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Gemini Award-winning reporter David Akin is the National Affairs Correspondent for Canwest News Service and is based at the CNS Parliamentary Bureau in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
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Who pays for this blog? I receive no fees, considerations, etc. etc. for the posts on this blog nor do I have any plans to accept any. My salary is paid by Canwest Global Communications Corp. I work for that company as the Ottawa-based National Affairs Correspondent for Canwest News Service. The blog publishing platform used here is called Blogware and it's developed by Tucows Inc. of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Blogware users typically pay a monthly fee for using this platform but I do not as Tucows has kindly provided me with this platform. I may report on Tucows, its associated operations and executives, and on industry issues that may affect Tucows. I am grateful for Tucows' assistance but that's it. No favours were promised for their generosity nor do Tucows executives expect any. I hold no direct equity or stock in any company, Tucows included. If you think other disclosures are appropriate in this space, I'd like to hear from you. All of my contact details are always at www.davidakin.com You can read more about this section Login
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Canadian law students gear up to fight the record biz
I got some e-mail the other day from Andy Kaplan-Myrth, a law student at
the University of Ottawa. Andy wrote to
tell me that The Information Technology Law
Society at his university and the University of Windsor's IP/IT society "have launched a
project that aims to bring together from across Canada law students and
practitioners interested in helping people who are targeted" by the record
industry. Just as the Recording Industry
Association of America has sued individuals in the U.S. it believes are
illegally trading music files, the Canadian
Recording Industry Association has threatened to sue file traders
in Canada. CRIA, if you ask its representatives, is a bit evasive on
details. U.S. law, for example, is significantly different than Canadian
law. There is no Canadian version of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act.
Moreover, the Copyright Board of Canada has ruled that it is perfectly legal
to make a single copy for personal use of a recording you own. In the U.S.,
any and all copying is illegal. So: We don't know what statutes CRIA will
cite if and when it sues Canadian file traders. CRIA is also very quiet
when it comes to deciding when to file these lawsuits.
But whenever it happens, some Canadian law students plan to stand up for the
defendants through the the Canadian
File-sharing Legal Information Network
"CanFLI is meant to be a public advocacy project," Kaplan-Myrth says,
",collecting and making available information that can help ordinary people
who are sued by CRIA. At this point, CanFLI is agnostic on questions of
digital copyright reform and the likes. Rather, we want to make sure
Canadians get due process, can find lawyers who want to take on these cases,
and are informed about Canadian copyright law and Canadian procedure."
An admirable mission that we hope makes it a little bit more of a fair fight when one of those most poweful industries in the world goes after its customers.
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