Original news and analysis on international IP policy
When Amazon.com remotely deleted George Orwell’s “1984" and “Animal Farm” from its Kindle e-books, it stirred up a hornet’s nest of complaints about privacy, the potential erosion of copyright users’ rights and censorship. Is the shift to “tethered devices” a real cause for concern or much ado about nothing?
With a day to go before the joint project agreement between the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and the United States Department of Commerce (DoC) is set to expire, calls for continuous US oversight role have been reiterated by US politicians and private-sector representatives who reason that this oversight is especially needed in the face of the planned introduction of new internet top-level domains like .shop.
BANGKOK – Government officials and private stakeholders were urged Monday to strike differences from the 280 pages of negotiating text in preparing a draft that could become a global agreement on climate change in December 2009.
Le problème, selon certains participants, est que ces ressources ont été allouées à des projets qui n'ont pas encore été approuvés. Le Comité du développement et de la propriété intellectuelle (CDIP) s’est réuni en novembre, puis en Avril, mais la prochaine réunion budgétaire n’aura pas lieu avant juillet, ce qui a amené de nombreux pays en développement à se demander comment des projets approuvés en novembre pouvaient être mis en œuvre rapidement alors même qu’ils ne disposent pas des ressources budgétaires nécessaires.
How to handle the deadlocked negotiations on traditional knowledge remains a sticky decision at this year’s World Intellectual Property Organization General Assemblies, with four proposals on the table and informal meetings ongoing in advance of a formal discussion next week. Meanwhile, WIPO member governments this week agreed to fund a CHF64.2 million franc WIPO conference centre aimed for late 2012.
La Organización Mundial de la Propiedad Intelectual (OMPI) debe tener la capacidad de fijar normas para la innovación, desde los avances de la tecnología más recientes hasta los sistemas de conocimientos tradicionales, si desea conservar su reconocimiento en la formulación de políticas, expresó hoy el Director General en la apertura de la Asamblea General anual del organismo de las Naciones Unidas.
As the United States is moving to ensure that internet (net) neutrality is preserved in that country, some are hoping other regions of the world will take notice, particularly the European Union.
Participants at a recent United Nations conference on the role of new plant varieties and seeds in agriculture agreed that access to genetic resources and the protection of intellectual property rights are essential to sustain plant breeding. But key opponents not invited to the meeting claim that plant breeding will endanger biodiversity, sustainability and ultimately food security.
The World Intellectual Property Organization will need the help of national intellectual property offices - and need to listen to their needs as well - if Development Agenda implementation is to be effective outside of Geneva, participants on a panel said last week.
The World Intellectual Property Organization must be able to set norms for innovation, from the latest development in technology to traditional knowledge systems, if it is to retain its relevance in policymaking, said its director general at the opening of the UN agency's annual General Assemblies today.
A key decision on WIPO’s agenda this week is the future of its committee on the protection of traditional knowledge and genetic resources, where agreement has proved unreachable over the last year.
Javier Fernandez of CropLife Latin America argues the importance of protection of regulatory data and its relevance to the bid for food security.
A recent two-day conference of the World Intellectual Property Organization on IP infrastructure also served as a campaign platform of sorts for several candidates vying to be the next head of the European Patent Office in Munich starting in mid-2010.