Original news and analysis on international IP policy
A much-discussed new United Nations report on climate change addresses intellectual property issues and the role of innovation in developing technology and disseminate knowledge for local adaption to climate change.
When “Innocence of Muslims” first appeared online, the video provoked outrage among millions of Muslims around the world. Now the consternation has spread to many copyright experts, internet firms, news organisations, and entertainment companies, who assert that a recent 9th Circuit decision about the movie makes a major change in US copyright law, with terrible consequences for the internet, media, and free speech. Others state that the ruling makes no change at all in US law.
On 27 March, the United Kingdom introduced new exceptions to its Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 “to make our copyright system better suited to the digital age,” the UK Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) has said.
Just like the draft text on the protection of genetic resources last month, a set of draft articles on the protection of traditional knowledge have cleared a hurdle and will be forwarded to the World Intellectual Property Organization General Assembly next autumn.
An alleged leaked analysis by the European Union provides insight into the intellectual property section of the draft Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) with the United States. And separately, the US International Trade Commission released a report on trade barriers that US small businesses perceive in exporting to Europe.
As bacteria become more and more resistant to existing medicines, product pipelines are drying up. A solution may lie in a forgotten therapy developed in 1917, the use of which has been restricted to certain parts of Eastern Europe ever since the discovery and universal use of antibiotics. But business models and intellectual property regimes need to change to provide incentives for research and development in this area.
Representatives of indigenous peoples opened a key meeting at the World Intellectual Property Organization with a discussion of the definition of traditional knowledge (TK), the presence of TK in the public domain, and respect for indigenous peoples’ rights under the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
The World Intellectual Property Organization meeting on traditional knowledge and folklore meeting this week was abruptly adjourned by the chair this afternoon, to reconvene tomorrow morning, with a head-on challenge to governments.
In time for World TB Day today, an analysis has been published of research and development being carried out for tuberculosis by the 20 largest pharmaceutical companies.
Lawrence Strickling, the United States assistant secretary of Commerce, today called on the internet community to come up with a “solid proposal” for the transition of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), from the US to a new multi-stakeholder oversight model. IANA is responsible for changes made to the internet domain name system.
The United Nations Secretary General and head of the UN International Telecommunication Union earlier this week applauded an announcement by the United States government that it plans to relinquish its remaining control over the internet domain name system.
A quantitative analysis of the 187 submissions to the April NETmundial conference on the future of internet governance shows broad support for improving security, ensuring respect for privacy, ensuring freedom of expression, and globalizing the IANA function, analyst Richard Hill writes.