TACD meeting on IP Chapter for TTIP

On March 27, from noon to 3 pm, the IP Policy Committee of TACD will hold a meeting on the intellectual property chapter of the proposed U.S.-European Union Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP).

The meeting will be held at KEI's offices at 1621 Connecticut Avenue NW, Suite 500, Washington, DC 20009

Last day of SCCR 24 regarding education and research exceptions (or topic 3 for the WIPO Secretariat)

There are many issues including: the structure of the proposed working document and its title, will it include comments or only textual proposals? is it a stand alone document? or is it linked to other proposals? and how it will be adressed/mentioned/continued in the forthcoming conclusions of the SCCR. All delegations seem to agree that the proposed document on education and research is not quite ready. More after informals.

In their own words:
....

Libraries, public interest and other NGOs intervention followed the governments discussions on the topics for libraries and archives:

>> CHAIR: ... Strictly three minutes.

Government's interventions (excerpts) on the libraries and archives and how to continue work on possible 11 topics (or only 2 or 3?) that should be prioritized

Here are the topics:

Preservation of library and archival materials
Reproduction and Distribution of Copies by Libraries and Archives
Legal deposit
Supply of works/Library lending
Right to Parallel Importation
Right to Cross-Border Uses
Orphaned works
Limitation on Liability for Libraries and Archives
Obligations Concerning Technological Protection Measures
Relationship with contracts
Right to Translate Works

July 24, 2012 afternoon plenary: the broadcasting treaty text moved forward. All but India supported the Chair's text as the basis of future works. In their own words:

EGYPT: Thank you, Chair. The African Group ...
The African Group would support that the Chair's nonpaper be adopted as the Committee's working document, to guide our future deliberations on broadcasting. It's our further recommendation that this Committee makes a clear recommendation to the General Assembly on our plan towards hosting a Diplomatic Conference on broadcasting in 2014.
...

India like many other delegations (except the EU Commission and the US) has been a strong advocate for the treaty to faciltate access and sharing of accessible formats. There is a lot at stake.
According to the WHO page on the incidence of visual impairments in India:
285 million people are visually impaired worldwide: 39 million are blind and 246 have low vision.
About 90% of the world's visually impaired live in developing countries.

India has a particularly large population of blind persons:

Like many readers, I am now an official fan of Zach Carter. Mr. Carter just wrote a timely and intelligent article regarding the SCCR24 and the treaty for the blind and visually impaired persons:"Obama Administration Blocks International Treaty To Benefit The Blind"

The Blind people want a treaty:

Once again a diverse group of NGOS spoke clearly against the treaty for broadcasting organizations. To quote CCIA "While the world's governments can certainly create legal instruments with any language in them that they wish, surely granting copyright in objects that don't exist would be difficult to justify to the wider public". Well, the delegates are now back into informal sessions so the public in fact does not even know why they still work on more rights, (more road blocks) to solve signal piracy, already a crime I believe in most countries!

July 23, 2012. Broadcasting organizations (and MPA) views why they need a treaty

I am not sure if the best film analogy here would be Groundhog Day or The Bridge on the River Kwai but the following NGOs are re-affirming that they need a treaty because:
1. there is a piracy problem that can be fixed by giving them more exclusive rights for 20 years
2. the Internet treaties trilogy: there is a WCT and a WPPT so there has to be a WBT. To be fair.

July 23, 2012. The plenary at WIPO has started again briefly before lunch. While there is not much progress on a text about broadcasting protection there seems to be consensus among governments regarding the nature of the instrument: it has to be a treaty. No one seems to be talking about a soft recommendation for broadcasters!

WBU: we look forward to the revision tomorrow and we will study carefully. We see ourselves as technical advisors and we are available today and tomorrow for consultation.

STM (publishers); we have been supportive. But framework should not undermine publishers ambition....a legal instrument should be limited where there is no existing ...it has to be limited to the essential. Should also be mindful to respect flexibilities. Authorized entities can be trusted By all stakeholders. that could be provided if operationaly prepared and ....

ARTICLE F1 OBLIGATIONS CONCERNING TECHNOLOGICAL MEASURES

Member States shall ensure that beneficiaries of the exception provided by Article C have the means to enjoy the exception where technological protection measures have been applied to a work.

During the three hours of informal negotiations, I am told the discussions focused on among the definition, the first paragraph regarding "authorized entity"

[in SCCR23/7 Auhtorized entities]

means a governmental agency, a non-profit entity or non-profit organization that has as one of its activities to assist persons with print disabilities by providing them with services relating to education, training, adaptive reading, or information access needs, in accordance with national law.

The WIPO SCCR 24 delegates are still meeting behind closed doors (no NGOS and no streaming nor recording). I heard they are still talking about the definitions (see below) and that the 5pm plenary is delayed. Yesterday and this morning we heard quite a bit about "works" and "authorized entity". If they agreed on these maybe they are now arguing over the meaning of "reasonable price for developed countries" and "reasonable price for developing countries"

SCCR/23/7 ORIGINAL: English DATE: December 16, 2011

ARTICLE A DEFINITIONS

For the purposes of these provisions

Today is day 5 of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights which for over 2 years has been discussing the first ever treaty that would involved a limitation to copyright, in these case to benefit blind people as well as people with other disabilities. It is day 2 of plenary discussions regarding the treaty for people with disabilities.