Articles

At some point in their careers, most IT practitioners deal with open source software. Open source software presents a conceptual challenge to those who are used to dealing with the traditional proprietary licensing model in that, in a typical open source software license...

In the fall of 2011, the Ontario Bar Association’s Information Technology and Electronic Commerce Section hosted two ethics and professionalism programs.

The conception and regulation of privacy in today’s Internet-driven world is an evolving issue, as highlighted in the discussion at the OBA Information Technology and E-Commerce Section seminar on “Mobile Computing & Privacy” held on May 3, 2011.

A spate of recent patent purchases indicate the strength of the market for mobile computing, including smart phones and tablets. For example, earlier this year a consortium led by Microsoft outbid Google for Nortel’s patent portfolio of roughly 6000 patents and applications.

The use of open source software (OSS) is approaching its third decade but there remain many misconceptions and uncertainties regarding the legal effect of OSS licenses. There are many reasons for this. The chief reason, no doubt, is that while at its heart the concept of OSS is simple, in practice the effects of OSS licensing are complex.