(This post originally appeared on the UofT Students for Life blog.) The York Federation of Students’ (YFS) motion to ban “anti-choice” groups from using student union resources or space has successfully been accepted by the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS). The motion reads: Be it resolved that member locals [of […]
Law
65 posts
Last year, Viacom sued YouTube for a billion dollars over copyright infringement. The lawsuit is problematic and the premise is weak for many reasons, but that’s for another time. The recent news is that Google has filed its response to Viacom’s recent filings. Its defence has people talking about the […]
Confession: once you start watching a cappella videos on YouTube, it’s really hard to stop. And yes, it is 3am. This video, though, is a perfect example of why our copyright laws are terribly suited for encouraging artistic expression in the 21st century. This is way too good to be […]
Today, I was sent a link to an emotional rant by Harlan Ellison about paying writers royalties. I admit that I’d never never heard the name before (not sure if I should have or not…), but, from the sounds of his Wikipedia article, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t like him. […]
Last month, George Farris began a thread on the Ubuntu-devel-discuss mailing list questioning the license choice of Ubuntu training material. The training manuals are released under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license, which is non-free because it doesn’t allow commercial use. George asks, “why on earth would you not allow educational […]
What good thing could come of an intellectually dishonest smear campaign against Lawrence Lessig? Mike Masnick absolutely ripping it to shreds. As a general comment, these defenders of “intellectual property” don’t seem to understand that granting artificial monopolies involves more government intervention, not less. Free culture is not communism. Also, […]
I encountered Catholics Come Home through a video posted on YouTube last week via AmP. Upon returning to YouTube to watch the video again, I noticed that it has been removed due to a copyright claim by Catholics Come Home Inc. The video was originally here. What is wrong with […]
The New York Times has an interesting article on the tension between sports leagues and media organizations, an issue that Techdirt has been covering for a while. The Times article begins by focusing on blogging and amateur journalism, but then tries to get to the core problem: At the heart […]
University of Florida professor Michael Moulton is a great example of abuse which comes from treating ideas like property. He and his publisher are arguing that taking notes in his lectures is an infringement of copyright. This is worth repeating: he and his publisher are arguing that taking notes in […]