Universities Agree To Email Monitoring For Copyright Agency 165
New submitter fish waffle writes "The universities of Western Ontario and Toronto have signed a deal with Access Copyright that allows for surveillance of faculty correspondence, defines e-mailing hyperlinks as equivalent to photocopying a document, and imposes an annual $27.50 fee for every full-time equivalent student to pay for it all. Access Copyright is a licensing agency historically used by most universities in Canada to give them blanket permission to reproduce copyrighted works, largely to address photocopying concerns that may extend beyond basic fair-use. Since the expiration of this agreement, and with recognition that many academic uses do not require copyright permissions or payments or are already covered under vendor-specific agreements, Canadian academic institutions have been united in opposing continuation of the agreement with the agency. Access Copyright has countered with a proposal for increased fees, and expansion of the definition of copyright to include linking and the need for online surveillance. In a strange breaking of ranks, the University of Western Ontario and the University of Toronto have capitulated and signed agreements that basically accede to the licensing agency's demands. The Canadian Association of University Teachers bulletin provides detailed background on the issue (PDF)."
Re:Change Universities (Score:5, Funny)
eh
This [nonsense] would not fly in the US of A... (Score:5, Funny)
How can emailing a hyper-link be equivalent to photocopying? When one photocopies, they then get a physical copy of a document. On the other hand, e-mailing a hyper-link provides no such physical object.
Here's how to circumvent the insanity: Email actual documents and then argue that *no* hyper-links were emailed as required by the stipulation. How about that?
Re:Anti-scientific? (Score:5, Funny)
See, people keep saying Canada is just another part of the USA, but you guys never believe us...
Re:Is this some sort of joke? (Score:2, Funny)
Next up: referencing ISBN numbers is considered photocopying.
Later: SHOCKING BREAKING NEWS: Every reputable peer-reviewed field is engaged in MASSIVE copyright infringement! Just look at all the links at the end of all these articles - we can't have that!
Still later: Per resulting legislation, no peer-reviewed articles or texts can include references, and every reference on Wikipedia has by law been replaced with [citation removed].
So Where's My Cut? (Score:4, Funny)
I have a blog that I write and own the copyright on. Will Access Copyright send me my cut if a student happens to send a link to my blog to a friend? And what if they send a link to their own blog? Will that student now be entitled to a partial refund of their 27.50 Canadian?
Seems like this could be a revenue stream that bloggers may have to wake up to!!
Re:Poor Google? (Score:4, Funny)
Haha, you think this extends to textbooks.