The Supreme Court of Canada will release decisions on the 5 pending copyright proceedings on Thursday morning. The proceedings were taken under reserve last December and raise issues of communications to the public, previewing music, music in online games, educational fair dealing, and music in soundtracks.

I previously itemized these copyright proceedings when they were heard by the Supreme Court in December. The cases are:

• Entertainment Software Association et al. v. SOCAN (#33921) on whether a tariff is appropriate for music contained within games downloaded over the internet.
• Rogers Communications Inc. et al. v. SOCAN (#33922) which raises the issue of whether a communication to an individual over the internet is a ‘communication to the public’.
• SOCAN v. Bell Canada et al. (#33800) which relates to the previewing of music and whether that activity falls within the ‘fair dealing’ research exception.
• Province of Alberta as represented by the Minister of Education, et al. v. Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency Operating as “Access Copyright” (#33888) which relates to the educational use exception to fair dealing.
• Re:Sound v. Motion Picture Theatre Associations of Canada, et al. (SCC case #34210) which relates to whether separate tariffs apply sound recording is part of the soundtrack that are made available to the public.

The Copyright Act is in the process of being amended including on issues that may affect the pending proceedings such as fair dealing in education.

The Supreme Court also announced today that it will release decisions on leave applications on two patent infringement actions Schering Corporation et al. v. Apotex Inc. et al. (Ramipril – 34600) and Apotex Inc. et al. v. Merck & Co. Inc. et al. (Lovastatin – 34676).

More information about these and other intellectual property proceedings at the Supreme Court are available on my Supreme Court litigation page.