That version was produced as part of the Non-Residential Fellowship Program of the Center for Internet & Society at Stanford Law School, and the list of individuals acknowledged as having contributed or supported that document is a testament to the great effort involved in writing it.

First and foremost, we thank the authors and contributors to the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Podcasting Legal Guide for their efforts. Working within the Law & Technology program at the University of Ottawa, Kathleen Simmons did the bulk of the work updating the substantive aspects of the Guide to Canadian law.

Among other things, her contribution of the Copyright Matrix and the analysis of the many layers of collective societies in Canada will certainly be put to many uses beyond this Guide.

Thanks goes out to Mark Blevis of the Electric Sky Podcast (at http://www.electricsky.net/) and the Canadian Podcast Buffet (at http://www.canadianpodcastbuffet.ca/). Mark originally asked me if we could adapt the Podcasting Legal Guide for Canadian law.

He provided both the impetus to create this version of the Guide as well as the forum to launch it at Podcasters Across Borders 2007. Thanks also to Professor Jeremy de Beer for his comments and advice on early drafts and, finally, to Professor Michael Geist for contributing the Foreword and supporting Creative Commons Canada as a part of the Law & Technology program at the University of Ottawa.

Andy Kaplan-Myrth Creative Commons Canada Project Lead Ottawa, Ontario May 2007 <span lang="EN-CA" style="font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-ansi-language: EN-CA;mso-fareast-language:EN-US;mso-bidi-language:AR-SA">        

0.2       Foreword

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission has faced seemingly continuous criticism for years, however, in May 1999 it released a decision that generated near-universal praise.

The New Media decision, which adopted a hands-off regulatory approach to new media, was widely regarded as the right decision at the right time. Since that ruling, a remarkable array of new media services have emerged outside of the traditional broadcast regulation model.

Few offer as much promise as podcasting. Conventional broadcasters have jumped on the podcasting bandwagon, with many now offering podcasts of favourite shows bundled together with advertising, yet it is the thousands of Canadians creating home-grown audio content who are responsible for the freshest, most original, and most diverse programming.

The Canadian podcasting community is emerging as an important voice in Canada that deserves broad support and attention. While accessible and easy-to-use technology has removed many technological barriers for would-be podcasters, the legal challenges can be daunting.

Podcasting touches on several legal areas, including copyright, trade-mark, and personality rights, each of which brings its own complexities and uncertainties.

Conventional broadcasters typically enjoy the benefit of internal legal resources, however, until now most individual podcasters have been forced to confront legal questions on their own.

The arrival of the Podcasting Legal Guide for Canada addresses that dilemma. Andy Kaplan-Myrth, Kathleen Simmons, and Creative Commons Canada have come together to produce a first-rate legal guide that will undoubtedly become a “must-read” for the Canadian podcasting community.

The guide helpfully unpacks complicated legal issues, providing straightforward guidance on the use of text and music within podcasts. Moreover, by focusing exclusively on Canadian law, the guide will help to eliminate the tendency to confuse U.S. and Canadian approaches to the law associated with podcasting.

After reading the guide, many podcasters may well conclude that the law is in dire need of reform, as its complexity remains a significant challenge for many future Canadian podcasters.

If so, it will have an unintended benefit – educating podcasters about the state of Canadian law and galvanizing this important group to become more vocal on issues related to copyright law reform.

As audiences continue to grow, the legal issues associated with producing podcasts become unavoidable. This guide makes an important contribution to our understanding of those legal issues and promises to assist a new generation of Canadians who require little more than a personal computer and the Internet to make their voices heard.

Michael Geist Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law June 2007   <span lang="EN-CA" style="font-size:18.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:24.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-font-kerning:18.0pt;mso-ansi-language:EN-CA;mso-fareast-language:EN-US; mso-bidi-language:AR-SA">

1         Introduction

Welcome to the Podcasting Legal Guide for Canada.

An electronic version of this Guide is available on www.creativecommons.ca.

1.1       Purpose

The purpose of this Guide is to provide you with a general roadmap of some of the legal issues specific to podcasting with an emphasis on identifying how those issues may apply in the Canadian legal environment.

The Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC) has produced some practical and helpful resources related to legal issues affecting the internet that you can find at http://www.cippic.ca. In addition, EFF has produced a very practical and helpful guide for issues related to blogging generally (http://www.eff.org/bloggers/). While their guide is focussed on US law, it may still be helpful in pointing you in the right direction.