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WIPO Wants Your Feedback
Christian Engstrom writes "The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is hosting an online discussion about 'Intellectual Property in the Information Society' from June 1 to 15, 2005. The conclusions of the Online Forum will form part of WIPO's contribution to the WSIS Tunis Summit. There are 10 different themes for discussion, including 'Open Information: At Odds with the IP System?' and 'Enforcement of IP Rights'. If you have any comments about file sharing, copyright enforcement, etc. (and who hasn't?), this may be a good place to post them."
Right... just like our feedback would have any effect.
They have a very strong agenda, and they are the bad guys. The forum is supposed to give them advice about ways to enforce "intellectual property", and this means removing fair use rights, not protecting them.
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
Make it so that the penality for downloading a movie is less than the penality for mugging someone on the street and buying a legal DVD with the money.
How about "get rid of the middleman?" If movies and music were distributed electronically, and available online as soon as they were released in the theaters, you could do away with a lot of the packaging / marketing / middlemen that drive up the cost. Sell albums for $3-$5 apiece online (more if you need a CD shipped), with no DRM, and I think piracy will go down. Make DVD-quality movies available via download for $5-$10 -- or less for older, less-popular movies -- and people won't bother to pirate those, either.
Unfortnately, groups like the one doing the survey will be the big losers. Such a scheme benefits artists, actors, and the public -- none of whom have near as good representation and lobbyists as the big recording and movie companies.
Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
This is like the RIAA opening up an IRC channel to get some "intelligent discussion" going about IP enforcement. I think we all know where this will lead.
I think what is likely going on is that they want to hear some opinions from common people on these issues so they can analyze how to best promote their views in ways that will resonate. That way they can tweak their FUD for optimal consumption by the masses.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Why do I get the funny feeling that these people are much more interested in justifying putting people in prison for listening to music than they are with dealing with the fact that the five entertainment corporations have STOLEN the public domain in the USA by infinitely extending the copyright period.
When you buy something on 'time' you make an agreed number of payments and then the item is yours, you own it. The seller does not have the legal right to decide to extend the number of payments that you have to make whenever you get close to completion.
The copyright period works in the same way. We, the people, agree to let X corporation own the right to demand money for the viewing of an individual work of art or entertainment for a precise and limited amount of time agreed upon when the copyright was granted.
By bribing politicians to extend the copyright period without agreed upon compensation to We, the people, the corporations have stolen the work of art (or entertainment) and all demanded payments for viewing this title after the original copyright period has ended are improper and illegal extortions of revenue from the people wishing to view this work under their public domain rights.
By bribing the politicians to infinitely extend the copyright period, by extending it EVERY time that it is due to expire, the corporations are engaging in a repeated pattern of criminal behavior. Under the RICO act, the people can demand that the entities engaging in continous criminal behavior be deprived of their means, their assets, and the legal framework for their continued existence.
By copying music and movies and sharing these files, We, the people, are simply asserting our rights when faced with a corrupt and racketeering organization. Which in this case are entertainment companies who have stolen the public domain.
Don't let anyone ever tell you again that you are a 'pirate' or thief because you chose to share or download files of entertainment content.
And don't take any nonsense from corporate-controlled non-government trade organizations either.
Thank you.
All of the posts so far seem to be just generic knee-jerk comments about IP.
Consider this: if they recieve well-written and enlightened criticism (as most of the already existing commentary appears to be) then we will be able to view their future actions in light of the forum results. This will provide a yardstick for anyone to compare their future actions.
If they do something that opposes the majority opinion or most sensible recommendations present in the open forum, we can criticize them.
As is we have no reference for what information is available to them, so we cannot prove that they are being intentionally evil.
Even if they refuse to listen to us, it is a chance for concerned parties to submit their concerns in a single location on the record.
And in case they do listen to us we should explain rationally what and why we hold our opinions, what changes we would recommend and how they would effect those involved (ex. if patents disappeared no one would have to hire a patent attorney (yay!), but would have no protection against people copying their ideas and no incentive to ever document their inventions (boo!)). If they find our explanations acceptable they may change their policies to be more to our liking.
Of course, about the only reason anyone would ever *need* a lawyer is to deal with another lawyer, and the self-reinforcing system of complexity they have built around themselves.