Can an independent author obtain the same results as the original author?

Copyright in relation to a work gives its owner a monopoly on producing or reproducing the work or any substantial part thereof (Copyright Act, s. 3). In other words, copyright protection confers the right to prevent copying of the work. The act of copying is an essential ingredient of copyright infringement. If an independent author arrives at the same results through independent means rather than copying, therefore, there is no copyright infringement: see Hutton v. Canadian Broadcasting Corp. (1992), 1992 ABCA 39 (CanLII), 41 C.P.R. (3d) 45, at p. 48. Moreover, copyright protects a particular fixed expression of an idea; it does not protect the idea per se. An owner of copyright therefore has no monopoly on the use of the idea that his work expresses.