The Future is Here

Have an event tonight and don’t have anything to wear? Perhaps you can just print a dress at home. That’s right, it is now becoming possible to print 3 dimensional products from your home computer for your own personal use. Dita von Teese was quick to take advantage of this development in technology last month at an event in London.

Obviously, 3d printing has significant implications for consumer goods industry as a whole, in addition to the intellectual property law world.

CanadaFashionLaw teamed up with a colleague, Paul Banwatt (who is also a Juno-nominated artist) to discuss the implications of 3d printing.  Click here for the full article.

Think Twice Before Hitting “Send”

If you have a strong communications component to your business (and let’s face it, who doesn’t), you’d better take note. Canada is attempting to get rid of all those pesky spam e-mails and text messages through Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation (“CASL”), which is slated to come into effect in 2013.

This new legislation is somewhat contentious as it has been criticized as being too broad and vague, which could detrimentally affect how businesses communicate with their actual and prospective clients. CASL targets “any electronic message” that is sent “for business purposes”, which could extend to e-mails, instant messages, text messages and possibly even Facebook and Twitter messages. As you can see, CASL’s reach could be quite wide!

Generally, if you have an existing business relationship with an entity, your business’ messages won’t be caught by CASL. However, be careful if an official business relationship does not exist. Consent to receive the messages is critical and opt-out clauses are unlikely to suffice.

Stay tuned for developments on this.

CanadaFashionLaw Talks Shop

Last week was a pretty big week for CanadaFashionLaw.  The week started with a publication in the University of Toronto Alumni magazine authored by yours truly that looks at the wider ramifications of the fashion industry.  Next up, CanadaFashionLaw participated in a heated debate at the Royal Ontario Museum with fashion heavy hitters including Jeanne Beker, which garnerd significant media coverage.  Finally, the week ended with a trip to Chicago for a fashion law symposium at the John Marshall Law School, where CanadaFashionLaw participated in a comparative panel that looked at protecting fashion designs in Canada, America and Mexico.

All in all, it was a fantastic fashion law week!

Grassroots Model Movement Gains Traction

Over the past few years, CanadaFashionLaw has followed a grassroots movement within the modelling community.  Models are taking it upon themselves to cohesively promote certain workplace standards.  In some instances, modelling groups have issued a Bill of Rights.  Although more ‘policy’ than binding law, it was a serious step toward formalizing workplace standards for models. 

Yesterday’s announcement that Vogue UK signed a legally binding contract to promote ethical workplace standards for its models is a big step forward.  Below are some of the terms:

  • models will be treated with ‘respect and professionalism’
  • they will not be degraded or demeaned
  • all meals and beverages will be provided on set
  • models will approve any partial or full nudity
  • the working day will be limited to 10 hours a day, with regular breaks
  • models under the age of 16 will not be used to represent adults (it’s about bloody time!)
  • all young models will be chaperoned by an adult

In any other industry, these standards would be, well, standard,  Although this is a great step forward, CanadaFashioLaw can’t help but be saddened by the fact that it is a step forward.