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

[Mishi Choudhary]

Thanks Jeremy,

I had missed out on this traffic to understand how this all worked but I
would still like thorough discussions on this issue for future if others
agree.


On 04/29/2014 07:20 AM, Jeremy Malcolm wrote:
> On 29 Apr 2014, at 5:35 pm, Anriette Esterhuysen <anriette at apc.org
> <mailto:anriette at apc.org>> wrote:
>
>> The deadlock was broken by us using text that was suggested, or
>> proposed by Jeremy Malcolm on the second day. I can't remember
>> exactly what Jeremy had said, but is input implied that some
>> protection for authors would be acceptable.
>
> I lost my verbatim note of what I said due to a crash, but from
> Pranesh's log of the transcript (at
> https://prakash.im/text-netmundial-day1.html) here it is as delivered:
>
> THANK YOU, MADAM CHAIR. MY NAME IS JEREMY---- ON AN
> ENABLING ENVIRONMENT FOR INNOVATION AND CREATIVITY, WHICH AS YOUR
> CO-CHAIR NOTED GENERATED THE MOST COMMENTS OF ANY PARAGRAPH. DUE TO
> THE MISCONCEPTION THAT REFERENCE TO PERMISSIONLESS INNOVATION WAS
> ABOUT THE USE OF CREATIVE CONTENT WITHOUT PERMISSION. 
> NOW VORRING'S WHEN WE THINK OF INNOVATION, APART FROM SCIENTISTS,
> WE THINK OF ARTISTS AND PERMISSIONLESS INNOVATION IS SOMETHING THAT
> SHOULD BE A FAMILIAR CONCEPT TO ARTISTS BECAUSE THERE IS NO
> PERMISSION REQUIRED TO WRITE A SONG OR A PLAY OR A NOVEL. YOU JUST DO
> IT. AND INNOVATION ON THE INTERNET SHOULD WORK THE SAME
> WAY. NOW INNOVATION IS ALWAYS SUBJECT TO THE RULE OF LAW. THAT GOES
> WITHOUT SAYING. I DON'T, THEREFORE, THINK IT'S NECESSARY TO SPELL OUT
> ALL THE LEGAL LIMITS TO INNOVATION THAT MAY EXIST, OF WHICH
> INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS ARE JUST ONE. THOUGH IF WE WERE TO ADD
> THE WORDS "CONSISTENT WITH THE OTHER PRINCIPLES IN THIS DOCUMENT," I
> DON'T SEE WHAT HARM THAT COULD DO. 
> THAT DOES, HOWEVER, RAISE THE SECONDARY POINT OF WHETHER IP
> RIGHTS SHOULD BE ADDED TO THE LIST OF HUMAN RIGHTS, AS SOME HAVE
> CONTENDED. 
> AGAIN, I DON'T SEE HOW THAT IS NECESSARY BECAUSE THE LIST OF RIGHTS IS
> ALREADY EXPLICITLY NONEXCLUSIVE, AND NOTHING THAT WE AGREE
> AT NETmundial CAN DETRACT FROM WHAT'S ALREADY IN THE UDHR. 
> SO I WOULD OPPOSE ADDING A POINT ON IP, BUT IF ONE WAS
> ADDED NEVERTHELESS IT WOULD, AT THE VERY LEAST, BE NECESSARY TO
> QUALIFY IT TO REFLECT THE NEED TO BALANCE PRIVATE IP RIGHTS WITH THE
> BROADER PUBLIC INTEREST. 
> INDEED, PARAGRAPH 27 OF THE UDHR ITSELF BALANCES IP RIGHTS WITH
> THE RIGHT TO PARTICIPATE IN THE CULTURAL LIFE OF THE COMMUNITY, SO WE
> SHOULD MENTION THAT, ALONG WITH THE RIGHTS TO EDUCATION, FREEDOM OF
> EXPRESSION AND INFORMATION, AND THE RIGHT TO PRIVACY. 
> I CAN SEND SOME PARTICULAR TEXT SUGGESTIONS, BUT WE -- WE DO -- AS
> A -- AS A STARTING POINT, WE OPPOSE THE ADDITION OF A RIGHT TO IP. 
> SO IN CONCLUSION, WE DO SUPPORT THE RETENTION OF
> PERMISSIONLESS INNOVATION, AND WE BELIEVE THAT MINIMAL, IF
> ANY, CHANGES ARE NECESSARY TO CLARIFY THAT THIS IS NOT INTENDED TO
> OVERRIDE INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY RIGHTS -- 
> [TIMER SOUNDS ] 
> -- THANK YOU.
>
>> So, in the end, this text was not too bad. And we managed to keep
>> 'permissionless innovation' in another part of the document.  The BAD
>> news is that the text on internet intermediary liability which was
>> only finalised after the high level committee meeting is the same
>> OECD text which civil society opposed in 2011. France and the US were
>> insisted it be included. It is text that links intermediary liability
>> to economic growth and that opens the doors to intermediaries being
>> made responsible for enforcing copyright.  For me that was a huge,
>> huge blow.
>>
>> I am not in a position to respond to your other questions as I was
>> not involved in finalising the civil society inputs.
>
> There was no plan to produce a text, consensus or otherwise, out of
> the pre-meeting.  This was something that happened spontaneously
> because some of the organisers decided to do it.  They did a good job,
> but one of the things that was lost was context - such as degrees of
> consensus around particular text (there was not a consensus on
> everything) and whether some text is a "last resort" position, etc.
>  Part of the context that was lost for the IP text was that it was a
> "last resort" for how we could balance out the IP language if it was
> included by industry.  So it is correct of you (Achal) to say that
> this proposing protection of IP rights is not a civil society
> position.  I considered the text from the pre-meeting as more of a
> rough roadmap or guide for our interventions, rather than as an agreed
> text.  Similarly the closing statement, which also happened
> spontaneously, cannot be considered as representing a civil society
> consensus.
>
> -- 
> Jeremy Malcolm PhD LLB (Hons) B Com
> Internet lawyer, ICT policy advocate, geek
> host -t NAPTR 5.9.8.5.2.8.2.2.1.0.6.e164.org <http://e164.org>|awk -F!
> '{print $3}'
>
> WARNING: This email has not been encrypted. You are strongly
> recommended to enable encryption at your end. For instructions, see
> http://jere.my/l/pgp.
>


-- 
Warm Regards
Mishi Choudhary, Esq.
Legal Director
Software Freedom Law Center
1995 Broadway Floor 17
New York, NY-10023
(tel) 212-461-1912
(fax) 212-580-0898
www.softwarefreedom.org


Executive Director 
SFLC.IN
K-9, Second Floor
Jangpura Extn.
New Delhi-110014
(tel) +91-11-43587126 
(fax) +91-11-24323530
www.sflc.in

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/bestbits/attachments/20140429/f26e38a5/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 901 bytes
Desc: OpenPGP digital signature
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/bestbits/attachments/20140429/f26e38a5/attachment.sig>