Concordia riled the video star

The management of the student-run television station at Montreal's Concordia University has clashed with students over copyright.

In its constitution the campus station claims to own all copyright and distribution rights to its students' productions. Student producers who copy videos of their own work are violating station rules.

However, the Canadian Copyright Act stipulates that an author is the automatic owner of their original work.

One student producer, told he would not be able to own the documentary he was to make, decided to forego a showing on the student station. He produced the film independently using the university media service's equipment.

The station is claiming copyright because it says it wants to prevent individual producers from profiting over the other crew members on a production. A station representative denied that students are prevented from simply taking home a copy of the piece they produced.

The Canadian Copyright Act overrides any organisation's internal regulations, and the university's student union has been trying to convince the station that its rule against copying is legally untenable.