The Brand is the Message: Speaking at Ryerson

I am looking forward to teaching tonight at the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson University. I enjoy teaching, and the mission for tonight’s seminar course is to explore the basics of trade-mark law and, hopefully, make it come to life. What is it, why is it there, and since we have it, what can we do with it?

Apple. Google. Nike. Hermes. It isn’t easy being a brand.

As a lawyer and trade-mark agent, it is one thing to be inside the machinery of the process and to help clients navigate the legalese, technicalities and risks associated with using and enforcing trade-marks. However, it is also exciting to be part of the process of helping a brand come to life and keep its legs in the marketplace. Teaching, and sharing perspectives with business law students on how trade-marks support their business strategies should be a great discussion. Trade-marks and brands: you can’t have one without the other? If you build the brand, will they come? We’ll find out tonight.

The (R)evolution Continues: Interactive & Digital Media

I am looking forward to speaking tomorrow at the Ontario Bar Association conference “Interactive and Digital Media: The (R)evolution Continues.” On the panel “Branded Content and Video and Online Games,” I will discuss advertising and privacy risks, as well as challenges advertisers and content producers face when negotiating agreements to create branded content. We will also look at intellectual property and personality rights issues, and the role of social media, user generated content and virtual worlds. Other panels will examine the first six months of the Canada Media Fund, the guidelines of the Documentary Organization of Canada’s Fair Dealing and Copyright Guidelines, and there will be a discussion and Q&A on new distribution platforms for content in the world of digital media.

Click here for OBA website conference registration page and brochure.

Kids & Privacy: INplay 2010

I am looking forward to speaking today at Interactive Ontario’s INplay 2010 conference. My panel will be this afternoon: “Kids & Privacy: What Are You Doing With My Stuff?“

* Jennifer Lord, Producer of Online Communities, Corus Entertainment – Moderator
* Arni Stinnissen, Toddington International
* Jeanette Lee, Lawyer, Stohn Hay Cafazzo Dembroski Richmond LLP
* Marie Morency-Lee, Manager, TVO

“How have recent developments in technology changed how we deal with privacy? What are the new considerations? What about mobile? How do kids engage in social networks? How do we make them safe? What constitutes safety (and risk)? Who is doing it right and who is doing it wrong?”

INplay 2010

This should be a great discussion. Arni Stinnissen will start the session with a brief talk about kids online, privacy and security issues. He is a former Detective Staff Sergeant the Ontario Provincial Police, and Manager of the OPP’s Electronic Crime Section, now an educator, speaker and trainer with Toddington International. There will be much to discuss, in terms of how adults and kids use current technology, technology here and yet to come, law, self-regulation and policy, and the risks and competing interests of those who share information in the interactive media space, and others that wish to use that information for other purposes, commercial or otherwise. It will be interesting to see where the discussion leads, looking at multiple perspectives: security, media, interactive, marketing, legal – and users. I anticipate discussion around the benefits and failures of self-regulation versus legislation, to address privacy concerns.

Kids & privacy is a timely subject, since in the last few months online privacy has been front and centre in news and policy, in Canada and the U.S. To name a few examples: new proposed U.S. bills, COPPA review, privacy roundtables, white papers, Google (pick your service), and – Facebook. Of course, the power of Facebook to reach many has already been in discussion at INplay. Facebook and privacy will continue to be a hot topic, particularly given the most recent reports of alleged internal debates about (more) proposed changes to Facebook privacy settings. Some reports say the changes to further “simplfy” the settings may be implemented within weeks.

Hope to see some of you at INplay today!