an order for the internet service provider Eastlink to disclose the identity associated with the IP address which had created the fake profile in order to bring an action for defamation. Facebook had already supplied the IP address that created the profile and A.B. now sought to link it to an individual. This type of discovery mechanism is similar to the common law order outlined in Norwich Pharmacal Co v Comrs of Customs and Excise, [1974] AC 133 (HL) (discussed by IP Osgoode and ). For the order to be granted, the plaintiff must establish a prima facie defamation case.

In addition to the disclosure order, A.B. also requested a publication ban on the contents of the profile and her name. Eastlink, which is owned by Bragg Communications, did not oppose the motion at any level of trial. However, the publication ban caught the attention of The Halifax Herald and Global Television who intervened in opposition of the publication ban on the basis of the open court principle and freedom of expression. The trial judge found that A.B. had established a prima facie defamation case but he stayed the disclosure order until A.B. used her real name or an appeal allowed her to proceed anonymously. He reasoned that a publication ban would limit public awareness about the bullying that occurs on social networks and only an informed public can demand an issue be addressed. Furthermore, A.B. did not show that she would be specifically harmed by publication, especially since the profile had since been taken down [31-37]. The Court of Appeal agreed and focused on how defamation is an action for damage to the plaintiff’s reputation and the public nature of the action is part of how a reputation is restored and anonymity would be incompatible with this process [80-85].

Justice Abella, writing for a unanimous Supreme Court, found that when balancing between the open court principle and the privacy rights of A.B., harms to children can be determined objectively in the context of sexualized cyberbullying. This overturned the previous rulings which required that A.B. discharge the onus to demonstrate she would be specifically harmed by publication. The court had no trouble inferring that cyberbullying is harmful [20]. In doing so, the court lowered the burden of a plaintiff trying to unmask a bully. Having found that preserving A.B.’s anonymity was minimally intrusive upon freedom of expression, the Supreme Court did not find it necessary to keep the contents of the Facebook profile from publication provided it was not linked to A.B.

On balance, the court focused on the special circumstances of children who are bullied anonymously online and made it slightly easier for them to unmask their tormentors without fear of having to relive the bullying through the media coverage linked to their name. The court rightly focused on how the ability to proceed anonymously would increase the likelihood of a child protecting him or herself using the court system [25].

Even though the court lightened the burden of a young plaintiff seeking redress against cyberbullying, this case highlights the limits of the law.�� To respond to a Facebook profile created in minutes, the victim has no recourse to unmask their tormentor faster than the court system, which gets there, but not quickly—in this case about two and a half years.

Kalen Lumsden��is a JD candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School and is currently enrolled in Osgoode’s Intellectual Property Law and Technology Intensive Program.�� As part of the program requirements, students are asked to write a blog on a topic of their choice.

The post Bullying and Balancing Rights in AB v Bragg Communications appeared first on IPOsgoode.

Robert Levine

Robert Levine is a technology and pop culture journalist working out of New 91��ɫ and Berlin. He was an executive editor running the music business trade magazine at Billboard and has been published in Vanity Fair, Fortune, Rolling Stone and The New 91��ɫ Times. He discussed the current state of copyright and his recent book: .

He began his talk by taking the audience back in time, to 1999, when we still had VCRs, Napster first appeared and the internet was shiny, new and full of promise. He talked about the potential for a new market to emerge online, where revenue from intellectual property would offset the decline in manufacturing. Instead, what happened to the music industry was that, because of piracy, a legitimate market never emerged and even now, as paid music online begins to grow, prices have been permanently lowered.

Levine’s general thesis was that the main players in the copyright debate are not the dumb, old, greedy music studios and publishers against the smart, new, generous technology companies. Instead, it is simply a competition between different commercial actors who have the same business model – making money. Technology companies, such as Google, have a vested interest in making things free because it sells ads. Other companies have an interest in charging consumers for access to new works. Essentially, both sides are greedy.

As an author of copyright works, Levine discussed his own experience with his publisher. He noted that while he only receives a minority of the cost of each book sold, the additional revenue from book sales he has assigned to his publisher is used to aggregate risk from unsuccessful books, as opposed to the oft-noted stereotype that publishers exploit authors. When an audience member asked a question from a user’s perspective related to the inconvenience caused by the intentionally staggered commercial availability of works compared to the relative convenience of piracy, Levine underscored the commercial nature of copyright. He pointed out that unlike patents, copyright is never a matter of life or death, and, while living in Berlin he did not yet have access to HBO’s Game of Thrones, his ability to conveniently access the show is not a right.

Some of Levine’s most interesting analysis was the critical perspective he brought to the copyright debate itself. He contrasted the political right and left and, surprisingly, he observes that it is the left taking the libertarian, anti-regulatory position by arguing for a free and open internet. Yet, it is ironic that in the context of labour rights, the left is appalled by the lack of regulation and low wages of Walmart workers, as an example, but sees authors not being compensated as a problem that does not require government regulation.

Levine thinks that the term of copyright could stand to be shorter than the 70 year term in the US. He would prefer more effective copyright enforcement combined with a shorter copyright term. Specifically, he would like recourses against those distributing protected content, not those downloading protected content. This would, for instance, allow recourse against the the unauthorized distribution of his own book on foreign websites before the book even has a chance to become publicly available.

Dr. Brett Danaher

Dr. Brett Danaher is an Assistant Professor of Economics at Wellesley College. He researches the effects of new technologies and their impact on industries and government policy. He presented his paper, “,” which was coauthored with Michael D. Smith, Rahul Telang and Siwen Chen.

While many studies demonstrate piracy’s negative effect on music sales, Dr. Danaher and his coauthors aimed to provide a complementary study “evaluating the effectiveness of anti-piracy government intervention in France”.

In 2009, France passed the “anti-piracy” law known as Hadopi. It is a graduated response system, colloquially known as “three strikes”, whereby rights holders monitor the internet for infringement and report it to the Hadopi agency. Based on the information received, which is verified and then referenced through the relevant ISP, a warning email is triggered. If further infringement is alleged within six months, a letter is sent. If infringement is alleged a third time, Hadopi is entitled to refer the matter to the criminal court. Potential penalties range from a fine of up to 1000 euros, to the infringing household’s internet being suspended for one month to one year. This measure was not without controversy (discussed by IP Osgoode and ). For Dr. Danaher, the implementation of the Hadopi scheme provided an opportunity to measure change in consumer purchasing behaviour in response to the law.

The methodology of the study was to track the iTunes sales of four major music labels across multiple countries from July 2008 to May 2011.�� An average of iTunes sales from Italy, Spain, the UK, Germany and Belgium served as the control group to France. All had similar pre-Hadopi sales figures.�� To measure the effect of the Hadopi discussion they used Google Trends data on Hadopi-related inquiries.

The post IP Osgoode Speaker Series: Robert Levine and Dr. Brett Danaher appeared first on IPOsgoode.

Facts

Per Wimmer, the defendant and cross-claimant and one of the skydivers, claimed that he was entitled to reproduce and licence the work. He also made a cross claim for infringement after Stephen Slater, the cameraman and plaintiff, published some footage on . , an investment banker and thrill seeker, paid for Slater’s trip and most of his costs. Inconveniently, there was no contract setting out arrangements or addressing copyright ownership.

Implied Term?

The first pleading was that the footage was produced pursuant to a contract with an implied term regarding ownership of IP. Justice Birss found there was no agreement addressing IP with the intermediate production company that recommended Slater. Though there was no written contract, Birss J found that there was an implied contract between Slater and Wimmer based on the agreement to exchange an obligation to film for footing the costs of the trip. Regardless, no implied term addressing copyright was found because there was no evidence that the issue was ever raised with Slater.

Joint Authorship: Who’s the Producer?

In the UK, as in Canada, the author is the presumptive first owner of copyright, unless the work is produced under a contract of employment, and the author is the person who creates the work. Under the UK copyright regime, both the producer and director of a film are authors, they may be the same person; if separate people, they are joint authors (Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988 (UK), c 1, ). “Producer” is defined as “the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the making of the … film are undertaken.” “Director” is undefined.

Birss J denied Wimmer’s claim that he was a director, finding that only Slater “decided where to point the camera …[and] settings (aperture and so on) at any stage” [73]. As for who is the producer, Birss J highlights that determining who is the producer is “highly fact sensitive” and, after canvassing the case law,��writes that it “does not simply refer to the person who made the film, it focuses on the person undertaking the necessary arrangements to do so.” Wimmer was found to be the producer and therefore a joint author of the work because he footed Slater’s travel costs and arranged the provision of the filming equipment.

As joint authors they are unable to reproduce the work without each other’s consent and therefore each infringed each other’s copyright. Ironically, this finding does not end the dispute so much as further entrench it.

Comments

On the same facts in Canada, Wimmer likely would not be found a joint author because each author must contribute inseverable, substantial, original expression and Wimmer hadn’t done so. Also, Canada has no unique authorship provision with respect to film. However, Wimmer may have a stronger claim that the work was produced under a contract of service, as opposed to a contract for service, and, as such, was made in the course of employment. As the employer, he would be the first owner of copyright (Copyright Act, RSC 1985, c 42, ).

The common law test for employment takes note of things like ownership of tools. Wimmer arranging for Slater’s camera equipment weighs in favour of finding an employment relationship. Under Professor Vaver’s test for “made in the course of employment,” Slater clearly would have breached his duty of loyalty, to the extent it existed, if he failed to film Wimmer’s dive, which implies a contract for service. On the other hand, as Birss J highlighted, Wimmer had no creative control over Slater’s camerawork, which implies he was an independent contractor. As well, Slater took time off from his full time job to go on the expedition where he filmed everything, not just Wimimer’s dive.

The take away point from this case is universal and unsurprising: nip IP issues in the bud by writing contracts.

Gossip

Here’s a BBC news story on the expedition and its organizer, Nigel Gifford, entitled “.” Much of the footage of angry tourists was provided by Stephen Slater who clearly filmed more than just skydiving.

Kalen Lumsden is a JD candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School.

The post Mt. Everest Skydive Footage Lands In Court appeared first on IPOsgoode.

Background

The harassment apparently began when , a pilot for British Airlines and a member of the British Airline Pilots Association was identified as having trained as a volunteer cabin crew member when BASSA, a subset of the Unite union, was threatening an action. Afterwards, Mr. Patel and other pilots who trained as volunteer cabin crew were threatened and harassed online and elsewhere. Mr. Patel blames this abuse on the widespread publicity that resulted from his being identified in the abusive and defamatory postings on the BASSA forum. He claims these postings were libelous and raises a second cause of action under the . The postings alleged that Mr. Patel was unsafe to fly with, had lied, was unfit to be a captain, behaved erratically and illegally, fired innocent cabin crew and was involved in police corruption. All the postings were made under anonymous usernames and, without disclosure of the identities of the writers, Mr. Patel cannot bring his proceedings against those responsible.

BASSA’s forum is operated by , the larges union in the UK.�� The terms and conditions of the website “reserve the right to disclose the true identities of users to third parties, if requested, subject to the user’s data protection rights.” In June or July 2011 Unite took the forum offline and published a statement that the allegations made about Mr. Patel were untrue, but did not identify the users who made the postings, as requested by Mr. Patel.

On 30 September 2011, Mr. Patel was granted a order which obliged Unite to carry out a reasonable search to locate and��identity the��home address and IP address of the persons associated with the usernames collected by Mr. Patel.

According to the site’s administrators it was not possible to comply with the order because since the site had been taken down, all that remained was a dated backup. The backup would only reveal the identity of the members using a particular username at that particular date. Apparently it was common practice for members to change usernames in order to hide their identities from British Airlines, as well as reuse names. Therefore associating a user with a username at the date the backup was taken would not guarantee it was the same user who had made the posts at issue at the time the posts were made. ��Furthermore, the administrator claimed the retrieving of the IP address of the users in question was not possible.

Application

Mr. Patel, unsatisfied with this response, made a second application that “in the event of Unite not being able to provide some or all of the information sought, an independent expert should be given access to all available copies of the BASSA forum database and permitted to make an image of the database and/or such other electronic copy of data on the database (existing or deleted) as the expert might consider necessary in order to prepare a report limited to the identification of the information sought” (para 13). According to Mr. Patel, the initial search made by BASSA was unreasonable because they failed to supply the information requested or explain what happened to it.�� Mr. Patel had technical experts who stated that since the forum was run on widely understood software��(phpBB version 3 and MySQL), identification of the IP addresses from where the posts were made would be possible.

Mr. Patel then sent BASSA instructions on how to retrieve the requested information. The site administrator, a BASSA branch secretary with a non-technical background, said this was not possible as the posts had been deleted and the first step in the instruction required the relevant post. Justice Parks notes that it might be though curious that BASSA took the forum off line and did not make a back-up (para 11). Mr. Patel and his experts noted that previous searches had yielded portions of the allegedly defamatory posts.

Instead of taking the position that BASSA is being wilfully unhelpful or untruthful, he claims that they lack the technical capability to carry out this search themselves. Hence his request to allow a third party to examine the forum database.

Reasoning

Justice Parkes acknowledges that the order sought by Mr. Patel is intrusive (para 28) and that there were no authorities on point. He relies on a paragraph from which states that only if necessary and proportionate can the court order access to be given to a party’s computer or database. Parkes J does find necessary and proportionate to make the order.�� Especially because the requested order is necessitated by the lack of compliance with the previous judicial order. Furthermore, when faced with evidence from Mr. Patel’s experts, BASSA’s representatives were not able to conclusively show what information had been deleted and what remained on the database.

Unite claimed that the personal data of union members contained on the database was protected under Article 8 of the and that information about trade union membership fell within the definition of sensitive personal data under the . Parkes J writes that “the information involved is not of the most sensitive kind: we are not talking here about information relating to religious beliefs, or sexual life, or medical matters” (para 30). He finds that the order is proportional and necessary, even though contrary to the Data Protection Act,��because there is no other way which the harm done to Mr. Patel could be exposed. He states “In this case, as in many other Norwich Pharmical cases, necessity and proportionality might go hand in hand.”

Finally, Parke J references the terms and conditions agreed to by those who posted on the BASSA forum that the right to disclose their identities was reserved. And that damage done to innocent parties who posted on the forum, can be mitigated by having an independent third party carry out the analysis.

Comments

Issues of user privacy are a topic of vocal public debate in a Canada at present, especially surrounding . Manish v Patel, and the Norwich Pharmacal line of cases demonstrate a common law approach to orders requiring disclosure of user information when linked to a cause of action and shown to be necessary and proportional. ��In Canada the debate mostly centres around the roles of ISPs in providing user data, though many point out that often ISPs are quite forthcoming and accommodating of law enforcement.

Beyond illustrating the irony that there is no apparent solidarity between pilots and flight attendants and their respective unions, one of the differentiating elements of this case was the lack of compliance on the part of BASSA, with the initial, less intrusive disclosure order. Manish v Patel shows how the court may respond to lack of compliance or lack of technical capability with a more intrusive order, while balancing innocent user’s privacy rights.

The future for this line of reasoning will be interesting, especially as different causes of action are tried. Here the cause of action is harassment and defamation, whether an order will be made for third party experts to independently review a website’s data with regard to a copyright infringement claim remains to be seen.

Kalen Lumsden is a JD candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School.

The post Spat Between Pilot and Attendants’ Unions Results in Intrusive Disclosure Order appeared first on IPOsgoode.

In response to the creation of a new, adult entertainment-centric domain - .XXX - many universities and trademark holders are buying up potentially pornographic versions of their web properties before they fall into irresponsible or malicious hands.

The .XXX domain names are reserved for adult-themed websites to create a red-light district on the internet, with all attendant advantages and disadvantages. The domains will be easily identified and blocked, likely seedy, and a headache for trademark holders. The spent almost $3000 on domains, such as www.KUgirls.xxx and www.KUnurses.xxx, and intends to sit on them and do nothing.

Beginning in 2000 ICM Registry LLC (a private company from Palm Beach, Florida) began to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (, an international, not-for-profit organization that regulates internet domain names) proposing the creation of new Top-Level Sponsored Domain Registry - .XXX. As opposed to unsponsored domains, such as .com, sponsored domains are intended to represent a specific community, in this case, the adult entertainment industry. ICM’s proposal was repeatedly rejected by ICANN. Only after a February 2010 hearing by ICANN’s Independent Review Panel in Washington was ICM found to have met the required sponsorship criteria and on April 7, 2011 ICANN to ICM.

Intellectual property issues were among the main reasons .XXX was rejected for so long. The international nature of the internet conflicts with the regional nature of trademarks, so multiple valid trademark holders may by vying for the same domain name. ICM has a IP claims notifications procedures in place for this eventuality. Another obvious concern is brand damage via pornographic parodies.

In their FAQs, ICM that those not in the adult entertainment industry take a preventative approach and reserve their domain names, even though there are post-launch rights protection procedures in place. Of course, this conveniently aligns with their business model. The .XXX domain names go for $60 - $100 each, which is significantly more expensive than most .COM domains. For this reason, many critics view ICM’s business model as tantamount to extortion.

The sale was designed by ICM to address many of these concerns. It consisted of two “sunrise” periods, an auction and then a general sale. In the first phase, trademark holders inside the adult entertainment industry could claim .XXX versions of sites they already held the trademark for. In the second, non-adult brands could have their names removed from circulation. What followed was a “landrush” in which premium addresses that hadn’t removed themselves were auctioned off, for example: www.nike.xxx. Finally, as of December 6, 2011 everything remaining is being on a first-come-first-served basis through a variety of middlemen domain registries.

What about Canadian universities? Major Brands? All registrations are public, mildly entertaining and viewable . Both www.yorku.xxx and www.utoronto.xxx have been registered by 1764210 Ontario Inc. of Kleinburg, Ontario, perhaps as an investment in future mischief or for resale. UVic registered www.uvic.xxx. Others, such as www.ualberta.xxx and www.mcgill.xxx were reserved during the sunrise phase and are not available for registration.

At present, www.osgoodehall.xxx is currently available for purchase for the low price of $99.99 USD a year if any law students are seeking a fallback career or foothold in the adult entertainment industry.

The post DomainRush.xxx appeared first on IPOsgoode.

In , No. 2010-1068 , Fed. Cir. 2011., decided September 21, 2011, a farmer appeals an adverse judgment after Monsanto had sued him for patent infringement because he had attempted to exploit a perceived loophole in his licensing agreement. The central issue of the case was how the doctrine of patent exhaustion applied to self-replicating technologies. Specifically, Monsanto’s Roundup Ready® genetically modified soybeans.

Monsanto had developed a series of herbicide resistant, genetically modified soybeans, registered under the name Roundup Ready®, for which they had been issued two patents from the United States Patent and Trademark Office. All Roundup Ready® soybeans sold to growers, either directly by Monsanto or through seed producers, is sold under a licence called the Monsanto Technology Agreement. The agreement had provisions covering the patented biotechnologies and restricted a grower to a single season. It also limited them to:

(1) use the seed containing Monsanto gene technologies for planting a commercial crop only in a single season

(2) not supply any of this seed to any other person or entity for planting

(3) not save any crop produced from this seed or provide it to anyone for crop breeding, research, generation of herbicide registration data, or seed production.

The only exception to the single season restriction is that the second-generation progeny of the Roundup Ready® seed could be sold to local grain elevators without restriction on the elevator’s subsequent sale of the seed, which were typically sourced from several places and were a mix of varieties. They were sold as feed or as a commodity.

Bowman had purchased licensed Roundup Ready® seed, signed the purchase agreement and planted them as his first crop of the season from 1999-2007. To save money on the riskier second crop of the 1999 season, Bowman purchased commodity seed from a local grain elevator. After applying the herbicide to which the Roundup Ready® soybeans were genetically resistant, Bowman discovered many of the commodity seeds he had purchased contained the genetic resistance. He then kept the second crop harvested seed for replanting as a second crop in subsequent years.

In 2007, Monsanto sued Bowman alleging patent infringement of two patented genes in the Roundup Ready® soybeans. Violation of the Technology Agreement was not alleged because it did not extend to seed purchased as a commodity.

Bowman argued that Monsanto’s patent rights where exhausted when seed was sold as an undifferentiated commodity by a grain elevator and that sale of second-generation seed is authorized under the Technology Agreement. Furthermore, Bowman pushed for a robust interpretation of the patent exhaustion doctrine that would “encompass the progeny of seed and other self-replicating biotechnologies.”

Monsanto argued that its patent rights in the seed were not exhausted because of a provision in the licensing agreement stating that “licensed seed never be sold for planting.” Additionally, Monsanto argued that “Bowman is nevertheless liable for infringement by planting those seed because patent protection is ‘independently applicable to each generation of soybeans (or other crops) that contain the patented trait” and that “under Bowman’s analysis, patent protection for self-replicating inventions would be eviscerated.”

The appeal court found that the doctrine of patent exhaustion did not bar Monsanto’s infringement claim and that the fact that a technology is self-replicating does not give a purchaser a right to use the replicated copies. While farmers may use commodity seed as feed, planting them constitutes patent infringement.

The post Roundup Ready® Soybeans: Patent Exhaustion in Self-Replicating Biotechnologies appeared first on IPOsgoode.

The University of Kansas, one of the first universities with a formal open access policy, along with 21 other universities, have joined together to form the (COAPI). Their mandate will be to craft policies to implement open access and advocate for it on a national level.

In 2009 the University of Kansas established their , which “asserts the rights of KU faculty to provide broad, free access to their journal publications to colleagues around the world.”

COAPI represents a collective commitment to implement an open access policy in practical, tangible ways. With a membership that includes Harvard, Columbia, MIT and Stanford this coalition may have the institutional weight behind it to effect actual change.

They plan to meet in November at the in Washington, DC to discuss ­where their focus should be and where to begin.

One positive aspect of open access policies is the potential for cost savings. Presently, in Canada, many universities, including 91��ɫ, are opting out of their blanket tariff with Access Copyright -- the copyright collective that manages permissions associated with photocopying and course-packs -- in favour of open access, creative commons licensing, individual licences and fair use exemptions, partially in an attempt to save money (previously discussed by IP Osgoode ). Coalitions like COAPI will help make open access a viable alternative.

Considered from one perspective, academic publishing is a bit of a racket: the writers and researchers are not compensated by the journals for their work, and yet the cost to access the journals is often quite high. Through controlling the means of distribution of a specialized type of knowledge, publishers profit. This is not to say that they do not provide an essential service through their curatorial and editorial contributions. However, as the purpose of academic journalism is usually to foster a dialogue and the value of a journal comes from being peer-reviewed, a policy that furthers the discussion is in the best interests of academia.

Research and the communication of new ideas occurs on a global scale and while COAPI is composed of only American universities, the benefits of sharing knowledge will cross borders. From universities, whose raison d’être is the promulgation of knowledge, open access policies make intuitive sense. Considering the changes in the upcoming year in how Canadian universities are managing their copy permissions as research adapts to the internet, the nascent development of COAPI can only be of assistance in smoothing out some of our growing pains. Maybe, if COAPI is looking to broaden their membership, they could look north.

The post 22 American Universities Form Coalition To Implement Open Access Policies appeared first on IPOsgoode.

91��ɫ, including Osgoode Hall Law School, has decided from , the copyright collective that manages permissions associated with photocopying and course kits. The current licence will end on August 31, 2011.

91��ɫ joins a of universities ending their blanket licences in favour of transactional licences, open sourced materials and a reliance on fair dealing copying exceptions. According to the universities, this approach will result in cost savings, especially since Access Copyright has proposed to raise the price for a blanket licence to $45 per student.

is a website launched by 91��ɫ to help manage the upcoming transition. It contains information on and how to ascertain what is available for classroom use and how to arrange for the necessary individual permissions.

91��ɫ’s copyright officer Patricia Lynch , in part, to changes in how educational institutions use technology:

The changing landscape in technology has led to an increase of licensed electronic resources in the 91��ɫ Libraries. There are also materials available through Open Access, Creative Commons, fair dealing and transactional licences. These changes mean that Access Copyright’s proposed licence became less relevant to teaching and research in a post secondary environment.

��

In response to universities’ assertions that they can save money through opting out, Access Copyright released a press statement titled in which they state:

Transactional licences for secondary uses of works are often not suited to the demands of the new digital economy. Impractical to implement and costly to administer, they have the added weakness of being unable to capture uses that should be compensated. They do not ensure that all secondary uses are legal, on the contrary, their very impracticality is an incentive to infringe.

Michael Geist “[i]ronically Access Copyright is resisting pay-per-use licences for education, leaving some schools to license the same materials from the U.S. Copyright Clearance Center.”

Ultimately, the final result of the shifting relationship between the universities and Access Copyright will be influenced heavily by market forces. Access Copyright sells licences and the consumption patterns of their biggest clients are shifting. The problem faced by Access Copyright and publishers is not dissimilar to that faced by music collectives and record companies – how do you compete with what's practically free? The prospect of transactional licences is like going from selling albums to single tracks on iTunes.

It will be an interesting school year to see if the momentum of universities opting out of the old photocopying tariff results in shifts from being a reaction to technological change into what gives the technologies the final push it needs to enter the mainstream. This could be a huge boon for open source educational projects and . Also, anything that saves students money undoubtedly will receive student support.

The post Break-Ups Are Never Easy: 91��ɫ Declines to Renew Blanket Copy Licence With Access Copyright appeared first on IPOsgoode.

The of the United Kingdom recently released a report titled that estimates the “level of UK market sector investment in knowledge assets protected by Intellectual Property Rights ��(IPRs) and the impact of investment in those assets via their contribution to labour productivity and growth in the UK market sector.” ��

The report was authored by Shikeb Farooqui, Peter Goodridge and Jonathan Haskel and an executive summary can be found �� Their main findings, quoted below, are:

1. On average, between 2000 and 2008, approximately 48% of UK market sector investment in knowledge was protected by IPRs.
2. Approximately 75% of IPR investment is in assets protected by copyright and unregistered design rights.
3. In 2008, approximately 62% of the stock of knowledge assets in the UK market sector were protected by IPRs.
4. On average, between 1990 and 2008, 10.6% of growth in labour productivity was due to growth in the use of IPR-protected assets, similar to the 11.1% contribution of ICT [Information and Communication Technologies] equipment. The contribution of knowledge capital not protected by IPRs is around 10.3, slightly less than that of protected IPRs.
5. …Patents protect a specific innovation but reveal information to others for free. The same is true for other forms of IPR-protected knowledge. Such freely available information contributes to growth via total factor productivity (TFP) – effects on total output not caused by inputs – which we estimate contributes around 45% of labour productivity growth . ��[pp 3-4]

Notably these findings cannot be read to suggest that more intellectual property rights or a stricter, more inclusive rights regime would increase their economic contribution. Nor can it be read to suggest that their contribution is causally linked to their being unprotected. In their conclusion, the authors write that whether the 10.3% contribution of knowledge capital not protected by IPR would have been higher or lower if it had been protected is unclear and an area for further study.�� They write “[w]hilst some evidence suggests that the ability to use IPRs increases innovation through the incentive of monopolist revenues, others suggest that the same mechanism reduces innovation by removing the incentive to continually innovate” [p 41].

Also notable is the relative valuation of different intellectual property areas and the overwhelming contribution of Copyright and Design rights compared to Patents and Trademarks.

The report also divides the intellectual property market into three categories of knowledge assets and weighs their relative contributions: i) Computerized information, ii) Innovative property, and iii) Economic competencies.

Table 1: UK Market Sector Investment; Tangible & Intangible, £bns nominal [p 11]

New to the report is the inclusion of the Artistic Originals category, which accounts for approximately £4 billion in investment. Considering this is just 1.65% of the total market sector investment, based on casual observation, this category seems to punch above its weight when it comes to media representation and the ongoing discourse surrounding intellectual property policy. No doubt this is partially because this category is the media. Regardless, in Canada we seem to spend a great deal of energy discussing the copyright issues that surround music, movies and books in the internet age. If Canada’s figures resemble the UK’s then very likely this amount of discussion is disproportionate to the actual effect this category of property rights has on the economy as a whole. ��Information like this certainly helps to contextualize intellectual property rights discourse. After all, training employees contributes more than art to the United Kingdom’s economy.

The post UK IPO Report Estimates Economic Contribution Of Intellectual Property Rights appeared first on IPOsgoode.