Is posting on the internet the same as broadcasting? That is a question in front of the courts in a libel case.

The York University Excalibur has an interesting story about motions being heard in the case of professor David Noble claiming he was defamed by Canadian Jewish Congress Ontario Region, Hillel of Greater Toronto, the United Jewish Appeal of Greater Toronto, as well as the York University Foundation and various individuals, including outgoing York University president Lorna Marsden.

As tempting as it may be to comment on the merits of the case, I’ll focus on the motion to throw out the suit. The motion is based on the view that under Ontario’s Libel and Slander Act, the statute of limitations is only 6 weeks for cases involving broadcasting. Under normal circumstances, individuals have two years to commence a personal libel case.

The CRTC’s treatment of the internet is not as relevant as Ontario’s libel law definition of broadcasting.

“broadcasting” means the dissemination of writing, signs, signals, pictures and sounds of all kinds, intended to be received by the public either directly or through the medium of relay stations, by means of,

1. any form of wireless radioelectric communication utilizing Hertzian waves, including radiotelegraph and radiotelephone, or
2. cables, wires, fibre-optic linkages or laser beams

Sounds like the internet could fit under this definition, right?

Except for a 2003 Ontario Appeals Court ruling in Bahlieda vs Santa. That case points to Section 7 of the Libel Act that that the abbreviated statute of limitations “apply only to newspapers printed and published in Ontario and to broadcasts from a station in Ontario.”

There is also the open question of whether the existence of the content constitutes retransmission of the material. The issues in Bahlieda vs Santa, a case which was highlighted in Michael Geist’s 2003 A-Z year in review, aren’t going away.

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libel, Bahlieda, Santa, York University, David Noble

Over the past few weeks, I received email messages from Merx telling me to “Take Advantage of Year-End Public Spending” and “Government Year-End Means Iincreased [sic] Tender Postings”.

Merx is the public tendering portal for many levels of government and for some private sector companies.

Obviously, suppliers to the government like the year-end rush to spend remaining money in the budget.

Would you run your business that way? How do most CEOs respond to people spending on the basis of ‘use it or lose it’? As a former telco boss of mine used to say when we were reviewing the capital program, “if this was your candy store, would you spend the money?”

I trust that departments are prudently spending consistent with meeting their objectives. I also hope suppliers are offering financial incentives so that we, the taxpayers, feel comfortable that we’re getting good ‘year-end’ public savings to go along with that year-end public spending.

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MERX

Mark Evans recently wrote that less regulation in telecom will mean less competition. It is an interesting viewpoint, but conversely, is it reasonable to believe that more regulation will lead to more competition?

From a consumer perspective, do we want to rely on a government-managed marketplace for communications services? Mark’s posting says

The fundamental problem, however, with deregulation in Canada is it comes after decades of micro-management by the CRTC…

Surely the answer can’t be continued regulation and government micro-management.

Would the marketplace for highspeed services be more competitive with someone else owning Inukshuk? Should someone other than Rogers have purchased Microcell? We would have had additional market participants, but where were the alternate bidders?

There was no government decree ordering Bell and Rogers to make these purchases. Microcell and Inukshuk were sold to the highest bidders. The shareholders and creditors would have insisted on that.

Any other potential buyers felt that they couldn’t afford to pay the same price. Why then, would the government prohibit the sale of these companies to the highest bidder?

If the government had intervened, then the alternate buyer would have ended paying less than market prices for the companies, distorting the economics of the marketplace.

You might have been able to enjoy lower prices, but at what cost to investors and shareholders? Under that scenario, the buyer of this subsidized asset would have a lower than normal cost base with which to compete against the incumbents.

Would consumers benefit from lower prices through such an expropriation of shareholder value? Or would the new owners benefit from higher profits because a government restriction on one set of companies creates extraordinary value for the buyer? What kind of climate are we creating for investment in infrastructure?

On the surface, it may be appealing to have government intervention to try to increase the level of competition, but what are the unintended consequences?

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Inukshuk, mobile, Rogers, Bell, Microcell, spectrum auction