[Ecommerce] FYI: UNCITRAL E-Commerce WG Future work?

[Manon Ress]

FYI: UNCITRAL 44th session, 11-22 October 2004, Vienna
http://www.uncitral.org/en-index.htm

 From the annotated agenda re future work:

[reporting on New York meeting, March 2004]

QUOTE
34.  Views were exchanged regarding possible future work in the field of
electronic commerce after completion of the current project.

SNIP

Possible elements of such guidelines could include data protection
issues, intellectual property rights and electronic fraud issues.
Another suggestion was that the Working Group might re-examine the issue
of negotiability and transfer of rights in tangible or intangible goods
by electronic means. Yet another suggestion was that the Working Group
might need to consider its future role in light of the conclusions
to be reached in 2005 by the World Summit on the Information Society
(WSIS) convened by the United Nations and the International
Telecommunication Union (ITU). One more suggestion noted was that the
Working Group could serve as an instrument of cooperation with other
Working Groups and with bodies outside UNCITRAL. The Secretariat was
requested to consider preparing any relevant study to facilitate
discussion by the Commission at its thirty-eighth session, in 2005, on
the issue of future work in the area of electronic commerce.

END OF QUOTE

Brief Background on UNCITRAL WG IV:

Since 1966, UNCITRAL's business is =93the modernization and harmonization
of rules on international business=94
There are 6 Working Groups.  Working Group IV activities:
(1997 to present) Electronic commerce
(1992 - 1996) Electronic data interchange
(1988 - 1992) International payments
(1973 - 1987) International negotiable instruments

After having completed the  UNCITRAL Model Law on Electronic Signatures
(2001), the E-commerce Working Group IV began its deliberations on
electronic contracting at its thirty-ninth session (New York, 11-15
March 2002).

The deliberations of the Working Group regarding IP since 2001 can be
summarized:

March 2001 in New York.
There were differing views regarding the scope of future work on
electronic contracting, as well as the appropriate moment to begin that
work. Pursuant to one view, the work should be limited to contracts for
the sale of tangible goods. The opposite view, which prevailed in the
course of the Commission=92s deliberations, was that the Working Group on
Electronic Commerce should be given a broad mandate to deal with issues
of electronic contracting, without narrowing the scope of the work from
the outset. It was understood, however, that consumer transactions and
contracts granting limited use of intellectual property rights would not
be dealt with by the Working Group.  Broad support was given to the idea
expressed in the context of the thirty-eighth session of the Working
Group that, to the extent possible, the treatment of Internet-based
sales transactions should not differ from the treatment given to sales
transactions conducted by more traditional means (A/CN.9/484, para. 102).

Vienna, October 2002.
In accordance with a decision taken at its fortieth session (see
A/CN.9/527, para. 93), the Working Group also held a preliminary
discussion on the question of excluding intellectual property rights
from the draft convention (see A/CN.9/528, paras. 55-60). The Working
Group agreed that the Secretariat should be requested to seek the
specific advice of relevant international organizations, such as the
World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and the World Trade
Organization, as to whether, in the view of those organizations,
including contracts that involved the licensing of intellectual property
rights in the scope of the draft convention so as to expressly recognize
the use of data messages in the context of those contracts might
negatively interfere with rules on the protection of intellectual
property rights. It was agreed that whether or not such an exclusion was
necessary would ultimately depend on the substantive scope of the
convention.

New York, May 2003.
The Commission was informed that the Working Group had held a
preliminary discussion on the question of whether intellectual property
rights should be excluded from the draft convention (see A/CN.9/528,
paras. 55-60). The Commission noted the Working Group=92s understanding
that its work should not be aimed at providing a substantive law
framework for transactions involving =93virtual goods=94, nor was it
concerned with the question of whether and to what extent =93virtual
goods=94 were or should be covered by the United Nations Sales Convention.

The question before the Working Group was whether and to what extent the
solutions for electronic contracting being considered in the context of
the preliminary draft convention could also apply to transactions
involving licensing of intellectual property rights and similar
arrangements. The Secretariat was requested to seek the views of other
international organizations on the question, in particular
WIPO.10




--
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