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(Updated Friday with some corrections and minor edits.)

Score another one for the public interest.

On Wednesday, Federal Court Prothonotary Mireille Tabib said yes to CIPPIC’s request to intervene in the Voltage “piracy” case. This order is very positive news in several respects.

(The Samuelson-Glushko Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic describes its mission in part as working “to fill voids in public policy debates on technology law issues, ensure balance in policy and law-making processes, and provide legal assistance to under-represented organizations and individuals on matters involving the intersection of law and technology.”)

1 – Full intervenor status. The Federal Court has put no restraints on CIPPIC’s participation – meaning they will be allowed to cross-examine the plaintiff’s witnesses, a big tactical advantage. The one issue tabled for the hearing judge’s future consideration concerns possible cost awards to CIPPIC. The order sets out the following five conditions for CIPPIC’s participation:

CIPPIC shall be permitted to produce affidavit evidence and to cross-examine the Plaintiff’s affiant.

CIPPIC shall be permitted to make arguments on points of law.

The rights of CIPPIC to seek or its liability to be made subject of any order for costs on the motion shall be determined by the Judge seized of the motion.

CIPPIC shall be served with all materials filed and to be filed by other parties, non-party respondents and Interveners, if any.

The schedule for proceeding on the Plaintiff’s motion pursuant to Rule 238 of the Federal Courts Rules shall be as set out in sub-paragraph 3 of the Order of January 18, 2013.

2 –Marc Gaudrault vindicated. Any minute now, I’m going to retire from the business of arguing that Marc did right by TekSavvy’s customers when he chose in December to push out notices rather than object to the Voltage motion. As I noted in my previous post, this decision created a deep split among pundits and commenters on discussion forums like DSLReports. Two months have gone by and CIPPIC is now officially a friend of the court in this matter. I think it’s high time we all stopped second-guessing Marc so we can focus our attention on what’s shaping up next.

3 – Milestone case. The court has made it eminently clear that this is an important case deserving of the best possible information. In his written reasons for the January 14 adjournment (issued January 31 – pdf), Judge Mandamin reiterated forcefully the points he made in his original oral comments. He notes this case is breaking new ground, with the ink barely dry on the Copyright Modernization Act. A proper airing of the issues means that the court “needs to be as informed as it can be.” His remarks sound to me as though CIPPIC is going to be given a lot of leeway in the arguments it presents.

4 – Customers protected. TekSavvy’s customers now get the benefit not only of the second adjournment, but also of the weapons CIPPIC will bring to bear on Voltage’s case. I spoke by phone today with David Fewer, CIPPIC’s lead counsel, who will be in court for the next round. He told me they will be addressing three major issues.

One concerns the protection of anonymous speakers on the Internet, which Fewer said is inadequate in Canada as the law now stands. He noted this issue is not confined to file-sharing, indicating the adjudication of this case may have ramifications that extend well beyond copyright. Fewer’s second major issue is one we’ve heard discussed at length in the blogosphere: Voltage’s track record in the United States as a copyright troll, whose business model is based on intimidating defendants into “settlements” with no intention of bringing a bona fide case to trial.

Thirdly, Fewer will be taking a close look at the evidence gathered by Canipre, which has been putting a hard sell on its forensic services through its website. That hard sell was conspicuous by its absence in Voltage’s original motion, which says remarkably little about why the company’s technology should inspire awe. The court has already indicated it has many questions of its own about how the evidence should be treated. To cite a further passage from Mandamin’s adjournment order: “What is the link between IP numbers and the alleged copyright infringers? Is it direct or indirect? Is it a link to a device or to an individual?”

That said, I can’t help but add a couple of observations about Michael Geist’s blog post last week on a similar and concurrent piracy case: Distributel Fights Back Against Motion to Disclose Subscriber Information in File Sharing Case. Although some are making Distributel out to be the hero of the day, it turns out Distributel had a change of heart after not objecting to the original motion to disclose, as Michael duly notes. Over at Cartt.ca, Greg O’Brien posted a detailed look at the case (here, behind paywall), which includes this comment:

According to Federal Court documents, back in November of 2012, Distributel was ordered by the court to disclose the names and addresses of customers associated with 27 different IP addresses. At that time, the company didn’t pay much attention to the motion and the subsequent court order (which are commonplace for ISPs) and provided four names associated with 11 of the IP addresses while letting the court know that the rest were unknown to them…

Both Michael and Greg provide a helpful analysis of Distributel’s reasoning in reaction to a further demand from plaintiff NGN for more customer information. Some of that reasoning overlaps what David Fewer outlined to me in our conversation today – especially the quality of the evidence and the troll’s approach to finding revenues. It’s no coincidence that here too the evidence has been provided by Canipre, which is now beginning to look like a major enabler of trolling opportunities in Canada (there are now two plaintiffs in the Distributel action: NGN Prima Productions Inc and Riding Films Inc).

One particular item in the latest Distributel motion (pdf uploaded here) echoes the concern aired in my previous post about the wider implications of this extortion racket for Canada’s smaller independent ISPs – our only hope for some consumer choice and pricing discipline in the residential broadband market. Distributel’s brief puts it thusly: