Author: Anthony Rosborough
Abstract: This analysis examines the legal implications of technological protection measures (“TPMs”) under Canada’s Copyright Act. Through embedded computing systems and proprietary interfaces, TPMs are being used by original equipment manufacturers (“OEMs”) of agricultural equipment to preclude reverse engineering and follow-on innovation. This has anti-competitive effects on Canada’s “shortline” agricultural equipment industry, which produces add-on or peripheral equipment used with OEM machinery. This requires interoperability between the interfaces, data formats, and physical connectors, which are often the subject of TPM control. Exceptions under the Act have provided little assistance to the shortline industry.
The research question posed by this analysis is: how does the Canadian Copyright Act’s protection for TPMs and its interoperability exception impact follow-on innovation in secondary markets?
Canada’s protection for TPMs and its interoperability exception is inadequate for protecting follow-on innovation in relation to computerised machinery and embedded systems. This is due to the Act’s broad protection for TPMs, yet limited conceptualisation of interoperability as a process that exists only between two “computer programs”. In legally protecting TPMs which safeguard uncopyrightable processes, data formats and interfaces, the Act’s interoperability exception fails to address the need to access subjects of TPM protection that extend beyond computer programs. This results in an asymmetry of protection and renders the interoperability exception inadequate.
The article proposes enacting regulations under the Act to provide new exceptions and limitations to TPM protections which would enable shortline innovation. Both the Copyright Act and the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement envision such additional TPM exceptions where the effect of protection has adverse effects on competition in a secondary market. In exploring a path forward for Canada’s shortline industry, the article then examines approaches taken in the United States and France to illustrate potential avenues for TPM regulation in Canada.
Citation: Rosborough, Anthony, If a Machine Could Talk, We Would Not Understand It: Canadian Innovation and the Copyright Act’s TPM Interoperability Framework (April 23, 2021). (2021) 19 J L & Tech [Forthcoming]., Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3848830
QUT Media4th November 2025 The United Kingdom Parliament is considering a bill aimed at making smoking obsolete, which has been
Speaking at the Global Expert Network on Copyright User Rights Symposium on 16 June 2025, Professor Christophe Geiger argues for
On 25 September 2025, Professor Wend Wendland, delivered the 14th Peter Jaszi Distinguished Lecture at American University in Washington D.C..
On September 18, 2025, the Italian Senate definitively approved the country’s first comprehensive framework law on artificial intelligence (AI). The
Por Andrés Izquierdo Durante la segunda semana de agosto, fui invitado a hablar en la Feria Internacional del Libro de
By Andrés Izquierdo AI, Copyright, and the Future of Creativity: Notes from the Panama International Book FairDuring the second week