Suspending IP rights will not help end pandemic

Biden Administration Should Absolutely Reject Patent Waivers for COVID-19 Vaccines | Reason - Ronald Bailey: 

May 4, 2021 - "A coalition of developing countries led by India and South Africa are pushing the World Trade Organization to suspend patent rights to the vaccines, arguing that doing so will enable them to get more shots to poor people across the globe. Progressives in the U.S., such as Senators Bernie Sanders (I–Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D–Mass.) are arguing that suspending the patents is a moral imperative. However, suspending patents is not a moral imperative, it's moral grandstanding and would do nothing to get the vaccines faster to the people who need them.

"The World Health Organization lists fewer than 25 countries capable of manufacturing any vaccines whatsoever, much less the novel and highly complex COVID-19 vaccines.... Just lifting patent protection would do nothing to actually enable most poor countries to ramp up production of these vaccines, and it would discourage companies from continuing to make them now and in the future.

"[T]he vaccine makers are on track to supply enough COVID-19 vaccine to inoculate 7 billion people by the end of this year. It would be much more helpful for progressives to put aside their vendetta against the pharmaceutical companies and instead concentrate on figuring out the logistics of getting vaccines to people in poor countries."
Read more: https://reason.com/2021/05/04/biden-administration-should-absolutely-reject-patent-waivers-for-covid-19-vaccines/

The Biden administration says it will support lifting patent protections to help produce more vaccines globally | New York Times:

May 5, 2021 - "The Biden administration on Wednesday came out in support of waiving intellectual property protections for Covid-19 vaccines.... Katherine Tai, the United States trade representative, announced the administration’s position in a statement on Wednesday afternoon.

"'This is a global health crisis, and the extraordinary circumstances of the Covid-19 pandemic call for extraordinary measures,' she said. 'The administration believes strongly in intellectual property protections, but in service of ending this pandemic, supports the waiver of those protections for Covid-19 vaccines.'"
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/05/05/world/covid-vaccine-coronavirus-cases#covid-vaccine-patent-biden

Patents are Not the Problem! | Marginal Revolution - Alex Tabarrok:

May 6, 2021 - "Waive IP protections. So simple. Why didn’t I think of that???

"Patents are not the problem. All of the vaccine manufacturers are trying to increase supply as quickly as possible. Billions of doses are being produced – more than ever before in the history of the world. Licenses are widely available. AstraZeneca have licensed their vaccine for production with manufactures around the world, including in India, Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, China and South Africa. J&J’s vaccine has been licensed for production by multiple firms in the United States as well as with firms in Spain, South Africa and France. Sputnik has been licensed for production by firms in India, China, South Korea, Brazil and pending EMA approval with firms in Germany and France. Sinopharm has been licensed in the UAE, Egypt and Bangladesh. Novavax has licensed its vaccine for production in South Korea, India, and Japan and it is desperate to find other licensees but technology transfer isn’t easy and there are limited supplies of raw materials....

"Plastic bags are a bigger bottleneck than patents. The US embargo on vaccine supplies to India was precisely that the Biden administration used the DPA [Defense Production Act] to prioritize things like bioreactor bags and filters to US suppliers and that meant that India’s Serum Institute was having trouble getting its production lines ready for Novavax. CureVac, another potential mRNA vaccine, is also finding it difficult to find supplies due to US restrictions (which means supplies are short everywhere). As Derek Lowe said: 'Abolishing patents will not provide more shaker bags or more Chilean tree bark, nor provide more of the key filtration materials needed for production. These processes have a lot of potential choke points and rate-limiting steps in them, and there is no wand that will wave that complexity away.'

"Technology transfer has been difficult for AstraZeneca ... and their vaccine uses relatively well understood technology. The mRNA technology is new and has never before been used to produce at scale. Pfizer and Moderna had to build factories and distribution systems from scratch. There are no mRNA factories idling on the sidelines. If there were, Moderna or Pfizer would be happy to license since they are producing in their own factories 24 hours a day, seven days a week.... Moderna has said that they won’t enforce their patents during the pandemic but no one has stepped up to produce because no one else can.

"The US trade representative’s announcement is virtue signaling to the anti-market left and will do little to nothing to increase supply."
Read more: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2021/05/ip-is-not-the-constraint.html

The espionage that took down Nortel

Did Huawei bring down Nortel? Corporate espionage, theft, and the parallel rise and fall of two telecom giants | The Intelligencer - Tom Blackwell:

February 24, 2020 - "Nortel Networks ... led the way in developing digital telephone networks worldwide in the 1970s and 1980s. By the turn of the last century ... it boasted over 90,000 employees and ... accounted for a third of the worth of companies on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Its technological prowess is still legendary.... Then, in 2000, the speculative Internet bubble that had so elevated Nortel suddenly burst.... In January, 2009, Nortel filed for bankruptcy protection.... 

"Nortel’s financial troubles were well documented, but what didn’t become public until years later was espionage traced back to China....

"Michel Juneau-Katsuya was head of the CSIS Asia-Pacific desk in the late 1990s when the service became aware of 'spying activities the Chinese were conducting' against Nortel.... When the intelligence agency warned the company, it all but ignored CSIS. This led Juneau-Katsuya to a startling conclusion: 'To this day, I believe there might have been one or more agents of influence controlled by the Chinese in [Nortel] which succeeded in neutralizing our warning.'

"A little later, around 2000,...  [at] a Nortel facility in Texas, Huawei returned a fibre card ... and asked for a refund, recalls Lawrence Bill, a forensic analyst who worked on the subsequent investigation.... [W] hen Nortel engineers looked closely, they realized the 'bleeding-edge' gear had been disassembled and reverse engineered, says Bill.... Meanwhile, the company started noticing knock-off versions of some of its products in Asian markets, he says. Nortel considered suing, but dropped the matter after the Huawei office across the road in Texas closed down....

"[I]n the spring of 2004 ... a Nortel employee in the U.K. noticed some documents he’d stored in the company’s 'LiveLink' database had been downloaded by a senior executive in Canada. The Brit helpfully emailed the manager — optical-networks president Brian McFadden — to say he was available to answer any questions McFadden might have about the material. The executive’s response? I have no idea what you’re talking about. Nortel’s security staff in Raleigh, N.C., were promptly alerted.

"Larry Bill, based in Raleigh, noticed a troubling fact: Logs indicated that McFadden had signed into the Nortel system from multiple locations around the world, places he had never visited.... Security advisor Brian Shields discovered that not one, but seven Nortel executives, including CEO Frank Dunn, had been hacked, and that the hackers were vacuuming an alarming volume of sensitive material out of its databases.

"By the end of his investigation, Shields says he was able to track the theft of over 1,400 documents from the LiveLink server, and that was only during a six-month period when bosses allowed him to monitor the stealing. He found evidence the break-in of Nortel’s internal computer network had started no later than 2000, and probably began in the 1990s. He says it lasted past 2009, when he was laid off. He traced most of the hacks back to IP addresses and four Internet service providers (ISPs) in China. When material was actually downloaded from Nortel, it mostly ended up at an ISP in Shanghai....

"He cites a 2013 report by cyber-security firm Mandiant, which revealed the existence of a major Internet-espionage organization in Shanghai, likely “Unit 61398” of the People’s Liberation Army. Mandiant tracked thefts of data from 141 companies in 20 major industries.... 

"Shields, who was Nortel’s representative on the Network Security Information Exchange, a U.S. government initiative to help protect the national telecom infrastructure ... has no evidence of who ultimately received the documents, but notes that only a Nortel competitor would benefit from the information, helping it develop products, craft sales pitches and out-sell rivals.  Shields cannot prove that Huawei benefited from the hacking, but is convinced that its rise to a world telecommunications superpower — as Nortel simultaneously withered away — is no coincidence.... And yet he is certain the Nortel CEO never saw that report. His investigation wound down after a few months, and it appears no one notified firms that later bought Nortel assets that its computers might be infected.

"CSIS got in touch again early in 2009, offering to help Nortel with the hacks, Shields says, but by then it was too late. Within a week, the company had filed for bankruptcy protection.... A few years later, as the National Defence Department prepared to take over Nortel’s former research campus in Ottawa, it discovered evidence of another type of spying — old-school listening bugs implanted in the building during Nortel days, a senior Defence officer told the Ottawa Citizen and Globe and Mail."

Read more: https://www.intelligencer.ca/news/exclusive-did-huawei-bring-down-nortel-corporate-espionage-theft-and-the-parallel-rise-and-fall-of-two-telecom-giants/wcm/543c8eee-d7d0-4b8a-89e9-09c3b9c92b4a

Sanders campaign expropriates YAL brand name

Libertarian group accuses Bernie Sanders campaign of stealing door-knocking brand - Anthony Leonardi, Washington Examiner:

February 14, 2020 - "A libertarian organization is threatening to sue Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, claiming his campaign stole its intellectual property. Young Americans for Liberty, a nonprofit student activist organization, sent a cease-and-desist letter to the Sanders campaign, accusing it of stealing the organization's brand 'Operation Win at the Door' by calling its door-knocking operation the same thing.

"'YAL launched Operation Win at the Door in 2018. Operation Win at the Door has knocked on over 1.5 million doors and secured 56 election victories,' writes Dan Backer, counsel for the libertarian group. 'YAL has expended substantial resources in developing the name and goodwill associated with Operation Win at the Door. Your bastardization of our clients’ intellectual property and flagrant attempt to redistribute their hard-won goodwill — a product of tremendous labor on the part of our client — is unauthorized and un-American.'

'The Washington Times obtained text messages from someone claiming to represent the Sanders campaign that encouraged people to join 'the largest grassroots campaign in the country — Operation Win at the Door.'

"YAL claims that the Sanders campaign is able to mislead the public into believing it has endorsed the socialist's campaign, something it says is antithetical to the organization's belief system.... 'This bald-faced deceit violates laws that prohibit such deceptive solicitations and protect donations for their intended use as well as infringes on the intellectual property rights of YAL,' the letter said.

"The group plans to pursue legal action unless the Sanders campaign discontinues its use of the brand.

"The Washington Examiner reached out to the Sanders campaign but did not receive a response for publication."

Read more: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/libertarian-group-accuses-bernie-sanders-campaign-of-stealing-door-knocking-brand
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Canadian copyright term extension on hold

Canada Introduces USMCA Implementation Bill…Without a General Copyright Term Extension Provision - Michael Geist, MichaelGeist.ca:

May 30, 2019 - The Canadian government tabled Bill C-100 yesterday, the bill to implement the Canada-US-Mexico Trade Agreement.... [K]ey provisions ... include new criminal provisions on trade secrets and tampering with rights management information. The bill also features several provisions related to copyright term but notably does not touch the current general copyright term of life of the author plus an additional 50 years. There are several new terms included in the bill with extensions for anonymous works, performances in sound recordings, sound recordings, and cinematographic works. The bill expressly states that none of the extensions are retroactive which means that the works that are currently in the public domain will remain there even after the new terms are established.

Yet the big story is that Section 6 of the Copyright Act, which states that the general term of copyright is life of the author plus 50 years, remains unchanged despite a USMCA requirement of life plus 70 years. Why unchanged?

I am advised that the reason is that the Canadian government negotiated a 2 1/2 year transition period for the USMCA and it intends to use the time to consult with the public on the best way to meet the copyright term obligation. That holds the promise of the making the best of a bad situation given that few (other than the embarrassingly one-sided Heritage committee study) think that extending the term of copyright benefits Canadians.

For example, there has been some thought given to establishing a registration requirement for the additional 20 years. That approach would allow rights holders that want the extension to get it, while ensuring that many other works enter the public domain at the international standard of life plus 50 years. By providing for life plus 50 and the option for an additional 20 years, Canadian law would be consistent with Berne Convention formalities requirements and with its new trade treaty obligations. Copyright registration would not eliminate all the harm to the public domain, but it would mean that only those that desire the extension would take the positive steps to get it, thereby reducing the costs of the USMCA’s unnecessary copyright term extension.

Read more: http://www.michaelgeist.ca/2019/05/canada-introduces-usmca-implementation-bill-without-a-general-copyright-term-extension-provision/

Article copyright Michael Geist. Licensed Creative Commons BY 2.5.

Canadian copyright extension buried in trade deal

IPPro Magazine | The Great White North: How Canada is matching US IP system changes | ippromagazine.com - Ben Wadecki:

March 6, 2019 - "The US-Mexico-Canada Agreement USMCA, touted by US president Donald Trump as a 'great deal for all three countries', is a reorganisation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and will shape trade and IP relations between the three countries for years to come....

"In relation to copyright, Paul Smith, senior partner at Smiths IP, remarks that under USMCA, the extension of the copyright terms from the life of the author +50 years will become the life of the author +70 years.... Smith points out that the change has been criticised as a curtailment of Canadian heritage and as a significant increase in the cost of education in Canada, all apparently to benefit a handful of large US-based entertainment companies."
Read more: http://www.ippromagazine.com/specialistfeatures/specialistfeature.php?specialist_id=50

New NAFTA Would Harm Canadian Copyright Reform and Shrink the Public Domain - Creative Commons - Timothy Vollmer:

October 1, 2018 - "The extension of already-lengthy copyright terms will discourage new creativity in Canada. It will further prevent Canadians from accessing and using the rich pool of resources in the public domain, which means they can be used free of any copyright protections. Creativity always builds upon the past, and the public domain is our shared cultural commons used to create new works of art and science....

"Before these negotiations took place, an increase in copyright term was not  on the agenda for the Canadian reform. Last year, Canadian ministers responsible for the copyright review indicated some support of the public domain, stating that an updated law 'should ensure […] that users benefit from a public domain.' In our submission to the public consultation, we wrote:

"'We believe that Canada has been right to push back against any extension of copyright term or expansion of the scope. The copyright term of life of the author + 50 years is already far too long. Extremely long copyright terms prevent works from entering the public domain, where they may be used by anyone — including CC licensors — without restriction as the raw material for additional creative works.' If the USMCA is adopted, it will clearly violate the direction of the Canadian copyright reform....

"The USMCA text shows the powerful hand of U.S. copyright interests. A copyright term extension was floated in earlier versions of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and Creative Commons joined with dozens of other organisations to push back on it then.... But USMCA shows a swing back in the other direction, almost surely a result of U.S. pressure to ratchet up copyright protection and enforcement measures....

"There is no reason for any more copyright term extensions, which would harm the commons and are contrary to the policies and values supported by the Creative Commons community."

Read more: https://creativecommons.org/2018/10/01/new-nafta-would-harm-canada-and-shrink-the-public-domain/

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In praise of the public domain

by George J. Dance

January 1, 2019 - In Canada, January 1 is Public Domain Day, the day when works of art lose their copyright status and pass into the public domain. "Public domain" means that the art no longer has an owner who can charge (and therefore exclude) those who want to experience it. Physical copies are still owned; but anyone in the country – teacher, humble blogger, or even small press owner – can make their own copies without having to pay royalties for the privilege.

Public Domain Day happens today in the United States, as well, but there it is more momentous. January 1, 2019 is the first Public Domain Day in the U.S. in 20 years, the very first since the rise of the internet.

The concept of a 'public domain' has a long pedigree, reaching back to the Roman legal concepts of res nullus (things that cannot be owned) and res communes (things owned in common). In modern law, though, it is treated as a mere negative: the things to which property law does not apply. The term itself was coined by French poet Alfred de Vigny, who equated the end of a work's copyright with it falling "into the sinkhole of public domain." "Sinkhole" was a good description; For most books, songs and poems, the lack of copyright meant that no one would publish them; a work that fell into the public domain could well and truly disappear.

However, the internet changed all that. Project Gutenberg began putting the literary canon online – Internet Archive began doing the same for the rest of pre-1923 writing – Wikimedia Commons did the same for paintings and music. Today, rather than being lost to us, public domain works are available and freely accessible to billions.  

Simultaneous with the rise of the net in the 1990s, copyright holders began pushing to extend their copyrights. In 1995 the United Kingdom increased its copyright term, from life plus 50 to life plus 70 years. The United States followed suit in 1998 with its own 20-year increase, from 75 to 95 years. The British law was retroactive, declaring works already in the public domain (some already republished) back in copyright (and those published works therefore illegal). However, as the U.S. Constitution forbids ex post facto punishments, Congress had to be content with freezing copyrights for 20 years, effectively banning Public Domain Day for that time.

Canada has been under considerable pressure (most recently with the Trans-Pacific Partnership) to increase its own term. Thankfully, that pressure failed; not least, because such extensions of copyright are indefensible. A libertarian can accept the idea of giving a work's creator the sole right to use and profit from his work, even for life; and adding an extra fixed term insures his dependents against his accidental death. (For example, if a writer dies at 30, Canadian law lets his heirs collect royalties as if he had lived to 80.) But there is no justification for forcing consumers to pay royalties to a creator's grandchildren.  

Yet copyright advocates continued to demand more for another decade. Some, like Sonny Bono (a main proponent of the 1998 law), even argued for perpetual copyrights that would never expire. Perpetual copyright is also forbidden by the U.S. Constitution, which empowers Congress to grant patents and copyrights for "limited times" only; Bono and his ilk hoped to circumvent that by passing further 20-year extensions every 20 years, meaning that the next increase had to happen by 2018.

Fortunately, the internet changed all that, too. The tipping point came in 2012, when Congress debated the Stop Internet Piracy Act (SOPA), which would have forced ISPs to black out websites accused of copyright violation and blacklist the site owners. Online opposition to SOPA was massive and widespread, and in addition backed by big sites like Google and Wikipedia. For once the big money pushing to expand copyright was balanced by big money pushing back. "The defeat of SOPA was so complete," says website Ars Technica, "that it has essentially ended efforts by copyright interests to expand copyright protection via legislation."

Which is why the U.S. enjoyed a Public Domain Day this year. American copyright law today is far from perfect, and in many respects not even very good. But at least this day can remind Americans that, thankfully, their government no longer has carte blanche to make it worse.

Why libertarians like Bitcoin

The Libertarian Case for Bitcoin | Hacked: Hacking Finance - William Bartlett:

August 23, 2018 - "From the outside looking in, Bitcoin seems to have a cult-like following.... However, as you get to understand crypto a little better, it becomes clear that there are many different factions.... There are the technologists who think technology is king, [the] contrarians who believe that the US dollar and all fiat currencies are overvalued, and then there are the libertarians who want to have as much freedom from the government as possible.

 "At its core, libertarianism is a political philosophy that gives individuals rights to acquire, keep, and exchange their holdings. It is a very 'American' point-of-view, and has gained a lot of support in recent times, due to the rising fiscal deficit, among other things.... To libertarians, the ideal is to have minimum intervention from the state.

"This also involves locking middlemen and intermediaries out of the equation. Oligopolies such as the one the big banks currently hold end up giving them a 'government-level' of control over the funds of customers. Bitcoin disintermediates these banks and creates a natural market for all who wish to do commerce online.

"An auxiliary point would be the somewhat excessive intervention in the money markets by the Fed. Denationalization of currency is a position most libertarians take as another way of protecting their money from purposeful inflation.

"What is especially beautiful about Bitcoin is the fact that it is censorship resistant. Not only is there economic freedom, but also the ability to fund whatever you would like, but without worrying about being stopped. This is true 'freedom of expression' (another libertarian ideal). Obviously there are cases where this goes too far (e.g. terrorism) and this is where the debate about Bitcoin’s place in society heats up.

"Bitcoin also goes in direct conflict with the government’s desire to track the flow of money for taxation and regulatory purposes. It is very difficult for governments to track the flow of Bitcoin funds, and even though it’s possible to match up public addresses, anonymity is generally ensured. And for those looking for a more robust solution, other privacy coins like zCash and Monero have popped up.

"Aside from Bitcoin, you have numerous new 'markets' popping up where there used to be inefficient markets with minimal innovation. Utility coins are putting a value on what used to be deadweight loss in the markets. This connects to Bitcoin with the idea of 'economic liberty', where they have property rights and fully privatized free markets."

Read more: https://hacked.com/the-libertarian-case-for-bitcoin/
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Further US copyright extension unlikely this year

Why Mickey Mouse’s 1998 copyright extension probably won’t happen again | Ars Technica - Timothy B. Lee:

January 8, 2018 - "On January 1, 2019, every book, film, and song published in 1923 will fall out of copyright protection — something that hasn't happened in 40 years. At least, that's what will happen if Congress doesn't retroactively change copyright law to prevent it — as Congress has done two previous times.

"Until the 1970s, copyright terms only lasted for 56 years. But Congress retroactively extended the term of older works to 75 years in 1976. Then on October 27, 1998 — just weeks before works from 1923 were scheduled to fall into the public domain — President Bill Clinton signed legislation retroactively extending the term of older works to 95 years, locking up works published in 1923 or later for another 20 years.

"Will Congress do the same thing again this year? To find out, we talked to groups on both sides of the nation's copyright debate.... To our surprise, there seemed to be universal agreement that another copyright extension was unlikely to be on the agenda this year....

"The rise of the Internet has totally changed the political landscape on copyright issues. The Electronic Frontier Foundation is much larger than it was in 1998. Other groups, including Public Knowledge, didn't even exist 20 years ago. Internet companies — especially Google — have become powerful opponents of expanding copyright protections.

"Most importantly, there's now a broad grassroots engagement on copyright issues — something that became evident with the massive online protests against the infamous Stop Online Piracy Act in 2012. SOPA would have forced ISPs to enforce DNS-based blacklists of sites accused of promoting piracy. It was such a bad idea that Wikipedia, Google, and other major sites blacked themselves out in protest.... The protest against SOPA 'was a big show of force," says Meredith Rose, a lawyer at Public Knowledge. The protest showed that 'the public really cares about this stuff.'

"The defeat of SOPA was so complete that it has essentially ended efforts by copyright interests to expand copyright protection via legislation. Prior to SOPA, Congress would regularly pass bills ratcheting up copyright protections.... Since 2012, copyright has been a legislative stalemate, with neither side passing significant legislation.

"And that means that advocates of a new copyright term extension bill wouldn't be able to steamroll opponents the way they did 20 years ago. Any term extension proposal would face a well-organized and well-funded opposition with significant grassroots support.... Of course, copyright interests might try to slip a copyright term extension into a must-pass bill in hopes opponents wouldn't notice until it was too late. But ... 'The likelihood of it slipping by unnoticed' is low, Rose said.

"And even some content creators aren't keen on ever-longer copyright terms. The Authors Guild, for example, 'does not support extending the copyright term, especially since many of our members benefit from having access to a thriving and substantial public domain of older works,' a Guild spokeswoman told Ars in an email. 'If anything, we would likely support a rollback to a term of life-plus-50 if it were politically feasible.'"

Read more: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2018/01/hollywood-says-its-not-planning-another-copyright-extension-push/
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Apple CEO defends encyption with 'no backdoors'

Apple’s Tim Cook Lashes Out at White House Officials for Being Wishy-Washy on Encryption - Jenna McLaughlin, The Intercept::

January 12, 2016 - "Apple CEO Tim Cook lashed out at the high-level delegation of Obama administration officials who came calling on tech leaders in San Jose last week, criticizing the White House for a lack of leadership and asking the administration to issue a strong public statement defending the use of unbreakable encryption.

"The White House should come out and say 'no backdoors,' Cook said. That would mean overruling repeated requests from FBI Director James Comey and other administration officials that tech companies build some sort of special access for law enforcement into otherwise unbreakable encryption. Technologists agree that any such measure could be exploited by others....

The Washington Post reported in September that the White House had decided not to pursue legislation against unbreakable encryption. But the intelligence community’s top lawyer was quoted in an email saying that that the administration should be 'keeping our options open … in the event of a terrorist attack or criminal event where strong encryption can be shown to have hindered law enforcement.'

"And Comey has been urging technology companies to voluntarily alter 'their business model' and stop offering end-to-end encryption by default.

"Despite the growing pressure tech companies are feeling from governments worldwide to stop letting terrorists take advantage of their services, Cook has continued to defend the importance of encryption in protecting all digital transactions — from text messages and emails to bank information and medical records.

"Cook has been outspoken in his opposition to the idea that we need to sacrifice privacy and digital security for the sake of public safety. During an episode of 60 Minutes on December 20, he said, 'We’re America, we should have both'....

"[T]echnologists and cryptographers have been insisting for decades almost unanimously that trying to pierce impenetrable end-to-end encryption to provide the government with access would be more dangerous than beneficial."

Read more: https://theintercept.com/2016/01/12/apples-tim-cook-lashes-out-at-white-house-officials-for-being-wishy-washy-on-encryption/
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Tech, libertarian groups press for strong encryption

Tech, libertarian groups up pressure on Obama on encryption | TheHill - Cory Bennett:

October 7, 2015 - ""In two separate letters, a major tech trade group and a libertarian-leaning coalition pressed President Obama to publicly support strong encryption, even if it locks out law enforcement officials.

"'As organizations committed to free markets and limited government, we urge your administration to take a clear stand in support of the individual’s right to protect his or her security and privacy with strong encryption technology,' said one letter, signed by groups like TechFreedom and the Niskanen Center.

"''Regardless of good intentions, any efforts to undermine the security and effectiveness of strong encryption are misguided, shortsighted, impractical and ultimately counterproductive,” said a second letter from Ed Black, CEO of the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), which represents major tech players like Amazon, Facebook, Google and Microsoft.

"The letters come a week after privacy advocates and digital rights groups officially petitioned the White House to take the same stance.

"The combination has created a unique and powerful coalition pressing the White House on encryption.

"The Obama administration has been considering possible proposals that would give law enforcement guaranteed access to encrypted communications. Silicon Valley, privacy advocates and technologists have pushed back against this, arguing any such access makes encryption vulnerable to hackers and cyber spies.... Officials have countered that without access, investigators may not be able to get legitimate data on criminals and terrorists, even when armed with a warrant....

"In recent weeks, leaked memos have shown the White House is considering backpedaling from its desire for a technological solution that would let investigators bypass encryption.

"Privacy advocates have jumped on these signals, collecting signatures on a petition that would require the White House to publicly respond to a call for it to support full encryption.... As of Wednesday, the appeal had collected over 48,000 signatures in nine days."

Read more: http://thehill.com/policy/cybersecurity/256281-tech-libertarian-groups-up-pressure-on-obama-in-encryption-fight
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Happy Birthday copyright claim invalid, judge rules

'Happy Birthday' song copyright claims are invalid, federal judge rules - LA Times - Christine Mai-Duc::

September 22, 2015 - "None of the companies that have collected royalties on the 'Happy Birthday' song for the past 80 years held a valid copyright claim to one of the most popular songs in history, a federal judge in Los Angeles ruled on Tuesday.

"In a stunning reversal of decades of copyright claims, the judge ruled that Warner/Chappell never had the right to charge for the use of the 'Happy Birthday To You' song. Warner had been enforcing a copyright since 1988, when it bought Birch Tree Group, the successor to Clayton F. Summy Co., which claimed the original disputed copyright.

"Judge George H. King ruled that a copyright filed by the Summy Co. in 1935 granted only the rights to specific piano arrangements of the music, not the actual song.

"'"Happy Birthday" is finally free after 80 years,' said Randall Newman, an attorney for the plaintiffs in the suit, which included a group of filmmakers who are producing a documentary about the song. 'Finally, the charade is over. It's unbelievable.'

"Until now, Warner has asked for royalties from anyone who wanted to sing or play 'Happy Birthday to You' – with the lyrics – as part of a profit-making enterprise. Royalties were most often collected from stage productions, television shows, movies or greeting cards. But even those who wanted to sing the song publicly as part of a business, say a restaurant owner giving out free birthday cake to patrons, technically had to pay to use the song....

"Two of the filmmaker plaintiffs paid $1,500 and $3,000 for the rights to use the song, their attorneys said. Filmmaker Steve James paid Warner $5,000 to use the song in his 1994 documentary Hoop Dreams.

"At a March hearing in the case, records show, a Warner/Chappell representative seated in the audience told the judge that the company collects as much as 'six figures' for certain single uses of the song. The song brings in about $2 million a year in royalties for Warner, according to some estimates....

"It is not entirely clear, the judge ruled, that the Hill sisters wrote the lyrics for 'Happy Birthday To You.' But either way, they never asserted a copyright claim for the lyrics, even though they sued for the rights to the original melody....

"Ultimately, the judge ruled that no evidence existed that the Summy Co. -- the original company to assert a copyright claim -- ever legally obtained the rights to the ... song from whomever wrote it.

"Tuesday's ruling means that the song is now considered a public work and is free for everyone to use without fear of having to pay for it, according to a statement from the plaintiffs' attorneys."

Read more: http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-happy-birthday-song-lawsuit-decision-20150922-story.html
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Bachman's absurd argument for copyright extension

Randy Bachman: Canadian Music ‘Could Stop Being Made' Without Copyright Extension - Daniel Tencer, Huffington Post Canada::

June 24, 2015 - "Canada may stop creating great musical acts like Arcade Fire or Joni Mitchell if the country doesn’t extend copyright terms, rocker Randy Bachman says....

"As part of its latest budget, the Harper government extended copyright terms for sound recordings to 70 years, from the previous 50 years. Bachman, echoing the calls of certain artists’ groups, is calling for that extension to apply to songwriters and composers as well.

"The copyright extension in the budget 'helps only those who performed on the recordings,' Bachman writes. “The creators’ copyright protection is frozen at the life of the author plus 50 years. This would leave Canada lagging behind most other G20 countries, including the United States, the U.K., and almost all of the European Union'....

"He concludes by saying society 'should pay the creators what they have rightfully earned, so that a middle-class career (at least) can be the reward for solid songwriting skills, and so that they can keep creating — in Canada. Otherwise, Canadian music could stop being made.'

"University of Ottawa e-commerce law professor Michael Geist says Bachman’s column 'contains some of the most absurd claims about copyright in recent memory'....

"Geist wrote that Bachman’s claim Canadian artists would stop making music 'is simply not credible' because, with or without the copyright extension, they are protected for life.

"'The reality is that songwriters and composers typically get far more than 70 years since their work is protected for their entire lives plus an additional 50 years,' he wrote.

"'In Bachman’s case, "Takin’ Care of Business" was written in 1973. That means it has already been protected for 42 years. It is entitled to another 50 years after Bachman dies, meaning that it is guaranteed to get at least 92 years of protection'....

"He adds: 'Does Bachman seriously believe that there are any Canadian songwriters, composers, or authors who would decide not to write because they receive copyright protection for their entire lives and their heirs get 50 years of protection rather than 70 years?'"

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/06/24/randy-bachman-copyright-canada_n_7654566.html
'via Blog this'

A libertarian case for patent reform

How to Fix Patents: Economic liberty requires patent reform - Derek Satya Khanna, Lincoln Labs:

"Patent policy is increasingly failing in its constitutionally enumerated purpose of 'promoting
the progress of the sciences and useful arts' as a result of patent trolling and an epidemic of
granting low-quality patents. For conservatives and libertarians, this should be striking, as the
Copyright/Patent Clause is the only clause in the Constitution that provides a specific purpose for
granting the government that power.If this clause means anything, it certainly doesn’t
mean to 'reduce the progress of the sciences and useful arts,' which is the unfortunate result of
how today’s patent policies are affecting several important sectors of the economy. Patent trolling,
created and exacerbated by modern patent policy including low-quality patents, is increasingly
stifling competition, stopping legitimate innovations created independently, and raising barriers to entry
for new market entrants.

"Restoring constitutional principles for patents by implementing free market oriented policies
will jumpstart the U.S. economy and is well past due. The solution to patent trolling is not merely
addressing trolling behavior, but also fixing the underlying problem of low-quality patents.

"In this report, we present a number of suggestions for practical reform to patent policy consistent
with the original public meaning of the Patent Clause, which will foster more innovation,
entrepreneurship, and economic growth. Patents are one of the primary ways the federal government
regulates innovation and technology throughout the economy, and today it more closely resembles
cronyism rather than sensible policy.

"When government and big business team up, they often rig the game to keep out the competition,
and the case is no different with modern patent regulation. Recently, several conservative organizations — many of whom receive funding from industries with vested interests—have tried to preempt any form of patent reform by arguing how patent reform would violate their 'property rights.'

"Nothing could be further from the truth: janitors do not have 'property' in how to clean a building; Apple does not have 'property' in rounded rectangles and 'slide to unlock'; Amazon does not have 'property' in one-click checkout; Priceline does not have 'property' in the concept of reverse auctions; Microsoft does not have 'property' in squiggly lines when you mistype a word; Smuckers doesn’t have 'property' in peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, anymore than a known patent troll has a 'property' in the entire practice of podcasting; certainly no one ought to have 'property' in the concept of the hyperlink; and we should probably all agree that no one ought to have 'property”' in the idea of exercising a cat by using a laser pointer.

"Unforunately, they have — or in some cases had, and in these cases should never have had — monopolies through patents granted by a government regulator, the United States Patent Office."

Read more: http://lincolnlabs.com/pdfs/lincoln-labs-patent-reform.pdf
'via Blog this'

Book makes free-market case for copyright reform (video)

New book makes free-market case for copyright reform - Jerry Brito, Technology Liberation Front:

December 6. 2012 - "I’m happy to announce today that the new book I’ve edited, Copyright Unbalanced: From Incentive to Excess is now available. The book is not a moral case for or against copyright; it is a pragmatic look at the excesses of the present copyright regime from a free-market, limited government perspective....

"Conservatives and libertarians, who are naturally suspicious of big government, should be skeptical of our ever-expanding copyright system. They should also be skeptical of the recent trend toward criminal prosecution of even minor copyright infringements, of the growing use of civil asset forfeiture in copyright enforcement, and of attempts to regulate the Internet and electronics in the name of piracy eradication. These are the issues Copyright Unbalanced addresses."

Read more: http://techliberation.com/2012/12/03/new-book-makes-free-market-case-for-copyright-reform/
'via Blog this'

How copyright criminalization threatens online innovation

How Copyright Criminalization Threatens Online Innovation - Forbes - Timothy B. Lee:

December 6, 2012 -: "Jerry Brito has pulled together an edited collection of copyright reform essays by libertarians (and one from a pair of libertarian-leaning conservatives) called Copyright Unbalanced.... Jerry’s book promises to be a handbook for free-market copyright reformers....

"I contributed a chapter focusing on a recent development that I find particularly alarming: the increasing use of harsh criminal penalties, including civil asset forfeiture, against online intermediaries....

"In 2008, Congress passed the PRO IP Act, which for the first time allowed the use of civil asset forfeiture in copyright cases. This tactic, which has become infamous due to its abuse in drug cases, allows the police to seize property without convicting, or even indicting, its owner of any crime. The police have used this tactic with devastating effect against startups such as Megaupload, a popular file-sharing site that was shuttered by the federal government in January. The feds seized the Megaupload servers, all the firm’s assets, as well as the personal assets of founder Kim Dotcom. And they have charged Dotcom with criminal copyright infringement and are seeking his extradition from his home in New Zealand."

Read more: http://www.forbes.com/sites/timothylee/2012/12/06/how-copyright-criminalization-threatens-online-innovation/
'via Blog this'

Copyfraud

Copyfraud - by George Dance, Nolan Chart, Aug. 7, 2011:

"The threat of copyfraud is particularly ominous on the Web, where it can combine with a new phenomenon called 'copyright trolling.' Copyright trolls are law firms that 'acquire copyright licenses on articles and images, then go scouring the Web for infringers ... copyright trolls target small companies and individuals. Their business model is to pick on the relatively defenseless, threatening and intimidating people into paying settlements of a few thousand dollars' ... copyright trolls’ claims are rarely tested in court, and bogus copyright claims look as likely to go unexamined as valid ones."

Read more: http://www.nolanchart.com/article8871_Copyfraud.html

Property rights in the Constitution | The Liberal view

“Property rights” in the Constitution | Warren Kinsella, Feb. 24, 2011:

"What does it mean for you?

"Higher drug prices, in perpetuity, as Big Pharma will win eternal patent protections
"The loss of anti-pollution rules
"The end of new parks and the potential elimination of existing parks
"Elimination of zoning rules designed to prevent neighbourhoods from being ruined – noise bylaws, giant homes, etc.
"Friction with aboriginal peoples, with land claims being overturned and challenged
"Discrimination against women in divorce settlements
"The challenge of labour laws, and potential end to collective bargaining
"The loss of shorelines, and commercialization of public lands

"It’s crazy."

http://warrenkinsella.com/2011/02/property-rights-in-the-constitution/