The Third Access to Knowledge Global Conference is taking place right now in Geneva.   Access to Knowledge (A2K) is a proposed development-friendly (as opposed to intellectual-property-as-commodity) agenda for the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).  Follow the talks on the conference blog.  Thanks to Peter Suber on Open Access News.

The SLAIS Info Policy Class (LIBR 561) has started!  Students are asked to view the Info Policy blog, so now would be a good time to get back from vacation mode and into posting mode.

LIBR 561 is taught by Devon Greyson and Heather Morrison, with lots of help from speakers from the IPC - thanks!!.  (If you are interested in speaking or visiting the class, please get in touch with Heather).

The class wiki is available at http://wiki.elearning.ubc.ca/InfoPolicy  Watch the wiki throughout the term, as students will be taking on topic leads and posting links to readings and discussion questions.

From Tectonic:

The South African Cabinet today announced that it had approved a free and open source strategy and that government would migrate its current software to free and open source software.

At a Cabinet media briefing government said that it had “approved a policy and strategy for the implementation of free and open source software (FOSS) in government”http://www.tectonic.co.za/wordpress/?p=1377

Thanks to the Jennifer Bell on the civicaccess discussion list.

PolicyArchive is an open access archive for documents on public policy research.  Thanks to Peter Suber on Open Access News.

Telecentre is a global community of people and organizations who share a vision of a world where people everywhere have the opportunity to access technology and use it to join the knowledge economy on their own terms.  Telecentre is an initiative of Canada’s International Development and Research Centre (IDRC), Microsoft, and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC).

My letter to my MP about the Canadian DMCA is posted here.    Now I wish I’d see the Are You a Copyright Criminal video Tara posted first!

The battle for fair copyright in Canada is heating up!  Check out this graphic novel explaining the history of the “Canadian DMCA”, through this link from culturelibre.ca Une bande dessinée en attendant la loi

(Note:  the graphic novel itself is in english).

From Michael Geist:  Thursday, June 12, 2008 is Canadian DMCA Day

Canada launches privacy probe into Facebook
Associated Press, June 2, 2008

Canada’s federal privacy commissioner has launched an investigation into Facebook after four students complained that the popular Web site violates Canadian law by disclosing personal information to advertisers without proper consent. The University of Ottawa law students, some of whom are dedicated Facebook users, allege in a complaint lodged Friday that the social networking Web site has committed 22 violations of the law.
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hpMWm7pPdLssNR9Uu4OksMSOpZcgD910STD80

Michael Geist has posted an Unofficial Canadian DMCA Background Document.  In brief, Canada’s new copyright bill is expected to be introduced this Wednesday afternoon, with minimal opportunities for questions and debate.