[bestbits] What is civil society's position on copyright in Internet governance?

[Achal Prabhala]

I have been trying to understand what civil society's position on copyright
in Internet governance is, esp. in the aftermath of NETmundial.

On April 22, I took part in a civil society meeting along with many of you,
when the following language was suggested to be included in civil society
feedback to the draft outcome document: "resisting the expansion of a
sovereign application of copyright on to the global online landscape."

The language came from the recent, vivid and very real threats posed by the
almost-legislated SOPA/PIPA in the US.

Then it seems civil society changed it's mind: this is the language used in
the final feedback document: (http://bestbits.net/netmundial-proposals/)

"Right to participate in cultural life: everyone has the right freely to
participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to
share in scientific advancement and its benefits, and this right extends to
the Internet. Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and
material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic
production of which he is the author. This protection must be balanced with
the larger public interest and human rights, including the rights to
education, freedom of expression and information and the right to privacy."

This is the language from the final NETmundial outcome document: (
http://netmundial.br/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/NETmundial-Multistakeholder-Document.pdf
)

"Everyone should havethe right to access, share, create and distribute
information on the Internet, consistent with the rights of authors and
creators as established in law."

Inexplicably, the language on "protection" of intellectual property is
stronger in the civil society statement than in the NETmundial document.

Following from this, naturally, weak or nonexistent language *against* a
restrictive, censorious and unilaterally decided global intellectual
property regime did not figure anywhere in the list of official civil
society complaints against the final NETmundial outcome document. (
http://bestbits.net/netmundial-response/)

I'd like to understand from someone who led this civil society document as
to:

a) Whether you considered the copyright threat sufficiently addresses in
the language around freedom of expression and access to information, as
well as ISP liability (even though the legal scope in these three ideas, as
expressed in the statement from you, is fuzzy and does not use the word
'copyright') and therefore chose to explicitly leave it out of
consideration?

b) Or whether you deem the unjustified unilateral enforcement of copyright
protection an insufficient threat to global online freedom and access to
knowledge, despite the almost-legislated SOPA/PIPA from not that long ago.

c) And lastly, whether (and how), despite the copyright issue having been
raised - and seemingly accepted - in the meetings running up to the
document, "civil society" believed there was "consensus" around leaving the
copyright issue out of its demands.

Thank you,
Achal
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