Signed: The Washington Declaration on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest. Signed: The Washington Declaration on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest Read more about the Washington Declaration on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest American University Washington College of Law writes in a press release: Experts and advocates working on international intellectual property (IP) issues came together at American University Washington College of Law Aug. 25-27, 2011 for the inaugural Global Congress on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest.With nearly 200 academics, practitioners, and government and private sector participants from 35 countries, the Global Congress served as a site for sharing research, ideas, and policy proposals for how international IP law can better protect global public interest concerns.[...]The final proposals from the collective Global Congress were released in the Washington Declaration on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest on Monday, Sept. 5, 2011.
Tags: piratpartiet, eu, politik, informationspolitik. Formal Decision on Copyright Term Extension on Monday. Formal Decision on Copyright Term Extension on Monday The Council will take the formal decision to extend the copyright term for music recordings on Monday Yesterday there was a meeting of the Coreper, which is Brussels jargon for the Committee of the Permanent Representatives to the EU. Its job is to prepare the agenda for the ministerial Council meetings. At the Coreper meeting, it was decided that the EU Council of Ministers will take the formal decision to extend the protection term for music recordings from 50 to 70 years on Monday. It will be an ”A item” on the agenda, which means that the ministers will just rubber stamp the decision without any discussion.
Unless a miracle happens, and one or more governments change their mind over the weekend, the term extension will then be a fact. Read more about the background. Others on the subject (in English): PC World På svenska: DN, DN, Mitt i musiken, Kulturnyheterna, Kulturnyheterna. Explanation of the ECJ opinion on internet blocking. Copyright term extension will be voted this week. This video from the Open Rights Group explains the background to the copyright term extension issue Monday or Tuesday this upcoming week there will be another round in the fight against prolonging the copyright protection term for recorded music in the EU. Now is an opportunity to contact MEPs, Members of the European Parliament, and persuade them to vote against the term extension.
Background: In 2009, the EU discussed the issue of a term extension for the ”neighbouring rights” that record companies have to recorded music. These neighbouring rights are now 50 years from the recording of a song. The proposal was to extend them to 95 years. After a lively debate in the European Parliament, it was decided to extend them to 70 years. Then the issue got stuck in the Council of Ministers, where several countries (including Sweden and Denmark) felt that no extension was necessary.
Now we need to raise some attention about this. There are several possibilities here. ACTA resolution failed. The resolution on ACTA was narrowly defeated The European Parliament just narrowly failed to adopt a joint resolution demanding that the Commission should clarify and assess the consequences of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement ACTA. The numbers were 306 in favour, 322 against, and 26 abstentions. The resolution had been put forward by the Green group (including the Pirate Party), the Social Democrats, the Liberals and the Left.
A resolution from the Green group (where I was one of the co-signatories) was also defeated. Instead, an alternative resolution by the Christian Democrat group EPP and the Conservative group was carried. This resolution basically welcomes what the negotiators have been doing so far, without placing any specific demands on the Commission for further clarifications or assessments. This was a defeat, but it is far from the final word on the issue. EU Commissioner: ”Copyright is not end in itself” No Geographical Indications in ACTA. Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht explaining that US authorities will not enforce European geograpical indications according to ACTA Enforcement of Geographical Indications by US customs officials is not part of the ACTA agreement on intellectual property rights enforcement. This was made clear by the EU’s trade commissioner Karel De Gucht when he appeared before the International Trade Committee INTA in the European Parliament yesterday.
In Europe, you are only allowed to market a sparkling wine as ”champagne” if it actually comes from the Champagne district in France. This is because the word ”champagne” is a Geographical Indication, or GI. Other examples are Parma ham, which may only be called that if it is produced in Parma, and Feta cheese, which may only be called that if it is produced in Greece. Geographical Indications are similar to trademarks (in particular, certification marks), but they constitute an intellectual property right of their own. My question was: Eight questions on ACTA. Members of the European Parliament can ask questions to the Commission (and the Council), much in the same way as members of national parliaments can ask questions to their respective governments. Ordinary questions by MEPs are answered by the Commissison or Council within 6 weeks.
There is also a possibility to ask a ”priority” question, to be answered within 3 weeks. Each MEP is allowed to ask one priority question per month. Last week, I and other members of the Green Group in the European Parliament submitted eight priority questions on the ACTA agreement on intellectual property rights enforcement. Although the text of the agreement has now been published, the language is (deliberately) very ambiguous in many key areas. Debate on three-strikes in ACTA. Trade commissoner De Gucht attended a debate on ACTA in the European Parliament on Wednesday there was a debate in the European Parliament about the ACTA agreement on intellectual property rights enforcement.
The EU Commission, which has been negotiating the agreement, was represented by trade commissioner Karel De Gucht , who defended the agreement. Many of the Members of the European Parliament who spoke in the debate were critical of the agreement, while others seemed to accept the Commissions view that the agreement will change nothing, and that all criticism of the agreement is based on misunderstandings. on the issue of “three-strikes”, i.e.: whether Internet Service Providers will be forced to start policing their customers, and cut the internet connection for people who are accused of illegal file sharing.
This is what I said: This is because we don’t want the Internet service providers to start acting as private police forces, or be forced to take on that role. Gilla. ACTA debate tonight Wednesday evening. Swedish Pirate Party to Host New WikiLeaks Servers. ACTA negotiators inform the Parliament in secret. The room where the Commission held the closed briefing The ACTA negotiators from the Commission came to the European Parliament today, to inform the Parliament about what happened in the last round of negotiations in Luzern. However, the meeting where the information was to be given was declared ”in camera”, i.e.: closed to the public. At the meeting, I asked if this meant that there were restrictions on how the information given could be used and spread.
At first the Commission seemed unwilling to answer this question with a straight yes or no, but after I had repeated the question a number of times, they finally came out and said that I would not be allowed to spread the information given. I then left the meeting, since I am not prepared to accept information given under such conditions in this particular case. The ACTA agreement is about introducing stricter legislation to enforce intellectual property rights such as copyright and patents. That is disgraceful. Common EU Parliament resolution on ACTA tabled « Christian Engst.
Our ACTA team: Erik Josefsson, Lassi Jyrkkiö, Christian Engström, Henrik Alexandersson I have just signed a parliamentary resolution on ACTA. The resolution was tabled officially a couple of minutes ago. It will be discussed in plenary this evening (some time between 21.00 and 24.00), and voted in plenary tomorrow Wednesday. Here is the full text of the Common Resolution on ACTA. This is a joint resolution by all the party groups in the European Parliament (except the small EFD group, which was not asked). I was present at the meeting yesterday evening when we finalized the wording of the resolution, and this is the text we agreed on.
It is a very strong resolution that leaves no room for doubt that the European Parliament demands that the Council and the Commission put all papers on the table immediately. The first six paragraphs say that the European Parliament 1. After that, the resolution also goes into the content of the ACTA agreement as such. Previous articles on ACTA. ACTA – ”The parliament is not a door mat” « Christian Engström, Epic win for transparency on ACTA « Christian Engström, Pirate M. ACTA - Epic win! The European Parliament today voted on a resolution that demands transparency in the ACTA negotiations, and that the Commission puts all papers on the table. The resolution was carried by 633 votes in favour, 13 against, and 16 abstentions. Epic win! :) At last, the elected representatives in the parliament have sent a strong message. We have shown that we do not accept secrecy. And we have shown that the European Parliament is not a door mat.
But this is just the beginning. And once we do get access to the documents, the fight over the content of the agreement will begin in earnest. But today, we have every reason to be happy. Update: Unofficial consolidated version of the resolution Press release by the Green group Previous articles on ACTA Andra som skriver om omröstningen: DN, SvD, Nyheter24.se, Piratpartiet, Hax, Liberal och långsint, ProjO, Daniel Holm, Svensk Myndighetskontroll, The picture is free for publication, cc0. Counterfeiting and file sharing are different things « Christian. European Digital Rights Commercial goods counterfeiting and non-commercial peer to peer file sharing are two different things.
In its proposal to establish an IP Observatory, the EU Commission mixes them up as if they were the same. When the proposal was discussed in the European Parliament’s legal affairs committee JURI, this mix-up was criticized by several members from different party groups. Even if you think that illegal file sharing is something bad that should society should try to reduce, pretending that it is the same thing as commercial goods counterfeiting is not a constructive way forward. The European Digital Rights organization EDRI has prepared a one-page summary making this point.
They have sent it to the members of the JURI committee, who will be voting on a report (called the ”Gallo report”) on the IP Observatory later this spring. It is a good summary by EDRI, so I republish it here: Previous posts on the IP Observatory. The Internet according to BBC. Epic win for transparency on ACTA « Christian Engström, Pirate M. No ACTA transparency from Spain. Spanish Secretary of State Diego López Garrido (middle) giving answers The Spanish Secretary of State to the EU, Mr.
Diego López Garrido, just visited us in IMCO, the European Parliament’s committee for consumer protection and the internal market. He talked for about half an hour in very general terms: ”The 2020 Strategy is the key to developing the internal market. The 2020 Strategy and the EU Structural Funds are the two most powerful tools that the EU has,” etcetera. Many words, little content. But he also mentioned the ACTA agreement, and more specifically the resolution that the European Parliament passed with and overwhelming majority last week. ”The Council wants to combat counterfeiting and piracy, through the ACTA agreement,” said the Spanish Secretary of State. ”The resolution highlights transparency and the role of the European Parliament.
After his introductory speech, the members of the committee got a chance to ask questions. First Mr. And that was it. Previous articles on ACTA. What does ”No absolute openness on ACTA” mean? « Christian Engst. EU Commission disregarding the Parliament’s ACTA resolution « Ch. Consolidated ACTA leak as Word document « Christian Engström, Pi. Click to download the leaked ACTA document as a Word file The European Commission is negotiating the international ACTA agreement about intellectual property rights enforcement, but it refuses grant public and parliamentary access to ACTA negotiation texts and summaries. The negotiations are carried out behind closed doors, and not even the elected members of the European Parliament are allowed to see the texts. The only way that we can get to know what they are planning to do in the name of intellectual property rights enforcement, is to rely on leaks.
A leaked consolidated version of the ACTA text dated January 18th, 2010, has been floating around unofficially in the corridors in Brussels for some time. Last week, the French activist organization La Quadrature du Net published a pdf of the leaked ACTA document with each page scanned as a picture. The same pdf file is also available for download via The Pirate Bay. We demand all papers on the table, not under it. Previous articles on ACTA. IFPI’s child porn strategy. IFPI's lawyer Johan Schlüter (portrait by Mads Rye) ”Child pornography is great,” the speaker at the podium declared enthusiastically. ”It is great because politicians understand child pornography. By playing that card, we can get them to act, and start blocking sites. And once they have done that, we can get them to start blocking file sharing sites”. The venue was a seminar organized by the American Chamber of Commerce in Stockholm on May 27, 2007, under the title ”Sweden — A Safe Haven for Pirates?”.
The speaker was Johan Schlüter from the Danish Anti-Piracy Group, a lobby organization for the music and film industry associations, like IFPI and others. I was there together with two other pirates, Pirate Party leader Rick Falkvinge, and veteran Internet activist Oscar Swartz. ”One day we will have a giant filter that we develop in close cooperation with IFPI and MPA. Today, the file sharing site The Pirate Bay is blocked by all major Internet service providers in Denmark. Net censorship debate with EU Commissioner Malmström « Christian. Swedish EU Commissioner Cecilia Malmström wants to introduce ”filtering” of the Internet, to block sites that are accused of spreading child pornography. She believes this would be an effective way to reduce sexual child abuse in the world. I and The Pirate Party disagree with her, and think that censorship of the Internet is a bad idea. If there are sites on the net that are illegally distributing pictures of sexual child abuse, we think that the sites should be shut down and the perpetrators put in jail, after a proper trial.
But we do not accept censorship that is carried out in secrecy and without due process. A couple of weeks ago, on April 7, I got the chance to have a debate about this proposal for Internet censorship with Cecilia Malmström on Swedish radio. The debate was in Swedish, but I have translated it here from the transcript in Swedish that some net activists did. The policeman from the Child Pornography Group said that the stop page has about 50,000 hits per day. An encouraging breakfast 4 copyright « Christian Engström, Pirat. Written declaration 29, for data retention of Internet searches.