Today’s decision in R. v. National Post, 2010 SCC 16 (CanLII) contains the following line from Binnie J for the majority (McLachlin C.J. and Binnie, Deschamps, Fish, Charron, Rothstein and Cromwell JJ.:

As recently pointed out in Grant v. Torstar Corp., 2009 SCC 61, [2009] 3 S.C.R. 640, the protection attaching to freedom of expression is not limited to the “traditional media”, but is enjoyed by “everyone” (in the words of s. 2(b) of the Charter) who chooses to exercise his or her freedom of expression on matters of public interest whether by blogging, tweeting, standing on a street corner

. . . [more]

In the wake of much public debate over the anti-hate provisions of human rights legislation, the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission applied to the Supreme Court of Canada for leave to appeal the February 2010 Saskatchewan Court of Appeal decision, William Whatcott v. Saskatchewan Human Rights Tribunal.

As many Slaw readers will already know from the extensive coverage this has received, the Ontario Divisional Court released an important ruling in Warman v. Wilkins-Fournier, a case in which Richard Warman is suing a number of persons for defamation. Warman had tried to get the court to compel disclosure from one of the defendants of information that would help identify various other defendants who had posted on anonymously on the internet message board run by the first defendant.

The court overturned a ruling by the trier of the motion to compel disclosure and sent the matter back for . . . [more]

I made a half-baked comment in response to Omar’s April 4th post on the procedural issues in dealing with the communications that employees have with their legal counsel through employer e-mail systems. This is a post based on some “more baked” thoughts that I plan to incorporate into a book chapter under development.

The thoughts I’ve included are strictly on the procedure for dealing with these “hot” e-mails. I’ll leave the substantive issue about the legitimacy of an employee privilege claim to another day, but will set up the thoughts below by noting that the issue is highly uncertain in . . . [more]

When should software and business methods be patentable, if ever? Two courts are currently grappling with this very question. In the United States, the Supreme Court is expected to deliver its decision in Bilski v. Kappos within weeks. In Canada, the Federal Court recently heard oral arguments in Amazon.com, Inc. v. The Attorney General of Canada et al, the Amazon 1-Click appeal. Both cases are likely to shape the patent landscape for years to come.

Previous developments

Previous decisions in Bilski and Amazon both conspicuously broke with established patentability requirements and led to the current appeals. Each discarded earlier . . . [more]

In Canada, under s. 48(1) of the Patent Act, a patentee can disclaim portions of an issued patent if “by mistake, accident or inadvertence, and without any willful intent to defraud or mislead the public,” the patentee has “made a specification too broad, claiming more than that of which the patentee… was the inventor.” Disclaimers can be filed to correct errors in patents and can be used to enhance the validity of existing claims by narrowing the claims based on newly discovered prior art. However, patentees should proceed with caution, as disclaimers filed in the wrong manner, or for . . . [more]

The decision in Vinod Chopra Films Private Limited et al. v. John Doe 2010 FC 387 by Hughes, J. concerns a review of a “rolling” Anton Piller order granted by the Federal Court of Canada in a copyright infringement case to an Indian film production company and its Canadian licensee against various un-named persons who (according to the claim) “deal in counterfeit video recordings.”

Pursuant to Justice Zinn’s Order of January 26, 2010, the plaintiffs seized allegedly counterfeit copies of a film entitled “3 Idiots” from a number of defendants who then sought review of the Order.

An Anton Piller . . . [more]

Witty not being an adjective often used to describe legal judgments, it is worthwhile to further highlight a judgment that some might have seen in the Globe and Mail: “Witty judgment wins out in lottery dispute”.

(2009) 98 O.R. (3d) 432 is well worth your time to read, I don’t want to give anything away so I will just add that Justice Quinn makes excellent use of footnotes. . . . [more]

British Columbia, home of Bountiful, the town that boasts a sect of religious polygamists, finally bit the bullet a while back and took steps to clarify the legality of polygamy in Canada. After a false start through criminal charges against two men (see Blackmore v. British Columbia (Attorney General) 2009 BCSC 1299, the province began a reference in the B.C. Supreme Court under the Constitutional Question Act R.S.B.C. 1996, c. 68, s. 1, asking:

a. Is section 293 of the Criminal Code of Canada consistent with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms? If not, in what

. . . [more]

Someone should do the court a favour and introduce the justices to a few teenagers who might explain the technological facts of life.

That’s the only conclusion that one can draw from reading the transcript of Ontario v. Quon, argued yesterday.

As the New York Post headline put it: Supreme Court justices demonstrate extreme lack of tech savvy. . . . [more]

The E-Discovery Canada Case Law Digests (Common Law) have been updated over the weekend. Hosted by LexUM, the Digests, both common law and civil law, are part of the E-Discovery Portal managed by Sedona Canada.

New material relates to: Requests for further production, Demands for particulars, Preservation of evidence, Spoliation, Discovery Plan, Proportion and Marginal Utility, Cost Shifting, Admissibility of Internet Information, Privacy Issues, Third Party Information and Norwich orders, and Anton Piller Orders. . . . [more]

There is an interesting case being heard right now in the Ontario Superior Court (reported in the Financial Post on April 7), which claims that the province’s marijuana prohibition violates the freedom of religion protections in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.