Original news and analysis on international IP policy
While most of the 27 member states of the European Union signed the much-debated Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) yesterday in Tokyo, joining the United States, Japan and other ACTA partners, hackers brought down the website of the European Parliament, and a key official stepped down. This may be only the beginning of the protests and petitioning.
In the annual State of Union address last night, US President Obama announced a new Trade Enforcement Unit that includes anti-piracy and anti-counterfeiting.
The blog Monday Note has an analysis today on digital piracy in light of the media frenzy over the US Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) bill last week. The analysis suggests that anti-piracy measures like France's Hadopi are not working, but there is evidence that offering competitive legitimate download sites does work.
French online rights group La Quadrature du Net this week announced an analysis asserting that in more than half of European Union countries, telecommunications operators engage in "illegitimate" restrictions of their users' access.
Industry profits from digital music are on the rise as industry-owned music download services expand and gain acceptance, anti-piracy efforts take hold in some countries, and internet intermediaries join in, music industry representatives said today.
Online piracy, patent reform and intellectual property issues relating to pharmaceuticals are among the top legislative and regulatory priorities for many stakeholder groups in the United States this year, but given that 2012 is an election year, chances are slim that Congress will push through anything that isn’t a top priority or that could cause too much partisan rancour.
In the midst of the global flare-up over draft anti-piracy legislation in the US Congress this week, several heavy-hitting actions were taken in the United States against websites said to be supporting unauthorised content.
It may be too much, too late for content providers finally trying to tame the internet, and a fresh approach is needed, writes Bruce Berman.
The new age of lobbying through online public engagement showed its effectiveness today as the Senate announced the postponement of next week's vote on controversial anti-piracy legislation that led to unprecedented protests on the internet.
The online protest yesterday against the bills in the United States Congress aimed at stopping internet piracy was the biggest yet, according to statistics being circulated by the protestors. More than 115,000 websites - including four of the top 10 in the US - and over 13 million internet users participated. There were 10 million petition signatures, 3 million emails sent, 100,000 phone calls, and some 3 million messages on Twitter.