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In a decision delivered on May 10, 2016, the Federal Court of Canada determined that no facts contained in a documentary are protected by copyright.  The Court asserted “Facts are facts; and no one owns copyright in them no matter what their relative size or significance,” and further emphasized that “using an actual fact from [a documentary] is not infringement no matter how large or small, significant or insignificant, such a fact may be.”

In a decision delivered on April 21, 2016, the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench ruled that copyright can subsist in seismic data.  While facts and ideas are not protected by copyright, the Court held that “the raw or field seismic data is an original literary compilation work and the processed data is both an original literary compilation work and an artistic compilation work in the scientific domain. As such, they are protected under s 3 of the Copyright Act.”