Issues / Your Take

Fake Law Firms, Bogus DMCA Threats, and the “Dead Internet”. Why AI threatens to automate Copyright Trolling.

Hey All! While working on my final paper, I stumbled over an interesting article published by ArsTechnica that has raised my eyebrows, and I am sure it may raise yours as well. Eric Smith, a writer based in the United States recently “received a ‘DMCA Copyright Infringement Notice’ in late March from “Commonwealth Legal,” representing […]

‘Free’ cash from social media: but at what cost?

The recent emergence of Temu, a rapidly growing online marketplace originating from China, has stirred controversy and raised concerns over data privacy and user consent. Promising ‘free’ cash incentives for new sign-ups and referrals, Temu has garnered significant attention on social media platforms, with users sharing screenshots of payments ranging from £50-£100. The site spends […]

Human Expression in EDM

Following the insightful presentations of last Friday, and inspired by a previous class debate on the intersection of AI and EDM, I wanted to share my take on EDM and how it is a genre driven by culture, human emotion, and social movements. Despite how it can be perceived as a genre, EDM isn’t merely […]

Big Fat Copyright Infringer

If you have not seen the 2002 film “Big Fat Liar,” you are surely missing out! It revolves around a young boy who tells an elaborate lie to cover up his tardiness for school, only to find himself caught up in a web of deception. The plot revolves around 14-year-old Jason Shepherd, an incorrigible liar living […]

The Ethical Ambiguity of Online File Sharing

Introduction Throughout this course, as the name ‘Copyright and Social Media’ suggests, we have focused on the internet, technology, and various legal and ethical issues that arise from their use. At the crux of modern technology we see today, is the desire to share information and ideas. Peer-to-peer online file-sharing platforms, like Torrentz, UTorrent, and […]

Can Social Media Trends Qualify for Copyright Protection?

Hi everyone, I am looking to explore if social media trends can qualify for copyright protection under Canadian Copyright law and the role that contractual licensing agreement plays in this. I have attached the introductory portion of my paper but I will appreciate your thoughts and comments. INTRODUCTION: There is little doubt that while our […]

Trump’s Truth… (Social)

Hi everyone, Saw this news article today and thought that it might be interesting for people in this class! If anyone remembers, former president Donald Trump launched a social media called “Truth Social” back in 2021. It has been called a “twitter clone” that is a alt-tech social media platform. As of today, it has […]

Data as Copyright

Good morning everyone, Sharvani and myself are going to be presenting this Friday on “Data as copyright”. This post will provide a brief rundown on what we will be talking about. Code as Law– Borrowing from Lawrence Lessig’s argument that “code is law in the cyberspace”, this segment will present the importance of “code” and […]

Podcast on AI and Elections

I listened to an interesting podcast on the implications of generative AI in elections last week that I thought people in this class might enjoy. While the podcast makes note of the benefits of generative AI to elections, specifically around generative AI’s capacity to reduce campaign costs, it mostly focuses on the threats that generative […]

Deepfakes in Canadian Law Presentation

Please click link below in the browser to see the presentation! https://allard-law423-001-2024.sites.olt.ubc.ca/files/2024/03/Deepfakes-in-Canadian-Law-Michelle-Ching.pdf

Found an amazing resource for cases on “fair use” in the USA!

Hey everyone! I found an amazing resource for finding “fair use” cases in the USA. It’s called the US Copyright Office Fair Use Index: https://www.copyright.gov/fair-use/fair-index.html You can search by jurisdiction or category of the issue (like parody, internet, film, etc) and they are all in condensed down case briefs. Maybe you know about this resource […]

Two Cases from Internet Courts in China concerning Copyright Aspects of AI-Generated Content

There has been a significant amount of debate about whether AI-generated works should enjoy copyright protection or not. Generally, a work may enjoy copyright protection if it is Even if the same argument is made for AI-generated content, the question remains as to whom will the copyright protection be attributed. The programmer? The AI itself […]

Video Games as Social Media

Online video games, particularly those with subscription models, create social spaces for players to interact, engage and play with each other online. The communities and interactions that spawn from these spaces often contain and mimic many of the types of interactions present in traditional forms of social media. With more explicit examples like miiverse, to […]

Copyright Issues Relating to TikTok

From January to June 2023, TikTok received over 189,000 copyright removal requests, which resulted in the successful removal of 60% of those videos (i.e., 113,000 videos). While TikTok requires users to submit requests to have copyright infringing content removed, YouTube offers a range of automated tools that proactively limit copyright infringement on its platform. The […]

Developments in EU Copyright and AI Regulation

Hi all, Tomorrow in class we will be doing our presentation on Developments in EU Copyright Law and AI Regulation. This news article introduces part of what we will be talking about. If you have time to read it ahead of tomorrow that would be great. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/08/eu-agrees-historic-deal-with-worlds-first-laws-to-regulate-ai Best, Amy and Mads

Interesting dissertation of traditional Indigenous knowledge and its intersections with IP law

Hello fellow classmates! The author of this dissertation, Greg Young-ing, was a professor of mine during my early undergrad years at UBCO (admittedly those were quite a few years ago now..). As a non-Indigenous person who was taught from a highly euro-centric perspective for much of my educational life, Greg’s Indigenous Studies class had a […]