USPTO, Microsoft seek to kill WIPO meeting on open collaborative models to develop public goods

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

> Date: Wed, 20 Aug 2003 17:33:29 -0400
> From: James Love <james.love () cptech org>
> Subject: USPTO, Microsoft seek to kill WIPO meeting on open collaborative
>  models to develop public goods
> To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
>
> August 19, 2003. Technology Daily PM Edition
>
> --
> Intellectual Property
> Global Group's Shift On 'Open Source' Meeting Spurs Stir
> by William New
>
> A request for a meeting on open development issues has plunged the 
> Geneva-based World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) into a 
> Washington political battle, causing it to shift its position on the issue.
>
> At issue is whether WIPO should hold a meeting next year on "open and 
> collaborative projects" such as "open source" software, which allows users 
> to view and modify underlying code.
>
> The meeting was proposed in a July 7 letter sent to WIPO Director General 
> Kamil Idris by 68 distinguished scientists, academics, technologists, 
> open-source advocates, consumer advocates, librarians, industry 
> representatives and economists worldwide.
> (http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/kamil-idris-7july2003.pdf)
>
> Although the letter cited a broad range of open collaborative projects 
> such as the World Wide Web and the Human Genome Project, the fight has 
> focused on open-source software and on one signer of the letter -- James 
> Love, director of the Consumer Project on Technology, who has actively 
> pushed for the meeting.
>
> WIPO's initial response to the idea was so favorable that proponents began 
> planning for a meeting. After receiving the letter, Francis Gurry, WIPO's 
> assistant director and legal counsel, e-mailed a statement to a Nature 
> magazine reporter calling such open development models "a very important 
> and interesting development."
>
> "The director general of WIPO looks forward with enthusiasm to taking up 
> the invitation to organize a conference to explore the scope and 
> application of these models as vehicles for encouraging innovation," he wrote.
>
> But a few weeks later, WIPO backed off the idea. Gurry said he and other 
> WIPO officials received "many calls" from consumer groups, trade 
> associations, professional associations and representatives from governments.
>
> "What happened in the intervening weeks is that a request for an open 
> discussion on a range of 'projects' became transformed into an 
> increasingly domestically, as opposed to internationally, oriented, 
> polarized political and trade debate about one only of those 'projects', 
> namely open-source software," Gurry told National Journal's Technology 
> Daily on Tuesday. "In those circumstances, the possibility of conducting a 
> policy discussion on intellectual property of the sort that might be 
> appropriate for an international organization devoted to intellectual 
> property became increasingly remote."
>
> U.S. government officials have argued that WIPO is an inappropriate place 
> for such a meeting.
>
> One developing country representative to WIPO on Monday expressed 
> disappointment at hearing that the meeting is in doubt, and Love and 
> representatives from the Computer and Communications Industry Association 
> (CCIA) were furious to learn of the shift. Love last week called the 
> decision a "temporary setback," and vowed, "We're going to make this 
> happen." But for meeting opponents, he said, it would be "as if you made 
> an atheist pope for the day."
>
> CCIA President Ed Black said on Tuesday: "Does this indicate that WIPO is 
> abdicating authority and responsibility for these issues, including open 
> source for the future? If so, we will all live by that, but then so must 
> they. They should step up the plate or step aside. ... It is inexplicable 
> that they would shut the door on what are clearly important issues."
>
>
> Intellectual Property
> U.S. Official Opposes 'Open Source' Talks At WIPO
> by William New
>
> An international intellectual property body is not the place for 
> discussions about "open source" software, which allows users to view and 
> modify the underlying code, because it falls outside of the organization's 
> mission, a senior U.S. official argued on Monday.
> Reviewing the original mission of the World Intellectual Property 
> Organization (WIPO), said Lois Boland, the U.S. Patent and Trademark 
> Office (PTO) acting director of international relations, it is "clearly 
> limited to the protection of intellectual property. To have a meeting 
> whose primary objective is to waive or remove those protections seems to 
> go against the mission."
>
> Boland was referring to a July request by a group of scientists, 
> academics, open-source advocates and others for a meeting at WIPO on "open 
> and collaborative projects," including open-source software. The WIPO 
> secretariat initially replied favorably to the idea.
> In a telephone interview, Boland gave several reasons why the Geneva-based 
> WIPO should not hold the meeting, including a tight budget and late 
> scheduling. She also said WIPO's agenda should be driven by member 
> nations, and the idea came from outside the organization.
> Officials from the 179 WIPO nations will convene in late September to 
> decide their agenda for the next two years; the agenda has been in the 
> works for months and does not include open-development issues. "It would 
> have been somewhat unusual for such a meeting to materialize out of 
> nothing," Boland said.
>
> In the past six months, WIPO has had to cancel several meetings on topics 
> directly relevant to the organization due to budgetary issues, she said, 
> adding that with those problems, the organization should not "go out on a 
> limb and express receptivity" to an open-development meeting.
> U.S. government officials have had "informal" communications with WIPO,
> Boland said. A WIPO official said that since receiving a wide range of 
> communications, WIPO has stepped back from the idea of a meeting but has 
> not fully rejected the possibility of addressing the topic.
>
> The U.S. government has an interagency process for developing formal 
> positions at WIPO. A meeting that included officials from PTO and the 
> Copyright Office was held last Thursday at the State Department. The 
> Commerce Department and Office of the U.S. Trade Representative are part 
> of the interagency process, too.
>
> Boland said the United States "would certainly have some rather 
> bureaucratic objections" to WIPO considering a policy on open-source 
> software. "There are technical and legalistic arguments to that." 
> Open-source software is not protected under copyright law but only 
> contract law, which is not the domain of WIPO, she said. That point has 
> been heavily disputed by copyright experts.
>
> Boland suggested that the U.S. government supports open-source growth as a 
> development tool and she proposed it for consideration by a U.N. body 
> focused on development.
>
> She also reprimanded WIPO officials for publicly giving the impression 
> that the body might consider open-source issues. "We think people working 
> within the organization need to be better stewards of interactions" with 
> nonprofit groups and other non-member organizations, she said.

-------------------------------------
You are subscribed as interesting-people () lists elistx com
To manage your subscription, go to
 http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip

Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/