[Random-bits] Longer CSC Statement on WIPO Broadcaster/Webcaster treaty

[James Love]

This was the written version of the CSC Statement on the WIPO 
Broadcaster/Webcaster Treaty.

The Civil Society Coalition Statement on Broadcaster/Webcaster Treaty


November 17, 2004

Members of the Civil Society Coalition attending this meeting are 
opposed to scheduling a diplomatic treaty based upon the Chairman’s 
consolidated text.  The specific objections are as follows:

1.	The treaty is not needed to protect creative works.

There is no evidence the broadcast organizations face problems 
concerning the piracy of signals that cannot be addressed under existing 
treaties and domestic laws.[1]

Creative works are protected under the Berne Convention, the TRIPS 
Agreement, the WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT) and WIPO Performers and 
Phonograms Treaties (WPPT).

We must be clear that this proposed treaty is not designed to protect 
creative works.  It is designed to create new rights for broadcasters to 
commercially exploit works that they did not create and do not own. 
These rights will come at the expense of copyright owners or the public 
domain.  They will raise prices for consumers, restrict the flow of 
information, reduce access to knowledge, and retard innovation.


2.	The treaty should not be extended to the Internet.

The Internet is the best opportunity ever to provide more equal access 
to knowledge.  Now every child who has access to the Internet has 
roughly the same opportunity to learn.   Every business, every citizen, 
and every scholar who has access has been empowered by the vast sea of 
free information available on the Internet.

The proposal to create new and never tested rights for webcasters are 
made by special interests who seek to claim ownership over works that 
are now freely available.   If these are creative works, they are 
already protected under copyright.  Copyright owners are free to license 
works to webcasters, or to release them to the public, for example under 
a creative commons license.  The treaty would create a new layer of 
rights that webcasters could exercise even when the copyright owner did 
not want the distribution of the works restricted.  It would allow 
webcasters to claim ownership of works that are in the public domain. 
It would change the Internet.  It will restrict access to knowledge.

It is not necessary to create these new rights to create incentives to 
disseminate digital works.  The market capitalization of Yahoo, Google 
and other Internet companies is staggering.    Shortsighted firms like 
Yahoo that are seeking this new webcasting right are wrong about what is 
best for the Internet, and they have almost no support within the 
broader technology industry.

There is much broader support for the views expressed by Argentina and 
Brazil in their proposal for a WIPO development agenda (WDA)

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WO/GA/31/11
Annex, page 3

While access to information and knowledge sharing are regarded as 
essential elements in fostering innovation and creativity in the 
information economy, adding new layers of intellectual property 
protection to the digital environment would obstruct the free flow of 
information and scuttle efforts to set up new arrangements for promoting 
innovation and creativity, through initiatives such as the ‘Creative 
Commons’. The ongoing controversy surrounding the use of technological 
protection measures in the digital environment is also of great concern.

-------------

3.	The SCCR has higher priorities than this treaty.

The proposed treaty for broadcast and webcasting organizations is taking 
up years of the SCCR’s time.  This is mistake.  There are more pressing 
issues to address.  The SCCR has spent many years expanding the scope of 
property rights in knowledge.  It has spent almost no time addressing 
issues about access to knowledge.  The WIPO Development Agenda (WDA) 
that was presented at this year’s General Assembly meeting calls for a 
new direction in WIPO.   The WDA calls for a new treaty on Access to 
Knowledge (a2k).  The WDA asks that WIPO examine the impact of new 
technological protection measures (TPMs) on consumers and on innovation. 
  The WDA calls upon WIPO to address the control of anticompetitive 
practices – including the implementation of Article 40 of the TRIPS. 
The WDA calls for new efforts to promote the transfer of technology and 
knowledge to developed countries.  The blind have asked WIPO to create 
minimum exceptions for the visually impaired.  Chile has asked WIPO to 
address minimum exceptions for the blind, libraries and educators, 
particularly for those important cases where information flows across 
borders.   Groups like CPTech have called upon WIPO to create minimum 
exceptions to patent and copyright laws to protect Internet innovations, 
such as Google.  There is a growing social movement to support open 
access publishing, and establish best practices for the access to 
government funded scientific research.  The Geneva Declaration on the 
Future of WIPO, signed by more than 600 persons, concluded with this 
statement:[2]

Delegations representing the WIPO member states and the WIPO Secretariat 
have been asked to choose a future. We want a change of direction, new 
priorities, and better outcomes for humanity. We cannot wait for another 
generation. It is time to seize the moment and move forward.

We agree.  If the SCCR spends all of its time on an endless quest for 
new property rights, it will never address the problems that concern the 
public.  This UN agency should not be a tool of special commercial 
interests.  WIPO must serve the broader public.  WIPO must support 
development, and access to knowledge and technology.  WIPO must change 
its priorities.

[1] In every country broadcast organizations are politically powerful, 
and can and do obtain strong domestic legislation to protect their 
investments, for example, through laws against the theft of signals.

[2] http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/futureofwipo.html


-- 
James Love | Consumer Project on Technology
http://www.cptech.org | mailto:james.love@cptech.org
P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC 200036
voice +1.202.387.8030 | fax +1.202.234.5176