[Random-bits] Paris Accord

[James Love]

TACD is holding a two day event in Paris (Mon,Tues, June 19-20), on  
new relationships between creative communities and consumers.   One  
objective of the meeting is to negotiate an agreement (the Paris  
Accord), that would be a step toward reconciling the creative  
community interest in earning a living, and the public's interest in  
access to knowledge goods.

The meeting agenda is on the web here:  http://www.tacd.org/docs/?id=296

The Draft text of the Paris Accord (which is a work in progress), is  
here:

---------

Begin forwarded message:

From: James Love <james.love@cptech.org>
Date: June 17, 2006 2:04:40 PM EDT
To: a2k discuss list <a2k@lists.essential.org>
Subject: [A2k] consolidated text of paris accord, in english

In three document formats....

http://www.cptech.org/a2k/pa/ParisAccord-june17draft.pdf
http://www.cptech.org/a2k/pa/ParisAccord-june17draft.odt
http://www.cptech.org/a2k/pa/ParisAccord-june17draft.doc


In plain text:

June 17, 2006 DRAFT

Working Discussion draft for:   The Paris Accord

The following is the draft text as of  June 17, 2006, for a proposed
"Paris Accord" between creative communities and the public.   This
text will be discussed at a TACD meeting in Paris on June 19-20.
Discussions about the text are also taking place online at: http://
lists.essential.org/mailman/listinfo/a2k.

The point of the Paris Accord is to establish an agreement between
creative communities and the public, that includes recognition of
(and suggestions for improvising) (1) access to, and (2) income for,
the knowledge goods produced by creative communities.

This text is far from final.  It reflects bottom-up suggestions and
comments from a number of different persons, does not have a
consistent editorial style, there is no consensus on the substantive
proposals, some sections are place holders, and it is often presented
in relatively bloodless prose.  It is however useful to see what has
been proposed, and to find out where we need to go, and I think it is
an excellent start.    jl


Table of Contents

Preamble	1
Medical Research and Development	1
Software	2
The Public as Creative Community	4
Films, Video and Art - Filmakers, Artists, Actors, and the Viewing
Public	4
Recorded Music: Songwriters, Performers, and Listening Public	6
Proposal on DRM	7
Scholarly Publishing: Authors and Readers	8

Preamble

There has not been much work yet on the introduction/preamble, which
was going to be done after there was some agreement on the
substantive portions.  It may or may not reference other documents
like the Geneva Declaration on the Future of the World Intellectual
Property Organization (2004), the Adelphi Charter on creativity,
innovation and intellectual property (2005) or various other
declarations and statements.


Medical Research and Development

1.	Research and development is a necessary and valued component of
the health care system.

2.	A number of different institutions are essential for the support
of medical R&D, including government, intergovernmental, non-
government not-for-profit and for-profit organizations.

3.	The systems for supporting research and development of new drugs
should ensure sustainable sources of finance that support employment
in R&D organizations, but also should not undermine the goal of
access for all for new medical inventions. [TF: I'm not sure why we
should be "supporting employment in R&D organizations."  Suppose, for
instance, that we concluded that malaria research could be conducted
more effectively and efficiently by university labs than by private
drug companies.  Should we be troubled by the fact that, shifting
funding from the latter to the former would put some research
scientists out of work?]

4.	Systems for stimulating R&D should address areas of greatest
health need and public interest.  [TF: When does "the public
interest" diverge from the "areas of greatest health need"?  Perhaps
when pursuit of a pure utilitarian criterion would neglect the
victims of rare diseases (the orphan drug problem)?  If that's the
only circumstance, I suggest that we spell it out.  Are there others?]

5.	Separation of markets for innovation and products that incorporate
those innovations.  When possible and appropriate, the elements of
the current systems of stimulating R&D through high prices for
[essential] medical products (through such measures as market
exclusivity for innovators), should be replaced with new systems that
reward developers of new products directly for improved health care
outcomes.  This can be easily accomplished when systems of public or
private insurance exist for medicine, and when it is feasible to
estimate the impact of new medicines on health outcomes.

6.	There is also a need to expand methods of funding projects that
support open research, the development of databases and other
research tools, as well as high-risk R&D projects that are likely to
be useful for follow-on innovation.

7.	Science depends upon access to knowledge.  Hoarding of data and
materials must be discouraged.

8.	Intellectual property rules should not prevent experimental use of
inventions or materials, nor should they discourage or prevent
investments in any field of invention.

9.	National governments should eliminate visa restrictions that limit
the ability of students to study at universities in another nation,
or restrict the ability of scientists or engineers to participate in
conferences or gain experience at firms in another nation.

10.	Methods of protecting investments in clinical trials for new
medicines should not prevent governments from making medicines
available at affordable prices or require unethical or unnecessary
replication of human experiments.

11.	Individuals and communities that collaborate in scientific
research should receive appropriate recognition for contributions to
new scientific discoveries.

12.	Governments must support global agreements to share in the costs
of evaluating new medicines.  Such testing should be transparent, and
funded by sources that do not have incentives to distort or
misrepresent findings, and which address the most useful scientific
and medical questions.  [TF: Could we add that governments should
assert and exercise the power to select the drugs that merit testing
and the diseases for which they should be tested?  The purpose of
such a provision would be to avoid outrages like that discussed in
The Guardian today, in which the British version of the FDA is
powerless to determine whether small doses of Avastin are effective
in dealing with a common source of blindness, because the maker and
patent holder (Genentech) refuses to apply for a license to use
Avastin on blindness.  Why?  Because Genentech hopes to make much
more money by licensing a closely related drug, Lucentis, for
blindness.]

13.	Patients should freely share biological materials, and consider
participation in clinical trials to test new medicines, with the
expectation that new scientific advancements will be accessible to
all, that clinical trials and other experiments follow appropriate
ethical standards, and that the trials are reported to public
databases, in order to provide for greater transparency of the
scientific evidence, subject to appropriate protections of personal
privacy.

Software


1.	Concentration of ownership and control of software operating
systems and applications presents risks and dangers to programmers
and users.

2.	Monopolies or cartel like ownership of PC operating systems and
office productivity applications harms users and programmers, and
must be addressed by governments, programmers and purchasers of
software.

3.	Programmers of software need access to certain interface data, in
order to design products that work with other products.

4.	Some high quality software products, standards and protocols can
and will be produced without regard to ownership or control of
software code, or any expectation of remuneration or other pecuniary
reward from the sale or licensing of the code.  On the other hand,
some important software products are unlikely to be produced without
an expectation of economic rewards.

5.	[Consumers agree that infringement of software applications
undermines economic incentives for firms to employ programmers to
develop certain new products.  Programmers agree that excessive
prices for software programs contribute to infringement of software
copyrights. [PA comment on earlier formulation: I don't agree with
the present drafting of 5. I am not in favour of infringing software
copyright. In many cases, free software is the obvious solution to
avoid infringing on proprietary software copyright. However, there is
strictly no evidence that infringement of software copyrights by
(whom? missing word in your draft) has "deterred firms from employing
programmers to develop new products". In contrast, there is strong
evidence that monopoly positions of installed software providers
(created including by letting "illegal" copying develop to lock in
users) acts as an innovation deterrent within these companies,
inducing a predominantly rent-seeking behaviour and the search for
innnovation that protects oligopolistic business models (DRMs for
instance) instead of providing new useful functionality to users.
Patent and other legal or regulatory developments that provide
dominant players with weapons of massive deterrence or destruction o
course reinforce this trend (as shown be Bessen, Maskin and Hunt).]]

6.	Commercial software products should not be designed to lock-in
users to particular vendors.

7.	Business models for software development should reward programmers
for making users better off, and not reward programmers or software
publishers for anticompetitive and anti-consumer practices.

8.	Open document formats are essential for the development of a
competitive and open software industry.

9.	Users and programmers should lobby large buyers of software to
demand open document formats, and other measures that promote
interoperability.

10.	Proprietary technologies that undermine the World Wide Web should
be discouraged.

11.	Experience has shown that the costs of extending patent
protection to software exceed the benefits.

12.	For any software functionality that is essential to creative,
expressive knowledge and innovation activities in today's or
tomorrow's information society, there should exists, as soon as
possible, at least one practical solution that is implemented as
FLOSS (free/libre/open source software), and whose usage does not
depend on proprietary software. [PA:  The legal, standards and
interoperability, competition and other points can be derived from
this prerequisite. Most cannot be credibly ensured without this being
fulfilled.  See also number 13, which PA proposed]

13.	Consumers and programmers support the legitimacy for governments
or other parties to support the creation of missing components of
essential FLOSS alternatives, either directly (German policy) or
indirectly (research and development policy, other forms of
incentives, pro-active competition policy with corrective measures
based on irrevocable royalty-free non-IP constrained licenses).

The Public as Creative Community

1.	The development of the Internet and other computing, audio, video
and information technologies have opened up a wide range of new
opportunities for the public to directly participate as creative
individuals and communities.

2.	Many of the most widely viewed web sites are those that point to,
showcase or host works that are created and made available for free
by the public.

3.	The explosion of web pages, listserves, personal weblogs and other
new publishing platforms and technologies, such as search engines and
collaborative editing and publishing tools, are part of the rise of a
new and dynamic creative community that will change society, and
challenge older publishing models.

4.	Intellectual property rules must be evaluated to determine if or
how copyright and other norms will accommodate and these
developments, in order to support rather than undermine the
opportunities for more democratic, open and collaborative
participation in the production and disseminations of creative works.

5.	It is essential that the public have the opportunity to freely use
world wide web hypertext links and other tools to point to
information, and to make copies and use excerpts of other published
works, in order to engage in criticism, commentary and analysis, and
to design new technologies and methods to expand the power of
collaborative creative efforts.

6.	These rights should not be undermined by DRM measures.

7.	The ability of persons to engage in anonymous speech is important,
as well as the right to protect confidential sources.

8.	Bloggers must be protected from frivolous or abusive threats and
lawsuits by copyright owners, or others that assert limits of speech
or the use or sharing of information, particularly in the context of
reviews or criticisms of important political, economic or cultural
figures or institutions.

9.	Bloggers should not be liable for third parties' comments on
blogs.  Immunity for online publishers should be extended to the
public when engaged in that activity..

10.	Bloggers must have the same right to access to blog from public
events as to journalists from traditional news organizations.

11.	The ability of the public to use web pages, blog, listserves and
other platforms to address issues relating to whistle blowing . . .

12.	All workshops and conferences should provide open wifi-
connections for participants.

Films, Video and Art - Filmakers, Artists, Actors, and the Viewing
Public

1.	It is vital to ensure that both content makers and consumers have
unimpeded, but fair, access to communicate and engage in transactions
with each other.  Access to audiovisual content is essential to help
ensure the public can readily obtain diverse sources of information,
including cultural products.

2.	The growing availability of a multiplatform digital distribution
systems, such as the broadband Internet, Internet Protocol TV (IPTV),
and mobile services, provides an important opportunity for both
audiovisual content creators and consumers.  For example, media
makers can now sell content directly to consumers using broadband
connections.  Consumers also have the ability to view and acquire a
diverse array of audiovisual content.

3.	We support the following rights:

4.	Audiovisual makers should be able to directly sell/distribute
their products and services to all consumers, regardless of regional
boundaries;

5.	All broadband networks/ media service providers available to the
public should readily foster such communications and transactions;

6.	Audiovisual makers should have access to the full range of
distribution modalities, including video on demand, switched video,
and mobile networks;

7.	Audiovisual makers should [respect all] [adhere to] appropriate
laws and regulatory regimes[, including] [and] rules protecting
privacy, advertising safeguards for minors; and human rights.

8.	Audiovisual makers should [respect] [adhere to] reasonable
measures including copyright law, that protect the moral and material
interests of creative communities.  However, these measures should
not be overly burdensome, with regard to the ability of audiovisual
makers to use portions of works to create new works.

9.	Audiovisual makers should have access to a universal and
affordable system of rights clearances, [as well as appropriate
limitations and exceptions in copyright law to protect the ability to
use works or portions of works without remuneration in appropriate
cases];

10.	Audiovisual makers should expect national governments and other
governmental bodies would provide financial support and other
assistance to aide the production and distribution of works;

11.	Audiovisual makers should expect national governments and other
governmental bodies to facilitate agreements between themselves and
access providers, if needed;

12.	Audiovisual makers should expect that broadcasting and computer
networks receive the necessary investment to ensure state of the art,
efficient, delivery of digital content to users;

13.	Audiovisual makers should expect government and network providers
to help ensure that digital distribution is equitably available and
affordable, including to rural and low-income consumers.

14.	Consumers:

15.	Have the right to directly contact and acquire the multimedia/
audiovisual content of their choice;

16.	Their privacy should be protected and purchases protected by
effective consumer standards;

17.	Consumer representatives must be included as a core constituency
in any deliberation involving government or government-sponsored
entities related to digital distribution (such as the recent European
Charter related to online film, etc);

18.	Consumers should expect that networks would receive the necessary
investment to ensure state of the art, efficient, delivery of digital
content to them;

19.	Consumers should expect government and network providers to help
ensure that digital distribution is equitably available an
affordable, including to rural and low-income communities;

20.	Consumers benefit from cultural diversity in all aspects of
broadcasting and publishing of cultural works.  Mechanisms to support
such diversity, including promotion for diverse languages, and
minority productions are needed. States or Regional entities must
consider diverse methods to support the creation and diffusion of
communitarian or artistic works, from quotas to subventions for
scripting, filming or diffusion and theaters.

21.	Concentration of ownership of the distribution systems presents
risks and dangers to both consumers and makers of audio visual works,
in terms of high prices (for distribution), lack of diversity of
content, and undue influence on cultural and political life.  Global
concentrations of ownership of media outlets are even more risky and
dangerous than concentrations of ownership of national systems.
Monopolistic control over "last mile" delivery of digital content, if
combined with the ability to discriminate among content providers,
presents the same type of problems.

22.	Creative communities and consumers oppose government imposed
censorship and other restrictions on the freedom of opinion and
expression; including the freedom to hold opinions without
interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas
through any media and regardless of frontiers.

23.	Both creative communities and consumers are harmed by excessive
prices costs associated with the distribution and sharing of
audiovisual works.

24.	Consumers and makers of audiovisual works agree that broadcasting
or webcasting organizations should not be given intellectual property
rights in the content of audo visual works.

25.	Audiovisual makers and consumers support efforts such as the 2005
Documentary Filmmakers Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use to
provide guidance for the appropriate practices in using copyrighted
material in documentary films.

Recorded Music: Songwriters, Performers, and Listening Public

1.	Authors, composers and performers of musical works, and consumers
agree that we have common interests and new opportunities to
collaborate. Enormous differences in bargaining power currently lead
to unfair outcomes between creative individuals users and the
commercial entities that sell culture and knowledge goods.

2.	We need legal regimes and public and private systems that support
the [incomes] [livelihoods] [economic security] of artists and
determine the access to works.   These legal regimes and systems should:

3.	provide protections from censorship or control by governments,

4.	provide for a diversity of distribution channels, free from
excessive concentrations of ownership;

5.	foster artistic freedom and creative control over works by artists,

6.	protect artists from unfair contract between artists and music
publishers;

7.	permit artists to benefit from and reinterpret and explore works
of other artists, while giving appropriate credit;

8.	allow consumers opportunities to discover new artists and music
genres;

9.	lower the amount of money being spend on the distribution of
works, at the expense of artists and consumers;

10.	provide access to works that area older, and not necessarily the
best known;

11.	provide opportunities for consumers to engage in criticism;

12.	commentary and promotion of works they enjoy, provide measures to
overcome technological or other means that restrict  access that
harms creators, libraries, educational, institutions, archives and
persons with disabilities, and undermine privacy and freedom;

13.	Permit measures that provide essential information about creative
goods and allow the creator to be identified, provided any data
produced is not linked to individual consumer purchases/access;

14.	Provide quick and easy means of redress to consumers.

Proposal on DRM

Short form:

1.	The use of digital technology is changing the production,
distribution, and  use of content  Not only can users access and copy
content ,they can also manipulate works to  create entirely new
products. Creators can bypass traditional intermediaries and have
direct contact with the public.

2.	 At the same time, in the digital environment it is easier to
control access to content. Encryption methods and other similar
techniques are used to block access or to monitor the use that a
person makes of such content.

3.	We oppose technological and other measures that restrict access to
knowledge goods, harm creators, libraries, educational institutions,
archives and persons with disabilities, and undermine privacy and
freedom. Such measures should not be granted legal protection.

4.	We support measures that provide essential information about
creative goods and allow the creator to be identified, provided any
data produced is not linked to individual consumer purchases/access.

5.	We consider that current redress systems for consumers are
inadequate and that new approaches are needed  which are  quick and
easy  to use, with meaningful sanctions for wrongdoing.

Long form:

1.	The use of digital technology is changing the production,
distribution, and use of content  Not only can users access and copy
content ,they can also manipulate works to  create entirely new
products. Creators can bypass traditional intermediaries and have
direct contact with the public.

2.	At the same time, in the digital environment it is easier to
control access to content. Encryption methods and other similar
techniques are used to block access or to monitor the use that a
person makes of such content In the digital enviroment Rights
Management Information (RMI) ( definition: need one e.g but ask Nick!
which identifies the artist and can be used to track  usage and
Technical Protection Measures (TPM) ( e.g which act as locks and can
block copying or usage on non authourised equipment  are used b
intermediaries to unreasonably restrict legitimate use by the public
without the consent or involvement of the creators or the public on
the contrary, usually over the strong objections of both.

3.	There is a clear failure of the marketplace to provide
implementations of these technologies that are constructive,
interoperable, reasonable, and equitable. For example [ RMI can  be
used constructively , by helping the development of systems to
equitably remunerate creators and rights-holders based upon actual
uses of cultural goods in the digital environment,provided such usage
data is not used to tracj individual s usage. Despite repeated calls
for a rethink of the current uses of these technologies by the
consumer movement, creators themselves, and even independent
phonogram producers, the abuse of these technologies continues
Creators and Consumers agree on the following principles and believe
that they should be given the force of law in any part of the world
where RMI and TPMs are themselves the subject of legal protection:

4.	RMI should only be given legal protection only if:

5.	The RMI is used to provide information, not as the basis for a
TPM, is accurate, and  anonymous (?) only receive the privilege of
legal protection if they cannot:

a.	Prohibit, or limit, access and/or use which is lawful with respect
to the works and/or performances being protected,

b.	Prohibit, or limit, access and uses which would be possible and/or
permitted when the same materials are acquired in physical form,

c.	Be deployed without the active, informed consent of the creators
and relevant rights-holders, or without successfully passing through
the testing process referenced below;

d.	Fail to work (interoperate) on all devices and/or platforms like
personal computers, mobile communications devices, and consumer
electronics which might reasonably be used by the public. In
particular, interoperability must not:

i.	prevent the author/artist from making works or performances
available under any licence terms he or she wishes;
ii.	Restrict the freedom of software developers to disclose and
licence under any terms whatever the source code which helps achieve
interoperability;]}
iii.	Fail to comply with data protection rules or privacy rights
generally,

e.	Prevent access and use, or make access and use difficult, to
anything that is in the public domain

6.	The extent and nature of any limitations these technologies may
impose on the user should be clearly visible on any product or
service so that the members of the public may make informed choices;

7.	We believe that an essential component of giving legal effect to
the above is the following:

8.	A regulatory regime that requires advance registration, and
testing of new TPMs by an independent agency to ensure that they
comply with the rules governing their use as outlined above, both
when released and at any further time. No TPM which fails to pass
through the testing regime should be used in the marketplace; [(Keep
in brackets  do not like this idea but others might), successfully
passing the tests should allow the vendor of the TPM to display a
mark that makes clear that the TPM has been approved and certified,
giving the public, and the creative community, confidence that the
TPM is both within the law and follows the rules]

9.	As a safeguard there should be in addition be a legal  right to
remove a TPM or circumvent it if it breaches the above principles,

10.	The public and the creative individual or community must have
access to quick, cheap and transparent redress systems to use against
the vendors and/or suppliers   of TPMs.,e   to  remedy any breaches
of the above principles. Such systems must also have the power to
impose sanctions that are sufficient to form a deterrent to future
infringements.

Scholarly Publishing: Authors and Readers

1.	Authors and readers of scholarly and scientific works have a
common interest in the broad dissemination and wide sharing of works.

2.	Concentration of ownership of scholarly and scientific publishing
presents risks and dangers to authors and readers, in terms of high
prices, lack of diversity of content, and undue influence on
\discourse involving scientific, cultural, professional and political
life.

3.	Authors and readers of scholarly and scientific works oppose
government imposed censorship and other restrictions on the freedom
of opinion and expression; including the freedom to hold opinions
without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and
ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

4.	Authors and readers are are harmed by excessive prices for
scholarly and scientific works.

5.	Acknowledging the profound impact the Internet has on the conduct
of scientific research and the benefits of research being shared as
widely as possible, authors and readers of scholarly and scientific
works and consumers agree that:

6.	Authors should retain the right to make their work available in a
non-commercial open digital archive on the World Wide Web [such as
the National Institutes of Health's PubMed Central or an
institution's open digital archive] or to make copies of their
article for use in the classes they teach.

7.	Authors should retain:

8.	The rights to reproduce, distribute, publicly perform,and publicly
display the Article in any medium for non-commercial purposes;

9.	the right to prepare derivative works from the Article; and

10.	the right to authorize others to make any non-commercial use of
the Article so long as the author receives credit as author and the
journal in which the Article has been published is cited as the
source of first publication of the Article.

11.	Authors/Researchers funded by governments should submit an
electronic version of their final, peer-reviewed manuscript to a
publicly available online archive upon acceptance for publication in
a journal.

12.	Authors, researchers and readers of scientific works express
their support for the following:

a.	Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL) Principles and
Strategies for the Reform of Scholarly Communication, August 28,2003,
http://www.ala.org

b.	Bethesda Statement on Open Access Publishing, June 20, 2003,
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters

c.	Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and
Humanities, October 22, 2003, http://www.zim.mpg.de/openaccess-berlin

d.	The Budapest Open Access Initiative,, http://www.soros.org/
openaccess/read.shtml

e.	Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD),
Declaration on Access to Research Data From Public Funding, January
30, 2004, http://www.oecd.org

f.	The International Federation of Library Associations and
Institutions (IFLA) Statement on Open Access to Scholarly Literature
and Research Documentation, February 24, 2004.  http://www.ifla.org

13.	Authors, researchers and readers of scholarly and scientific
works call upon governments, professional societies, publishers and
others to explore new business models, public subsidies and private
incentives to support professional editing and publishing services
that do not rely upon high prices for access to works.






---------------------------------
James Love, CPTech / www.cptech.org / mailto:james.love@cptech.org /
tel. +1.202.332.2670 / mobile +1.202.361.3040

"If everyone thinks the same: No one thinks."  Bill Walton


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