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US IP Law Comparisons with Other Countries?
jpalk asks: "Something I've been wondering about lately is how US
intellectual property laws stack up with those from other industrialized nations? Specifically, I've been wondering about things
like the durations of copyrights and patents and the number of works
that are patented/copywrighted every year vs. the number of such that
expire. I know where to find (some) of that information for the US,
but I'm clueless about where to find that for other countries." How many countries have IP laws that differ significantly from the framework established by the International Copyright Laws?
The length is pretty simple to explain - longer patents benefit the corporation (or, in less than 1 percent, the individual) holding the patent. The US politicians take whopping bribes...er, PAC and soft money, and repay their benefactors by extending the patents.
I'm not up on my European law, but England had two points that kept the patent system a lot less corrupt - first, many patents were shot down simply because they were viewed as either 'stifling legitimate competition', or against public interest. The second was that it used to cost a heck of a lot to actually patent something, making spurious and incremental patents much less prevelent than the US.
The second point is what is allowable. To give the simplest example, Europe won't allow you to patent life forms, while it's big business in the US. (Go Stargazers!)
Finally, while the trend is slowing, the US allowed a given patent to cover far more than England (and, AFAIK, Europe). Look at Bell's patent, and read about just how much ended up paying to use it, for a case study in legal elegance. In England, a patent could be struck down if any part of it was invalid (i.e. you patent a new car engine, but forget to specifically exclude the spark plugs, tough). The US _does_ have similar laws ... just that they rarely see the light of day. The US, geez, there was some guy who had patented 'sending music over wires using modulated electricity'. And you thought RIAA was bad!
Finally, the US is exactly like England and Europe in one regard - the patent system, since it's inception, has become just another place where corporations (and individuals) fight to establish dominance. The practice of 'licensing' highly questionable patents to a few of your close business partners (for under-the-table considerations), then going after your actual opponents in court ("But your honor, these seven other highly respected software companies are paying licensing fees, Sun is obviously just being criminal!) dates back to the first few years after the patent office came into existence.
Not that anyone would want to actually answer the original question posted in the article or anything, but WIPO has a number of resources that might help.
.INT TLD! Also, be aware that the default search page is Java-enabled, so pick HTML-only, if you aren't]
There's the WIPO Collection of Laws for International Access (CLEA) [Note the the
You might enjoy browsing the "International Patent Data Collections (When it's complete, it hopes to cover the world - not yet complete, however)
In fact, WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) or OMPI (Organization Mondiale Proprietaire Intellectuelle - pardon my French) has recently put a lot of new materials on its website, so it's worth a second visit, even if you thought you were familiar with WIPO offerings
And finally, there's WipoNET which is gradually providing access to all the IP offices in the WIPO member nations.
"But, it is well known, what strikes the capricious mind of the poet is not always what affects the mass of readers." -
-- flossie
http telnet
flossie
Write now. Defend liberty
One posssible basis for copyrights is "natural law", where an author has rights to their works forever. (eg. IP is very similar to physical property)
Another is "instrumentalist theory", where copyrights give an author some control for a limited time, to induce authors to create works.
Then there's "droit moral" (supported by Immanuel Kant and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel), which says something along the lines of: "property is acquired not necessarily by labor, but rather by one's joining of his individual Will to some object external to the self. As a result of this process, the thing possessed comes to embody the owner's personality". As a result, if someone disrespects/parodies/any-action, it's said that they're partly doing that to the author. "no strange work be presented as his, but that his own work not be presented in a changed form." Also, some followers of this theory separate authors' rights into two classes: alienable and inalienable. This seems to be a nice compromise between the two previous theories.
I don't know how accurate or current the paper is. But it's an interesting difference, IMHO.
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Short, untrue but useful, answer: not much variation in practice. The following are broad answers to give a sense of an answer -- the devil truly lies in the details.
Although the answers below suggest substantial verisimilitude, there are differences from country to country, both in terms of the subject matter and scope of protection available, that make it necessary for individuals to get specific advice for each nation in which protection is sought.
While there are substantial similarities in terms of IP these days, there remain substantial differences in other regards, and this may impact on the generality of the remarks below. Each nation protects different things differently, and sometimes gives different terms of protection for each.
Patents:
In most industrial nations, the term of a utility patent is twenty (20) years from the date of first filing in the first nation in which protection was sought, regardless when the patent issued. This was not the case in the United States until the nineties, before which the term was seventeen (17) years from the date the patent issued. However, the United States now follows the international model.
Copyrights
The well-adhered-to Berne convention requires a minimum term of life of the author plus 50 years. The UCC requires only a minimum term of the life of the author plus 25 years. Signatory nations may have longer terms if they see fit.
However, the European Union, and later, the United States have extended their term for published works to life of the author plus 70 years. Many nations accordingly feel pressure to, and either have or are anticipated to, increase their terms accordingly.
Under various circumstances, other terms may apply. Some nations give different, sometimes fixed, terms for motion pictures, computer software and the like. Your mileage may vary. ENESCO has an excellent page with English language translations of international copyright law for those interested in researching the interstices.
Trademarks
In many industrial nations, including the United States, trademarks or their analogues have potentially indefinite terms -- typically lasting so long as the trademark remains valid, and the trademark owner conforms with applicable registration requirements.
Due to the fact that a lot of the details of American law is based on the English model, which is also prevalent around Europe, there aren't that many differences in the fundamental concepts behind intellectual property laws in much of the world.
Of course, the actual figures will be different owing to America's vast corporate feudal lords have more influence upon the state than in other countries, and passing laws to get all kinds of IP extended in their favour. And when Bush wins the election, you can be sure that the situation will get even worse as his corporate masters carry on pimping him...
Jon Erikson, IT guru
All I know is that you can buy Microsoft beer in Russia. I want to know how long it will be before I can buy Intel toilet paper and Apple condoms in America.