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2002 is the first year of the Tenth Five Year Plan in India, mandating the prices of staples such as rice, milk, sugar, of paraffin for domestic cooking, and of industrial essentials like fuel, fertilisers, electricity. The Plan also sets the vast tariff rates on many products such as textiles and cars/trucks/2-wheelers that maintain local production...

The BJP may be moving the country away from command socialism, but there's a long way to go yet, and the process has to be managed carefully because the livelihoods and indeed survival of a billion people depend on getting it right.

I 'get the idea' from having visited the country in the last year. I'm backed up in this belief by, for instance, the WTO's review of the latest 5-year Plan.

TomV

I'm amazed on how you can readily classify that chip as inferior... Seen the design of the chip? Guess not, maybe it is the Made in China writing that made you derive this conclusion.

As for closing the market... this comment can only come from a blindly ignorant redneck white trash in a trailer parked somewhere where there is little to no TV or radio signal. FYI, a prerequisite of joining the WTO is to have an open market. China has been a member of the WTO since 11 December 2001.

What kind of market would buy those chips? What about computers that are not meant for managing critical data? And from the article itself, mobile phones and televisions? Why the hell would your mobile phone need a 2GHz Pentium 4?

Get a clue!

No its not legal.

America has so called anti dumping laws.

Here's a hint: "Selling a product at a loss" is not dumping. Not even a little bit. If you produced a product and gave it away for free, that still wouldn't be dumping.

Dumping is very simple: It is selling a product in a foreign market for less than you normally sell it for in your domestic market. If you don't believe me ask the World Trade Organization. So unless you believe that MS is selling the Xbox cheaper overseas (hint: they're not), MS is not dumping.

You may now all return to your ignorant, dogmatic lives.

Well, it's worked for them in the past.

Although I believe that after the United States got its choice of minimum copyright and patent standards written in to the GATT, they are theoretically no longer supposed to use these unilateral sanctions to coerce other countries into changing their laws.

The MPAA will see to it that customs holds these at the border

If they try to do this the logical counter move is to file a complaint with the World Trade Organization stating the case that the Regional Settings is a deliberate and unlawful inpediment to free trade. The risk of this being declared illegal combined with suits for Punitive damages subsequently filed in the US courts is high.
MPAA will give in long before that as the down side grossly outweighs the alternative.


NB: Write your representative in the country you are in and complain about Regional Settings. Its amazing it has survived so long.

Me, I'd rather be an honest and ethical person, rather than a rich one. At least I enjoy whatever little money I have!

Are you really so naive as to believe that unethical people who have a lot of money don't enjoy it? That sounds to me like something that people without money tell themselves to console themselves, sort of like telling your kid that the school bully is actually miserable, when in fact he's probably having a great time picking on other people.

Well, enjoy it while you can, because the people with money and power are looking to make sure you have even less money to enjoy than you have now, so that they will have even more money and power to enjoy.

Feel free to bury your head in the sand and tell yourself that it's okay, while legislation like the DMCA and SSSCA gets passed and enforced. Yes, it'll all be okay, even if you no longer have any money and are living in a corporate run police state. Because at least you'll still have your ethics!

(And yes, I despise those people without ethics and am sickened at how they seem to be able to do so much better than people with ethics, but I'm not naive enough to believe that the fact that I have any ethics makes one damned bit of difference in the real world. In fact, I know it puts me at a significant disadvantage, and sometimes wish I didn't have these ethical beliefs that prevent me from doing something about that).

Same sort of accident where a couple of US tomahawk cruise missiles hit the Chinese embassy in Serbia (Chinese soil).

I suspect that in the event of Chinese guided missiles being fired at targets in northern Europe, most people will have other things to worry about than their website. Certainly, bandwidth and hosting costs would be expected to rise!

However, I sincerely doubt that most people consider the ability of their upstream provider to withstand physical assault when selecting a contract. I would also suspect that the vast majority of ISPs in the continental US are more vulnerable to sabotage than HavenCo.

The important consideration here is that HavenCo is far more legally independent than most other service providers. They are not obliged to comply with whatever draconian legislation congress' paymasters deem appropriate and very little pressure can be applied to force them to sign up to distasteful international treaties.

... and as such is signed up to TRIPS which requires adherence to the Berne Convention.

In fact, I believe the change in copyright law came a couple of years ago in preparation for their accession to the World Trade Org. - so the copyright law mentioned is seriously out of date.

Certainly, the Taiwanese government was making an effort (without much effect) last year to stamp down on piracy etc. to convince the rest of the WTO that they'd be 'good neighbours' - but now they're in (as of January 1st) they might not care as much ...

.GOV should only be used by the true international world government.

wto.gov

Look at the site -- it looks just like the real thing.

Nice try, but it actually looks nothing like the "real thing".I think I could tell the two apart even if I was quite a large distance from my monitor.Perhaps by the "real thing" you meant "a professionally produced website".If so I agree; they've done a good job.

See that weird red, blue and green globe symbol?

That's trademarked. You can see it on the WTO website, and they have a nice (specific) notice clearly indicating it is theirs.

I'm all for parody. But there is no need for parody to make use of actual trademark symbols, or even trademarked phrases. It is much more funny, and more clever besides. Here's one example, in case you don't already know what I mean.

It's quite clear to me that the Yes Men are more interested in pissing off the WTO than in parody itself. This is not itself a crime, but replicating trademarks like that tends to fool people rather than to get the point across. The WTO has a legitimate complaint here.Trademark law is meant to protect consumers, not businesses, and (for once) the WTO seems to be using it completely legitimately. If the Yes Men aren't deliberately trying to fool the very people they are self-righteously trying to protect from the corporations, they should have no problem with getting off their duffs and altering the trademarked symbols on their website.

See that weird red, blue and green globe symbol?

That's trademarked. You can see it on the WTO website, and they have a nice (specific) notice clearly indicating it is theirs.

I'm all for parody. But there is no need for parody to make use of actual trademark symbols, or even trademarked phrases. It is much more funny, and more clever besides. Here's one example, in case you don't already know what I mean.

It's quite clear to me that the Yes Men are more interested in pissing off the WTO than in parody itself. This is not itself a crime, but replicating trademarks like that tends to fool people rather than to get the point across. The WTO has a legitimate complaint here.Trademark law is meant to protect consumers, not businesses, and (for once) the WTO seems to be using it completely legitimately. If the Yes Men aren't deliberately trying to fool the very people they are self-righteously trying to protect from the corporations, they should have no problem with getting off their duffs and altering the trademarked symbols on their website.

The essential goals of the WIPO and the WTO's TRIPS agreement have essentially the same goals: to standardize Intellectual Property Law across national borders. James Love, of the Consumer Project on Technology, has Pharm-policy mailing list readers a link to this joint press release of the WTO and the WIPO. This press release describes a new joint initiative regarding cooperation between these two corporation-friendly organizations. The initiative calls for a new push to help developing countries establish more monopolistic intellectual property infrastructures. Dr. Kamil Idris, Director General of the WIPO, states in the press release that intellectual property was a tool for technological advancement, economic growth and wealth creation for all nations, especially for least-developed countries. Does this joint initiative really take into account the economic needs of the people in less developed countries? Or does it simply add to the wealth of companies that monopolize information? What about economically comprimised people living in well-developed countries?

Read the essay entitled The WTO and the WIPO Combine Forces to Privatize the World .

The essential goals of the WIPO and the WTO's TRIPS agreement have essentially the same goals: to standardize Intellectual Property Law across national borders. James Love, of the Consumer Project on Technology, has Pharm-policy mailing list readers a link to this joint press release of the WTO and the WIPO. This press release describes a new joint initiative regarding cooperation between these two corporation-friendly organizations. The initiative calls for a new push to help developing countries establish more monopolistic intellectual property infrastructures. Dr. Kamil Idris, Director General of the WIPO, states in the press release that intellectual property was a tool for technological advancement, economic growth and wealth creation for all nations, especially for least-developed countries. Does this joint initiative really take into account the economic needs of the people in less developed countries? Or does it simply add to the wealth of companies that monopolize information? What about economically comprimised people living in well-developed countries?

Read the essay entitled The WTO and the WIPO Combine Forces to Privatize the World .

the official info is here
a good example of how TRIPs can be a Bad Thing is here
dense analysis in small font size is here

don't like how any of that sounds? fight it. come to kanaskis g8 2002. info here

"Europe" won't be doing anything in a hurry: the responsibility lies with the EPO which has its own legislative and executive bodies, not the EU, even though it is some people in the EU Commission which are giving us some concern. Patents are governed by international treaties, and remember it takes decades to change treaties. The WTO's agenda is set years in advance and software patents are very low on the priority list. For the current proposals see the report "Does the TRIPS Agreement require all member's rules on protection of intellectual property to be identical?" for an explanation.

The UK response to a recent initiative to re-look at software patents was firmly negative, and there is a Europe-wide campaigning body to ensure that it doesn't happen "by accident".

"Europe" won't be doing anything in a hurry: the responsibility lies with the EPO which has its own legislative and executive bodies, not the EU, even though it is some people in the EU Commission which are giving us some concern. Patents are governed by international treaties, and remember it takes decades to change treaties. The WTO's agenda is set years in advance and software patents are very low on the priority list. For the current proposals see the report "Does the TRIPS Agreement require all member's rules on protection of intellectual property to be identical?" for an explanation.

The UK response to a recent initiative to re-look at software patents was firmly negative, and there is a Europe-wide campaigning body to ensure that it doesn't happen "by accident".

So, dig this: suppose the time-frame of compulsory education has been hiked up for the purpose of keeping children off the job market longer, so as to not devalue labor and thereby devalue the labor system.

Suppose the compulsory educational system, which is economically (and therefore ideologically) linked to every other industry, is regearing to keep the middle class from further expanding and gaining power.

Suppose that, with all the psychological research that's been done, someone actually thought ahead and said, "Okay, if we can institutionalize middle-class children within the first 2 decades of their life, we'll be able to not only increase the size of the prison-industrial-military complex, but also to grab more power for ourselves and our friends overall" Just the same way some retailer once said, "Let's hire some of these behavioral psychologists to figure out how to organize the store in the most influential possible way[s]."

The net effect of our compulsory school system is obvious: 23% illiteracy in America, 13% prevalence of social phobia, Major depression (18.9%), generalized anxiety (14.8%), and the 'Suicide Rate Among U.S. Teens Keeps Increasing'.

And I nearly left out the continuous rise in teenage violence...

You see, the problem is, as Adam Yauch is quoted in the last link, that "Being on either end of a violent situation, whether you seem to have come out with the upper hand or whether you don't seem to, it doesn't resolve anything. It escalates the problem. Hatred leads to more hatred. Violence leads to more violence." Violence is not by any means limited to its overt outbreaks; it is a sadist/masochistic cycle which perpetuates itself. Our "educational" system suffers the Disney syndrome: the violence of management over the tenderness of interaction.

"Nature once had a chance to run riot in South Florida, producing jungles and swamps; now nature must submit to control. " And nature (which, yes children, is very much alive in each and every one of us) is pissed.

________________________________________________ __

Consider a corporation that produces an AIDS cure, patents it, and sells it for oo-gobs of money which would make it difficult for those from poorer countries to get a hold of it. Now imagine that somehow you were able to figure out a way that people with the right materials could create the cure on their own without as much cost.

Only to avoid bad PR. Here's more about how they feel on the matter. Remember, it's a press release, with Fluff Value Added.

What have things come to when we congratulate corporations or mega-corp-organizations for not abusing the legal system with SLAPP suits against their critics? Shows you where the status quo has fallen to, and probably why groups like the yesmen feel the need to shake up the corporate hegemony somewhat creatively.

I looked through the site, and these people aren't saying anything informed or intelligent...or even funny.

Try reading it again. If you feel you have to read it too carefully to get it, then think how much more carefully people need to read the WTO's site.

Since everyone seems to think the WTO has such a great sense of humor about this, check out their earlier statement on related matters.

They don't really have a sense of humor. They complained bitterly about it not so long ago. Here is an earlier statement by the WTO... to which gatt.org responds on their website.

The bottom line is that in many respects, it's really ONE WORLD now in the IP business.

Forget the rest of the crud you may have read on this story, the AC has got it right.

Sure there are still differences between industrialised (and non-industrialised) nations, but these are being progressively harmonised out if existence. Historically, of course, the US was always the IP skeptic, as pointed out about they signed the Berne Convention in 1989, over a century after the convention was originally drawn up in Berne (Sep 9, 1886, last revised 1971). Now, however the US seems to be leading the pack. A cynic might believe this is because the US administration has fallen captive to large corporate interests, but this could hardly be the case with a democratically elected government, surely?

While some differences do remain, TRIPS for instance specifically exempts members from enacting the kind of (continental) European 'moral rights' (Berne Conv Art 6bis) discussed above, it is becoming increasingly true that we are being made subject to a global IP regime.

Which is a non-issue since by region price fixing is illegal under the WTO.

This is an excellent point! Why haven't we heard more about this on the many /. debates?

I'd appreciate any citations you might have, or even the names of documents (The WTO, which whom, I have been recently corresponding, does not index all of its downloadable documents for maximum user-friendliness. You often have to know which documents you want, download, and then search them yourself)

This process often sidetracks me into chasing down the wrong papers. I do hopwever, often stumble across sardonics gems like the following (from the most recent (1999) WTO report on conditions in the US):

"Enforcement of antitrust laws is rigorous, as witnessed by the large number of ongoing investigations and actions taken to combat price-fixing, predatory pricing and exclusionary pacts involving major U.S. and foreign companies. Enforcement of laws protecting intellectual property rights (IPRs) is also rigorous, so as to ensure adequate returns for investment in innovation."

How's that for wry wit? I think it could apply to the MPAA as well as it does to MS-AP (Microsoft Appeals - their real business for the time being)

It seems to me the DMCA should *only* apply to the US of A territory.

Groups like the World Trade Organization are working hard to make sure that all the immoral, unjust and just plain stupid laws of the USA are enforceable around the world. Conversely, they are working to make sure that all of the immoral, unjust and stupid laws of the rest of the world are enforceable in the USA, too. Their vision is a unified world government, where they can exert their power in broad strokes without fear of local disturbances.

While I do think there is some merit in a "single nation of humanity", I think the harm would outweigh the benefits.

At the risk of sounding like Katz, we're fighting a war here. On our side (if you're reading this, you're almost certainly on the same side I'm on) we have consumers, individuals, artists, programmers, writers, poets, musicians -- in other words, people. We're small, and singly we're weak, but we have the advantages of creativity and cleverness, adaptability, flexibility and speed. We also have greater numbers, although most people are asleep. On the other side we have the multinational corporate giants. They're fucking huge. But they're slow and stupid, rigid, and static.

In this war, the terrain is the set of legal jurisdictions in which we (collectively) live. It's like a jungle, or a badlands, full of uneven terrain, obstacles and brush. People like us can dodge through it and evade the giants. The corporate behemoths get stuck in the sinkholes.

But the behemoths can flatten the terrain, slowly. They have enough power (money) to change laws in their favor. Wherever they stomp, the land becomes slightly more level, and the vegetation is ground into pulp. Soon, we'll have nowhere to hide, and the tanks will roll over us and crush us.

Question everything. Never take anything at face value. The world is full of lies. Don't believe what the media tell you. Don't believe what slashdot tells you. Don't believe what I tell you. Make up your own mind, and do what is right.

The worst scenario I can see is:

* Jon gets tried

* Jon gets aquitted because reverse engineering is legal.

* US trials note that the code was reverse engineered legally in Norway, therefor the "trade secret" is not a secret anymore.

The World Trade Organization strikes the Norwegian laws allowing reverse engineering preventing any future jeapordizing of trade secrets in this fashion. If you haven't been following the WTO, now might be the time to read up on them...
http://zmag.org/CrisesCurEvt s/Globalism/GlobalEcon.htm
http://www.indymedia.org/

Short answer: See NWO, errrr, I mean WTO.

Long answer: The way it would work internationally is that the US would put pressure (in the form of withholding aid and technology, increasing tarriffs, etc.) on the countries that don't go along with its plan. Just like they put pressure on other countries with regard to their drug laws, intellectual property laws, etc. That should take care of most of the countries outside of Western Europe. As for those guys, they're even more liberal than the United States, so it's hard to imagine their governments keeping their fingers out of it. Also, as the ridiculous "War over Kosovo" showed, for some reason they have a hard time saying no to the United States.

Cheers,
ZicoKnows@hotmail.com

DB

The WTO answers to it's member nations. The WTO is not accountable to mulit-nats, it has nothing to do with them. It is an NGO that is comprised of government representatives. There are approx. 135 member nations in the WTO right now. The reps to the WTO are picked by the govt they represent, and they work within the WTO on behalf of the govt. that they represent. Since every member nation gets to represent itself to the WTO, by proxy, every person in every member nation is represented to the WTO. If you live in a member nation and think that your govt is making poor choices wrt to WTO, talk to your govt. Furthermore, the WTO and it's predecessors have been around since 1947. It is not new. Your arguments show a serious mis-understanding of the WTO and the mechanisms of international trade. For more information about the WTO, try their website.


itachi

TRIPS is seriously old news. It was the result of extended negotiations and public debate over a period of years beginning in the early 1990's (and some time before then), and was ultimately adopted in January of 1995. These terms were negotiated in part through the USTR, then Mickey Kantor (sp?) and the USPTO Commissioner, Bruce Lehman, neither of whom are still in office.

As with most trade agreements, there can be found within it some good and some bad. But whatever else can be said about TRIPS, the issues raised there are not new ones. Moreover, to the extent that we have been signed on since the mid-90's, its sort of a done deal.

The WTO represents a serious change in the way nations and global corporations interact. It is the concentration of power in an unelected international court to inforce the rights of capital. It is a world court to which national and state laws can be overturned with out appeal. Please read up on what the WTO means to all of us. The growing power of the WTO is going to be one of the defining features of global economics and politics in the 21st century.

Consider, in the future you may not be able to pass a law which protects the environment, enforces minimum wages, or any number of other 'anti-free trade' laws.

There are lots of sites about what people are doing to counter the WTO, such as N30.org. You should also read up on the background of the new global capitalist order.