''Canadian Admiral Corporation Ltd. v. Rediffusion Inc.'',

954 Year 954 ( CMLIV) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Europe * Spring – A Hungarian army led by Bulcsú crosses the Rhine. He camps at Worms in th ...

Ex. CR 382, 20 CPR 75 is a

Canadian copyright law The copyright law of Canada governs the legally enforceable rights to creative and artistic works under the laws of Canada. Canada passed its first colonial copyright statute in 1832 but was subject to imperial copyright law established by Britain ...

decision by the Exchequer Court (a predecessor of the

Federal Court of Canada The Federal Court of Canada, which succeeded the Exchequer Court of Canada in 1971, was a national court of Canada that had limited jurisdiction to hear certain types of disputes arising under the federal government's legislative jurisdiction. ...

). The Court held that rebroadcasting of public performances by cable companies did not violate any communication rights or public performance rights. There cannot be copyright in telecasting live events because there is insufficient fixation. The result of the case became a major factor in the following growth of the Canadian

cable television Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with broa ...

industry.

Background

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

game was broadcast live from the stadium by a set of three cameras directed by a producer in a van just outside the venue. The game was not recorded in any format and was broadcast live to viewers. Canadian Admiral has purchased the rights to the live feed from the game. Rediffusion, a cable company, captured the transmission of the broadcast and sold it to private homes and public show rooms. Canadian Admiral sued for copyright infringement. The issue was whether Canadian Admiral owned any copyright in the football game.

Opinion of the Court

The Court held that there was no copyright in the rebroadcast of a live game. As a general rule there can be no copyright in a sports event. The games are not pre-planned and not predictable. Moreover, the live direction by the producer was an insufficient amount of planning to create any fixation. Cameron J held that " r copyright to subsist in a work, it must be expressed to some extent at least in some material form, capable of identification and having a more or less permanent endurance."

Aftermath

While the '' Copyright Act'' has never expressly made material form a condition of copyright subsistence, ''Canadian Admiral'' suggested that it was required. However, that is not to imply that a work cannot arise without fixation. ''Canadian Admiral'' was not followed by the

Federal Court of Appeal The Federal Court of Appeal (french: Cour d'appel fédérale) is a Canadian appellate court that hears cases concerning federal matters. History Section 101 of the Constitution Act, 1867 empowers the Parliament of Canada to establish "addit ...

in the 1993 case of ''Canadian Cable Television Assn v Canada ( Copyright Board )'', in which Létourneau JA held that other Commonwealth rulings that have considered when a performance takes place "take a realistic view of the impact and effect of technological developments and they are consistent with the plain and usual meaning of the words 'in public', that is to say openly, without concealment and to the knowledge of all."

Background

Opinion of the Court

Aftermath

See also

Notes

References

Further reading