The result of the case became a major factor in the following growth of the Canadian cable television industry.
A football game was broadcast live from the stadium by a set of three cameras directed by a producer in a van just outside the venue.
Rediffusion, a cable company, captured the transmission of the broadcast and sold it to private homes and public show rooms.
Cameron J held that "[f]or copyright to subsist in a work, it must be expressed to some extent at least in some material form, capable of identification and having a more or less permanent endurance."
[1] Canadian Admiral was not followed by the Federal Court of Appeal in the 1993 case of Canadian Cable Television Assn v Canada ( Copyright Board ), in which Létourneau JA held that other Commonwealth rulings that have considered when a performance takes place[a] "take a realistic view of the impact and effect of technological developments and they are consistent with the plain and usual meaning of the words 'in public', that is to say openly, without concealment and to the knowledge of all.