[Ecommerce] [Fwd: [Broadcast-discuss] UPD Position on the Treaty]

[Manon Anne Ress]

This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
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The WIPO Committee on Copyright and Related Rights is meeting next week
(June 7-9) in Geneva.  Comments on the chairman's draft or the NGO
proposal are welcome.  Please find the Union for the Public Domain
statement on the proposed Broacasters treaty in the forwarded message.
Manon
http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/wipo-casting.html
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Manon Anne Ress
Consumer Project on Technology
www.cptech.org
PO Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036
manon.ress@cptech.org, voice: 1.202.387.8030, fax: 1.202.234.5176
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From: David Tannenbaum <davidt@public-domain.org>
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To: broadcast-discuss@lists.essential.org
Subject: [Broadcast-discuss] UPD Position on the Treaty
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Date: Sat, 05 Jun 2004 17:34:00 +0100

(http://www.public-domain.org/?q=3Dnode/view/38)


UPD Resolution on the WIPO Casting Treaty
-----------------------------------------

1) The proposed WIPO "Treaty on the Protection of Broadcasting
Organisations" threatens to encroach on the public domain for the
following reasons:

a) This treaty would give broadcasters the power to control all
recording and use of broadcasts. Other international agreements, such as
TRIPS, give countries the option of granting these powers only to
copyright holders. With this treaty each program or piece that is
broadcast could be controlled by both copyright holders and broadcasters
at the same time. Users of broadcast material would then have to get
=93clearance=94 from both groups, creating harmful burdens for the public.

b) Currently, if countries decide to give special powers to
broadcasters, they only have to grant these powers for twenty years.
This treaty would require countries that sign the treaty to extend the
length of broadcasters=92 powers to fifty years. The twenty years is
already longer than the effective life of a patent, and four times as
long as the US government restricts the use of data on clinical trials
for pharmaceutical drugs. With the proposed extension, WIPO would set a
precedent that governments should give investors the long periods of
control over works that have only been granted to authors and other
creative works.

c) The treaty would give broadcasters exceptional powers over materials
that are in the public domain, cannot be copyrighted, or were created by
third parties who have no interest in suppressing distribution.
Broadcasters would receive these powers simply by transmitting
materials. This is a much lower bar than copyright, which does not grant
authors and artists control unless there is originality and creativity
involved. Even controversial powers granted to database compilers
require substantial investment. Giving broadcasters 50 years of control
every time something is broadcast is in effect equivalent to granting an
endlessly renewable copyright, with no standards for originality,
creativity or substantial investment.

d) Since many public domain works are available only when transmitted by
broadcasters, requiring countries to grant fifty years of power and
control to broadcasters would dramatically shrink the public domain.
There is no economic or moral rationale for this extension.

e) The definition of "webcasting" in Article 2(g), Alternative C, is so
broadly drawn that it could be interpreted as granting control over
nearly all transmissions of images and sounds over the internet and
internet-like networks.

f) The WIPO treaty requires signatories to outlaw the circumvention of
technology locks that prevent fair use. One version of the treaty would
even outlaw the sale or provision of any device capable of decrypting a
program signal. Broadcasters can use these locks to prevent uses of
broadcasts that are clearly for the public good, such as the ability to
archive public domain works for preservation and historical interest.

g) A prohibition against "formalities," means that broadcasters won't
have to indicate their control over any particular broadcast, which will
make it difficult to know who "owns" the rights to a broadcast. This
would make it nearly impossible for the public to discern the boundaries
of the public domain.

2) The public is not served by imposing these restrictions. A
"compromise" version imposing part of these restrictions could be less
bad, but no one has made the case that the treaty will benefit the
public, or that it is needed. The risks to the public of potentially bad
outcomes in a diplomatic conference outweigh the possible benefits, if
any, of proceeding.
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