The Latest on Writing and Publishing in Canada
PUBLISHERS
Nova Scotia’s Famed Letterpress Publisher, Gaspereau Press, Changing Ownership
Andrew Steeves and Gary Dunfield, founders of Gaspereau Press in Kentville, Nova Scotia have announced their departure, and the transfer of the name and imprint to Keagan Hawthorne, current owner of the micropress Hardscrabble. Under Hawthorne Gaspereau will move to to Sackville, New Brunswick after 2025.
In a posting on the Alcuin Society website, Andrew Steeves explains that his 28-year partner wishes to retire and that “my own post-Gaspereau plans are still taking shape, but will likely involve some combination of freelance writing, editing, book design and teaching. I also intend to keep producing fine letterpress books, chapbooks and broadsides under a new press name.”
COPYRIGHT
Canadian Court Challenge on Copyright for Artificial Intelligence
A law clinic at the University of Ottawa has recently filed a challenge against a Canadian copyright registration for an image created by artificial intelligence. The Samuelson-Glushko Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC) is disputing the legality of providing copyright protection to "Suryast," a sunset image in the style of Vincent Van Gogh that has been officially registered through the Canadian Intellectual Property Office's automated copyright registration process. This means that the registrant, Ankit Sahni, an intellectual property lawyer from New Delhi, has successfully listed his RAGHAV AI Painting App as a legitimate creator of the work, akin to any human creator or artist.
The court challenge seeks to get a ruling on the originality of the final AI-created image, and some official understanding of the difference between human and non-human originality. The Writers’ Union of Canada is following this case closely, aware that CIPPIC has historically taken positions that are detrimental to creator rights. TWUC is concerned that any resulting ruling here might form the basis for a future CIPPIC challenge demanding that the input and training stage of AI creativity also not be subject to copyright.
Legal Expert Takes Issue with Federal Court Permission on Password Sharing
Professional creative labour was dealt another damaging legal blow this past spring when the Federal Court ruled against a private Ottawa-based online newspaper in their series of lawsuits concerning blatant password sharing of subscription accounts among government departments. The case, 1395804 Ontario Ltd, operating as Blacklock’s Reporter v AG Canada, 2024 FC 829, involved Blacklock’s Reporter, a government accountability media outlet that does the slow, meticulous labour of covering Parliamentary Committee hearings and plowing through the masses of reports and recommendations related to Canada’s federal government.
Blacklock’s charges a reasonable government rate for access to its journalism, and requires that subscriptions be individual without the sharing of passwords. Having discovered various government staffers breaking subscription terms of service by emailing their passwords to others in their department, Blacklock’s sued for relief. In his ruling, Federal Justice Roy declared the government department in question “did not infringe copyright or breach the Copyright Act’s legal protection of technological protection measures by circulating copies of articles and passwords to locked articles published by Blacklock’s Reporter.”
In a thoroughly researched and expertly argued rebuke, copyright law scholar and Senior Counsel at McCarthy Tétrault in Toronto, Barry Sookman, takes issue with the ruling, declaring it “riddled with mistakes.” Sookman concludes “It is high time the Government decides whether it wants to win its suits with Blacklock’s at all costs and in the process create precedents which undermine news services and other cultural industries in Canada or do the right thing and support Canadian news publishing.”
TWUC continues to monitor this case and any possible appeal in its ongoing advocacy for strong copyright law as an incentive and protection for professional cultural work such as writing and publishing.
