[Ocg] Re: Re: [Linux-aus] Linux Australia FTA Position Draft Paper

Wed Apr 7 07:45:03 CST 2004

Here's another one.  I think that we should, at the very least, make a
submission on this topic.

Greg

----- Forwarded message from Anthony Towns <aj at azure.humbug.org.au> -----

> Date: Tue, 6 Apr 2004 02:08:23 +1000
> From: Anthony Towns <aj at azure.humbug.org.au>
> To: linux-aus <linux-aus at linux.org.au>
> Subject: Re: [Linux-aus] Linux Australia FTA Position Draft Paper
>
> On Mon, Apr 05, 2004 at 09:13:43PM +1000, Rusty Russell wrote:
>> We'll be following up with more stuff during the week as we get things
>> rolling: submissions to the Senate FTA committee close on 30 Apr.
>>         http://linux.org.au/papers/fta-paper.pdf
>
> Further to this, there's some interesting stuff from Kim Weatherall on
> the topic:
>
> http://weatherall.blogspot.com/2004_04_01_weatherall_archive.html#108112081247627695
>
>   ``The Federal Government is seeking submissions opposing
>     the Intellectual Property aspects of the US-Free Trade Agreement.
>     Submissions are required by the 13th of April 2004.'' -- Copyright Office
>
> (submissions supporting the IP aspects aren't desired/expected, apparently)
>
> Also from that URL is the point that public hearings will be happening around
> the country. The schedule's at:
>
>   http://www.aph.gov.au/house/committee/jsct/usafta/hearings.htm
>
> The week of 19th-23rd of this month (ie, the week after next) has meetings
> in Sydney, Melbourne, Hobart, Adelaide, Perth; 3rd-6th May has meetings
> in Darwin, Cairns, Brisbane and Sydney. The tour finishes in Canberra
> on the 14th of May.
>
> http://weatherall.blogspot.com/2004_03_01_weatherall_archive.html#108037118633707572
>
>   The other point that this IFAC-3 report really makes clear is, if this
>   agreement goes through, the negotiation of the agreement is not an end,
>   but only a beginning of US interference in Australian IP law-making. One
>   of the points that Australian IP negotiator, Stephen Fox was arguing
>   after the Agreement was made was that critics should carefully read
>   the text and notice all the flexibility built into the language of
>   the agreement - flexibility which, he asserted, meant that Australia
>   did not have to mirror US law.
>
> (in response to a report by a US private sector advisory ctte that
> comments on the IP bits of the FTA)
>
>
> If you haven't already written to your local Federal MP, National,
> Labor or Liberal or whatever, it's probably worth doing so, even if
> you can only express your concerns or point to LA's stuff rather than
> providing arguments of your own. If you don't know what to write, a good
> start might be to indicate what sort of Linux/open source stuff you're
> doing, or other folks in the same area/electorate are doing, and just
> talk about what stuff you're concerned about. Some things to think about:
>
> 	* Open source software to play DVDs is a circumvention device,
> 	  banning the distribution of that software, or banning even
> 	  the _use_ of that software doesn't stop copying it stops people
> 	  developing things like http://www.d1.com.au/hmc/
>
> 	* According to the Australian Copyright Council, in their January
> 	  2004 information sheet G25, "generally it is /not/ legal to tape
> 	  from TV without permission from the owners of copyright in the
> 	  material copied, even if the copy is made only for private use."
> 	  http://www.copyright.org.au/PDF/InfoSheets/G025.pdf [0]
>
> 	* According to the same group, its illegal to make backups
> 	  of music CDs or to make compilation tapes or CDs of music you
> 	  own for private use. That's from info sheet G70, which seems to
> 	  be pre-iPod. http://www.copyright.org.au/PDF/InfoSheets/G070.pdf
>
> 	* If you followed the Eldred case, you might like to ask if
> 	  copyright lengths are going to be increased to life+70 years,
> 	  from life+50 years; why they should be increased for existing
> 	  works, which we already have access to and which were already
> 	  created, rather than only new works.
>
> There are plenty of other concerns raised by the FTA's IP section
> too: you may like to consider the risks of "takedown" notices
> forcing ISPs to delete their customers' data, or the risk of the
> "guilty-until-proven-innocent" philosophy they apply to copyright
> infringement. You might like to consider the effect of various patents
> on your favourite free software projects, or even your favourite non-free
> projects. You might like to bring stuff like the Baen Books Free Library
> or the Creative Commons to your representatives' attention to demonstrate
> how weakened IP protection can produce good economic outcomes -- more
> interest in a work, and more people paying for it; more new works created
> since it's easier to "stand on the shoulders of giants" by reusing good
> bits of old works.
>
> If you don't want to write to your MP, consider writing to one of your
> senators. If you don't want to do that, consider making a submission
> to the Joint Senate/HoR Committee on Treaties. If you don't feel up to
> writing something on your own, confer with some friends, or help your
> LUG write a submission. Once you've written something, get some of your
> friends or acquaintances to write stuff too. LA's submissions and fact
> sheets and whatever else will try to cover all the bases in a coherent and
> rational manner, but the only way that any of that'll matter is if it's
> clearly representing the interests of a whole bunch of Australian voters.
>
> So the question is: is it? Do you care about these things? Do you
> want your representatives in Canberra to listen to Rusty's arguments
> and suggestions, or the arguments of other Australian free software
> developers? If you do, make sure your MP knows, not just your friends.
>
> We might or we mightn't win on the FTA, and any wins we end up with
> anytime soon will probably be qualified ones at best, but if we're /ever/
> going to win on these sorts of issues, we do need to start getting
> some practice talking about them with the people who'll end up making
> the decisions.
>
> Cheers,
> aj, hoping this is useful to someone
>
> [0] The ACC is referenced from the Attorney General dept's website
>     for people looking for more info about copyright [1]. They're a
>     private organisation, not a government one though, so they can be
>     wrong in the above legally speaking; but then they could be right
>     too. Do we want the law to be unclear on this topic, or the Attorney
>     General's dept to be pointing people to advice that says taping any
>     TV show is illegal without permission?
>
> [1] http://www.ag.gov.au/ -> Portfolio Responsibilities -> Copyright
>     or http://www.ag.gov.au/www/agdHome.nsf/HeadingPagesDisplay/Copyright?OpenDocument
>
> --
> Anthony Towns <aj at humbug.org.au> <http://azure.humbug.org.au/~aj/>
> I don't speak for anyone save myself. GPG signed mail preferred.
>
>              Linux.conf.au 2004 -- Because we could.
>            http://conf.linux.org.au/ -- Jan 12-17, 2004

----- End forwarded message -----

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