GVU Brown Bag Seminar: Jon Festinger

Speaker:

Jon Festinger

Title:

"Legal Constraints on Digital Creativity; Digital Media Demands on Legal Creativity"

Abstract:

The invention of digital worlds has resulted in changes that could scarcely be imagined, with much more to come. Among the most profound changes is a fundamental shift in our conception and understanding of what “creativity” means and how it manifests. With today's tools it is clearer than ever that being a creator is everyone's destiny.

Travelling a mile in the shoes of the creator can helps focus on how intended meanings are altered as a direct consequence of legal constraints and uncertainties. Because today's legal perspectives remain fundamentally "rights based" the law has notoriously become a source of uncertainty and even fear to creators. The most obvious example being the paradox of how the creative "rights" associated with freedom of speech can exist alongside intellectual property "rights". How is it that creativity is in fact restrained and reshaped even while “freedom of speech” is acknowledged?

Does creativity have to be diminished or can the legal system be hacked for its own good?"

Bio:

Jon Festinger, Q.C. (LL.B., B.C.L. 1980 (McGill University)) is a Vancouver, British Columbia based counsel and educator. A faculty member at the Centre for Digital Media (http://thecdm.ca) Jon has taught media, entertainment and communications law topics at the UBC Faculty of Law for over two decades, as well as occasionally teaching at the University of Victoria Faculty of Law and the UBC Graduate School of Journalism. He is the author of the first edition of “Video Game Law” published by LexisNexis in 2005, co-author of the 2nd Edition published in 2012 (http://www.lexisnexis.com/store/ca/catalog/booktemplate/productdetail.js...), and the author of “Mapping the Electronic Highway: A Survey of Domestic and International Law Issues” 1995, Volume 29, University of British Columbia Law Review. As a graduate of McGill University's Faculty of Law, Jon began his legal career in private practice, in turn becoming General Counsel of WIC Western International Communications, Senior Vice President of the CTV Television Network and Executive Vice President, Business & General Counsel of the Vancouver Canucks. Jon practices law through Festinger Law & Strategy, is Vice Chair of Ronald McDonald House British Columbia, a Director of City Opera Vancouver, a Director of the eatART Foundation, and a Trustee of the Simon Fraser University Foundation. Jon has been a Trustee of the Jack Webster Foundation, a Director of the CKNW Orphans Fund, a Director of the Vancouver Board of Trade, a Director of the British Columbia Association of Broadcasters, a Director of Canadian Women in Communications (national), Chair of the Canadian Bar Association Media & Communications Law Section (national), and a member of the “Working Group on Canadian Programming and Private Television convened by theMinister of Canadian Heritage in 1994 and which authored “The Future of Canadian Programming and the Role of Private Television: Keeping Canada on the Information Highway.”