[A2k] FFII statement to IIM

[Rufus Pollock]

Submission of the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure
WIPO IIM 11th to 13th April 2005


First, at the outset Mr Chairman we would like to congratulate you, as
well as the distinguished Vice-Chair, on your election. We would also
like to thank the WIPO secretariat and its member states for this
opportunity to present our views to you today.

Mr Chairman, distinguished delegates, and others, the Foundation for a
Free Information Infrastructure (FFII) is a non-profit association
registered in several European countries, which is dedicated to the
spread of data processing literacy. FFII supports the development of
public information goods based on copyright, free competition, and open
standards. More than 500 members, 1,200 companies and 75,000 supporters
have entrusted the FFII to act as their voice in public policy questions
concerning exclusion rights (intellectual property) in data processing.

We wish to be brief in our submission and will only emphasize a single
point, and one already clearly raised in the submission by the Friends
of Development to this meeting in which they stated:

	"[para 37] ... Norm-setting at the international level has been
dominated by a paradigm that regards intellectual property rights as the
only and unequivocally beneficial instrument to promote creative
intellectual activity. Increased scope and levels for intellectual
property protection thus often become ends in themselves in
international negotiations, which have failed to take into account the
need to promote and enhance access to knowledge and the results of
innovation ....

These are views we strongly endorse. To us the approach of WIPO often
brings to mind the maxim that for those who possess a hammer everything
is a nail. While IP in the right circumstances can be beneficial,
conversely in the wrong ones it is undoubtedly harmful.

For our constituents this is not just an abstract possibility but a
concrete one. A primary purpose of our organization over the last
several years has been to protect the European software industry from
the threat of software patents. For we believe that patents on software
hinder rather than help innovation as well as fundamentally undermining
the creation of the free and open standards necessary to sustain our
information infrastructures into the 21st century. Our view is not
simply opinion but is backed by a large body of evidence, to give one
example among many, Deustche bank wrote in a report of June last year
that: 'Stronger IP protection is not always better. Chances are that
patents on software, common practice in the US and on the brink of being
legalised in Europe, in fact stifle innovation.'

Yet without any basis in either theory or fact a variety of WIPO
documents have uncritically endorsed more and stronger IP as beneficial
for the software industry. For example WIPO's publication 'Intellectual
Property: A Power Tool for Economic Growth' uncompromisingly states in
its preface: 'This publication is written from a definite perspective --
that IP is good.' In our view this is simply not the case: IP is neither
good nor bad but only a tool -- in some cases the benefits of IP
outweigh the costs and in other cases they will not, how could it be
otherwise? Such pronouncements only serve to encourage the view that,
for WIPO, increased IP rights become ends in themselves, even when such
rights harm the public interest, reducing access to knowledge, limiting
innovation, obstructing competition and imposing large costs that fall
most heavily on countries least able to bear them.

We believe that a refocusing of WIPO's mission towards greater balance
in the use of IP as well as the use of alternative methods of fostering
creativity and innovation can only enhance the prestige of this body.
Moreover it will also, more importantly, vastly increase the benefits
and reduce the costs for its members of the agreements reached here.
Thank you for your attention.