The Open Rights Group : Blog Archive » WIPO Broadcast Treaty scheduled for further scrutiny - [del.icio.us wipo feed]

There's been a bunch of press about this round of WIPO meetings. Check out the WIPO Roundtable Roundup from Public Knowledge. Excerpt: "Very little new ground was broken at today’s USPTO’s WIPO Broadcast Treaty roundtable at the agency’s beautiful headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia Of course I am biased, but I would say that the opponents of the current treaty got the better of the proponents. The proponents, led by NAB Senior Associate General Counsel Ben Ivins essentially justified the need for a 50 year IP right in broadcast signals on the basis that broadcasters “invest” in their signals and that because 83 countries (but not the US and 99 other countries) have signed on to the Rome Convention that gives broadcasters a 20 year intellectual property-like right in their signals, the US should have it too [...]

Quite interesting survey of open content projects in non-western regions. For thinking about a2k outside the west also see the copy/south dossier. More on the open content survey from Open Access News: Openflows.org releases today a survey of open content
projects in five non-western regions: Arab countries, Sub-Saharan Africa,
India, Brazil and South East and Eastern Europe. The aim of the study is
to assess the potential of the open content production process for areas
and fields which are under served by the commercial players. While we

WIPO Development Agenda Talks End With No Agreement For Now - After two week-long meetings and intensive consultations during the year, talks on bolstering the development perspective of the World Intellectual Property Organization ended today with no agreement, sending proposals back to the UN body’s annual meeting of member states in September. But a continuation of the debate in some form ... [IP Watch]

[from TWN:] The second day of discussions on the WIPO development agenda
witnessed continuing differences between developed and developing countries, with some differences also in approach among developing countries. Below is a report on Tuesday afternoon's discussions of WIPO's Provisional Committee that covered the remaining 4 of the 6 negotiation clusters, namely, (C) Technology Transfer, Information and Communication Technology; (D) Assessments, Evaluation and Impact Studies; (E) Institutional Matters including Mandate and Governance; and (F) Other Issues. There are 111 proposals in the list of 6 clusters that are under discussion.

I've been thinking about the way that WIPO trains thousands in the basics of IPRs. For example, see their online courses at http://www.wipo.int/academy/en/courses/distance_learning/catalog/c_index.html. There are a couple of good responses that the A2K community could develop: 1. make our own online training materials in A2K/Knowledge Sharing/Commons 101. 2. See if it's possible to force WIPO to include Commons alternatives in their own IPR training materials. That would be a real coup. (schock)

About 150 people are meeting this week in Bangkok for the Asia Commons conference. It's a really interesting lineup of speakers and participants, discussing and strategizing what an Asian Knowledge Commons would mean and how to get there in terms of policy, technology, discourse, and so on. To follow it check out the resources page at the conference website, or if you want to follow blow by blow in the conference chat room check out chat.indymedia.org

The World Health Assembly has passed a resolution to increase research and development on diseases that have disproportionate impacts in developing countries. It's unclear at the moment how much language on open access, public domain, and exceptions to IPRs has made it into the resolution. For commentary and analysis see the following stories: Good WHA resolution could be better | Agreement Reached On IP And Public Health Resolution At WHO | WHA Adopts Milestone Declaration | WHA Adopts Resolution Tying Public Health to Trade Policy | Agreement Reached on IP and Public Health Resolution at WHO.

World Health Assembly Debates New Draft Text Merging IP Resolutions (By Tove Iren S. Gerhardsen and William New, IPWatch): A drafting group at the UN World Health Assembly today suggested a possible merger of two key intellectual property resolutions, including the establishment a global strategy and plan of action for research into diseases disproportionately affecting poor countries with action to be taken ... [IP Watch]

This is a really interesting article about the recent growth of Open Access journals and databases: Update on growth of OA - Heather Morrison, The Dramatic Growth of Open Access: March 31, 2006 Update, Imaginary Journal of Poetic Economics, March 31, 2006. Excerpt: In the last quarter, over 780,000 records have been added to OAIster, suggesting that those open access archives are beginning to fill! There are 170 more titles in DOAJ, likely an understated increase due to a weeding project. 78 titles have been added to DOAJ in the past 30 days, a growth rate of more than 2 new titles per day. Disciplinary archives are showing remarkable growth. E-LIS has been increasing at the equivalent of 56% annually. Differences in growth rates suggest the possibility of a life-cycle factor in open access archives growth, perhaps initial slow growth, followed by very rapid growth, then a more steady growth as the archive matures....The most notable increase is the addition of over 780,000 records to OAIster, the equivalent of a 50% annual increase. This rate of increase doubles that of 2005 (25%). This evidence suggests that those open access institutional archives are beginning to fill! Among the disciplinary archives examined, the highest growth rate was shown at E-LIS, with an equivalent of a 56% annual increase.

Analysis from FSF Europe: WIPO PCDA conlusion - learning English the hard way.

For an overview of the current stage of events re: WIPO development agenda, see http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/pcda/ This is info from the First session of the Provisional Committee on Proposals Related to the WIPO Development Agenda (PCDA) February 20- 24, 2006, in Geneva, Switzerland. There are links here to analysis from IP Watch, Third World Network, EFF, FSF, CPTech and others. Also see del.icio.us wipo feed.

WIPO Copyright Advice Deemed Misleading To Developing Countries - By Tove Iren S. Gerhardsen and William New

Non-governmental organisations attending this week’s meeting on a stronger development agenda for the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) are working to remind participants of the key elements of the original proposals. In so doing, one group found shrinking knowledge in the public domain ... [IP Watch]

WIPO Development Meeting Starts Slowly Despite Push For Strong Reform - By Tove Iren S. Gerhardsen and William New

A meeting on a development agenda at the World Intellectual Property Organization got off to a slow start after a half-day debate over who would chair the meeting. This took place in contrast to efforts of key developing nations to keep negotiations on ... [IP Watch]

Take action! Help stop the WIPO broadcast/netcast treaty - It's like the DMCA, but worse. [free software foundation] NY fair use have also created an action, and you can find out more background information on the Xcaster treaty from IPJustice.

From EFF: Your Senator Needs an iPod - IPac starts a campaign to bring modern, innovative technology into the hands of Senators--so they'll know first hand what the flag laws could do to interoperability and fair use. [EFF miniLinks]

LDCs Agree To Shorter Extension For TRIPS Implementation - Least-developed members of the World Trade Organization on 29 November agreed to extend the transition period for implementing the WTO agreement on intellectual property rights by seven and a half years, a reduction by half of their original request.

In addition, least developed countries agreed not to roll back on their ... [IP Watch]

A must-read: The Adelphi Charter - Criteria for copyright, patents, trademarks and other intellectual property in the 21st Century - [del.icio.us copyfight feed]

From IP Watch: Interview With WIPO Deputy Director General Rita Hayes - Member governments of the UN World Intellectual Property Organisation at their 26 September to 5 October General Assemblies agreed on a way to proceed with negotiations for a treaty on broadcasters’ rights. They will prepare a “basic proposal,” or draft negotiating text, during 2006 with an eye toward holding a ... [IP Watch]

A good summary of the outcome of the WIPO General Assembly: IP Justice: WIPO - NGO Statement for IIM/3 - [del.icio.us wipo feed]

[A2k] WIPO Assembly: WIPO creates "Provisional Committee" for Development Agenda - [del.icio.us wipo feed]

U.S. Holds Out On Extension Of High-Level Meeting On Development Agenda - After a week of meetings at the World Intellectual Property Organisation General Assembly, the United States is possibly alone in firmly objecting to the continuation of a high-level meeting on a proposal for a WIPO development agenda.

The proposal for cross-cutting reform of WIPO toward developing country concerns was first ... [IP Watch]