Copyright Corner (December 2023)

1 Copyright Corner, November/December 2023 More on Debunking Disinformation About Educational Fair Dealing One of the topics considered In the previous column was how copyright advisors and librarians have been rebutting claims bordering on disinformation about why most of Canada’s educational institutions outside of Quebec no longer engage in blanket collective licensing for textual works. Among the examples I provided was “Don’t Blame Copyright for Declining Revenue. It Won’t Help Authors,” a statement by the Canadian Federation of Library Associations (CFLA). In a response, “CFLA Statement Contains Damaging Inaccuracies,” the Writers’ Union of Canada (TWUC) suggests CFLA’s statement positions authors and publishers as “attackers” of libraries, and views some of the sources relied on by CFLA to be “anti-copyright activists.” This is a troubling turn of events, because it threatens to make relevant facts even more difficult to discern for non-specialists, which, in turn, intensifies the challenge for policymakers to make evidence-based decisions on copyright law amendments or reform that are in the public interest. So I was deeply grateful to see another viewpoint offered up that provides facts and historical context for this debate on a blog entitled Fair Duty. The author, Meera Nair, Copyright Officer at NAIT, was inspired by the CFLA and TWUC statements to pull together a week-long series of posts on her independent copyright blog that draw on her in-depth knowledge of the social forces that have shaped the development of Canadian copyright law and the users’ right of fair dealing. I recommend this series to anyone who wishes to enrich their understanding of how educational copying has evolved over the past several decades. • Part 1 – Prologue • Part 2 – Uncovering the problem • Part 3 – Where did the money go? • Part 4 – Unkept promises, promises impossible to keep • Part 5 – The Canadian way • Part 6 – A better game • Epilogue Incidentally, when the U of L copyright office receives permissions clearance requests for book chapters to be used as course materials, we always check to see if the Library owns a multi-user e-book version or if such a version is available for us to purchase. Part 2 of the above series discusses three examples of Canadian books that might be used as post-secondary course materials – Downtown Canada (2005), Shut Up, He Explained (2007), and Jonny Appleseed (2018). It so happens that each of these three books is permanently available to U of L users through the Library in e-book format allowing for unlimited concurrent users. 2 More on Copyright and Generative AI Over the past month or so we have seen some further developments in the copyright and generative AI sphere. Most notably, the Government of Canada launched an online form-based public consultation in mid-October to invite comment from creators and users in four areas: • technical evidence (e.g., How does your organization access and collect copyright-protected content, and encode it in training datasets?) • text and data mining (e.g., If the Government were to amend the Act to clarify the scope of permissible TDM activities, what should be its scope and safeguards?) • authorship and ownership (e.g., Is the uncertainty surrounding authorship or ownership of AI-assisted and AI-generated works impacting the development of AI technologies?) • infringement and liability (e.g., Are there concerns about existing legal tests for demonstrating that an AI-generated work infringes copyright?) The relatively brief consultation period (December 4 closing date) allowed little time to set up a process to consult with the U of L research community in order to gather input on the complex issues identified in the Government’s online form. However, since questions and conundrums regarding copyright and generative AI will most certainly be with us for at least the next several years, I am interested in connecting with U of L researchers who are working with or creating generative AI tools regarding potential intersections between their work and copyright. Please reach out if you or any of your students are working in this area and would like to chat with me. If you would like to acquire a better understanding about the intersections between copyright and generative AI but are not sure where to start, I have added a new FAQ to the University’s Copyright website, Does copyright apply to generative AI? Spoiler alert: I offer no answers to the question! But this FAQ suggests some sources that provide overviews of the theoretical issues, current state of play regarding issues caught up in recent lawsuits, and two sources that take an “under the hood” look at just how generative AI works. As always, feel free to reach out if you would like some help with a copyright conundrum in your teaching or research. Other articles in this bimonthly column are available here. Rumi Graham University Copyright Advisor E-mail: copyright@uleth.ca Phone: 403-332-4472 Website: library.ulethbridge.ca/copyrigh