[bestbits] [governance] Call for Participation: Global Congress on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest, 2015

[Burcu Kilic]

In addition to Anriette's comments, I have to say the Global Congress is a good venue to bring together the academics, activists and lawyers to exchange views, experiences, raise awareness and come up with strategies.  As IP lawyers/academics/activists, we learned by experience that we had no role or whatsoever in making rules for IP.  But this is changing now, the IP community is very well informed and organized, the policy makers cannot ignore us anymore. ACTA and the TPP are very good examples of this. 

I am very excited about this year's Congress and an opportunity to meet with Indian activists and academics whose hard work, enthusiasm and commitment help to make India as a prominent example of an IP regime that is well designed for developing countries. 

At the Congress, we will be discussing Internet-related issues, hence I do recommend everyone to take their time and share their substantive proposals and priorities with the organizers. I am sure they will somehow accommodate them.

Hopefully, I see you all in India.  

Cheers, 
Burcu




-----Original Message-----
From: bestbits-request at lists.bestbits.net [mailto:bestbits-request at lists.bestbits.net] On Behalf Of Anriette Esterhuysen
Sent: Wednesday, May 20, 2015 4:13 AM
To: Jeremy Malcolm; bestbits at lists.bestbits.net
Subject: Re: [bestbits] [governance] Call for Participation: Global Congress on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest, 2015

Dear all

I am writing against my better judgement, but here goes anyway.

The Global Congress on IP has been one of the most important spaces were radical civil society has mobilised and strategised against some of the most problematic US-government lead initiatives with regard to impact on access to knowledge in recent years - ACTA and TPP.

I have only ever been an observer at the Global Congress (when it was in Cape Town in 2013) but have always learnt a lot, and I really value the work that this community does in WIPO among other spaces. In Africa the Global Congress has collaborated with projects such as the African Access to Knowledge project.. people that we have done really important work with, and who have influenced intellectual property legislation positively. They work with groups such as councils for the blind and visually impaired, and the library community. People that we need in internet governance spaces if we want to build movement for social justice in internet governance.

I find it extremely disappointing and distressing that the debate in this thread is not about substantial issues that the Global Congress will address, but about whether it is 'multistakeholder' or not - evolving into yet another set of assertions that everyone who supports the notion of multistakeholder in ANY sense at all is by definition coopted by empire.

Why not write about substantive issues, and about how to pursue a social justice agenda around the issues that are internet-related that the Global Congress will address?

Anriette



On 19/05/2015 18:51, Jeremy Malcolm wrote:
> On 19/05/2015 5:50 am, parminder wrote:
>> Coming to the context of the series of congresses on 'Intellectual 
>> property and public interest', here is the list of participants 
>> <http://infojustice.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Participants-Hando
>> ut1.pdf>of the 2011 Congress . Just one big business participant - 
>> Google among scores and scores others. And none in program committee, 
>> or among the hosing group or funders (except one, again Google, which 
>> is certainly an oddity, perhaps explainable but wont go there right 
>> now) . No way to me this looks like a multistakeholder or MS 
>> conference, as we have come to understand the term in the Internet 
>> governance space.
> 
> Apples and oranges; the Global Congress on IP and the Public Interest 
> never purported to be a multi-stakeholder event; it is closer to a 
> Best Bits meeting or your Internet Social Forum, both of which are 
> civil society only, than it is to something like the IGF.
> 
> --
> Jeremy Malcolm
> Senior Global Policy Analyst
> Electronic Frontier Foundation
> https://eff.org
> jmalcolm at eff.org
> 
> Tel: 415.436.9333 ext 161
> 
> :: Defending Your Rights in the Digital World ::
> 
> Public key: https://www.eff.org/files/2014/10/09/key_jmalcolm.txt
> PGP fingerprint: FF13 C2E9 F9C3 DF54 7C4F EAC1 F675 AAE2 D2AB 2220 OTR 
> fingerprint: 26EE FD85 3740 8228 9460 49A8 536F BCD2 536F A5BD
> 
> Learn how to encrypt your email with the Email Self Defense guide:
> https://emailselfdefense.fsf.org/en
> 
> 
> 
> ____________________________________________________________
> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
>      bestbits at lists.bestbits.net.
> To unsubscribe or change your settings, visit:
>      http://lists.bestbits.net/wws/info/bestbits
>