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Antigua May Be Allowed To Violate US Copyrights
Skleed refers us to the NYTimes for an article on the high-stakes case the US is losing before the World Trade Organization. So far the US has lost an initial hearing and two appeals on its policies regarding Antiguan offshore gambling sites. Now the lawyer pressing the case has asked for a rarely invoked, but codified, recourse under WTO rules: letting Antiguans copy and distribute American music, movies, and software. The game may be to get Hollywood and Microsoft, et al., to pressure Washington to cut a deal. But their influence may not be sufficient to move lawmakers on the question of online gambling. From the article: "But not complying with the decision presents big problems of its own for Washington. That's because Mr. Mendel, who is claiming $3.4 billion in damages on behalf of Antigua, has asked the trade organization to grant a rare form of compensation if the American government refuses to accept the ruling: permission for Antiguans to violate intellectual property laws by allowing them to distribute copies of American music, movie and software products, among others."
Intellegence indicates WMD hidden in Antequa. Marines sent to investigate.
So I assume the US banned gambling in other countries via the net because the govt wasn't getting a piece? Is that the bottom line? Or is there another reason?
Hey Pirate Bay! You just got your island!
Allowed by the WTO. I will mean that if Antigua did pirate US stuff, the US would not be able to get the WTO to apply any sanctions. Which is pretty much all they could do, as Antigua is not in the Us and it would be awfully hard to convince anyone that you need a new war just cause of some pirate DVDs.
# cat
Damn, my RAM is full of llamas.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Fry: "What do we care? We live in the United States."
Leela: "The United States is part of the world."
Fry: "Wow, I have been gone a long time."
Thankfully, that is a transcript from the future, and America is not yet part of this "world" of which the UN speaks of
Then you didn't finish the article, including the fact that Ecuador was, at one point, granted just this sort of relief. Ecuador chose not to exercise their right to ignore US intellectual property claims, and instead used it as leverage in trade negotiations.
The U.S. banned international online gambling because of pressure (read: bribes) from the big domestic casinos. Mainly the Indian tribes and the Vegas / Atlantic City ones. Probably the state lotteries, too.
They made it into a "moral issue," but that's just bullshit that they can sell to a few Evangelical hicks. The real issue was that the casinos felt that international companies were cutting into their business, so they had Congress close it down. It was pretty straightforward protectionism; online betting with U.S.-based B&M casinos (including internet off-track betting on horses, internet purchase of lottery tickets, etc.) is OK, but international ones are not.
The WTO saw this for what it is, and is basically saying, 'either you let everyone compete, or you shut it all down.' So this puts the U.S. in the position of either letting international casinos into the U.S. market, or shutting down all internet gambling (including aforementioned web-based off-track-betting, lottery tickets, sports books, etc.). The casinos -- particularly the Vegas ones -- wouldn't like that much either.
So it's going to be interesting to see how this plays out. I have to give the Antiguans -- and most of all, their lawyer (who is from Texas) -- credit. It takes some brass ones to go eye-to-eye with the USG, even when they're doing something that's so transparently corrupt. I hope they can pull it off.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
That's right. Worldwide support for the US has never been so high; were Antigua to incur the wrath of America, the EU and Asian countries would just back off and completely ignore Antigua. The US is the world leader in these things, right?
It's not that simple.
Online gambling has been banned in the US for years by the same laws that made it illegal to wager over the phone. So there were never any domestic online gambling companies, because the US would just arrest the people running them for violating existing law.
But, the US couldn't get at people who ran online gambling companies outside the country, and while the US could have technically prosecuted individual gamblers for gambling online, that would hardly be practical. So instead, the US recently made it illegal for US banks and credit card companies to process payments to online gambling companies, effectively preventing US citizens from gambling online since it's now much harder to get your money to the gambling site.
The trick here is that the law only applies to certain kinds of online gambling, specifically, the kind of online gambling common in casinos, as it was mainly the casinos pushing for this legislation (under the guise of 'gambling is evil!'). So, the US had a situation in which certain domestic companies could engage in gambling as a trade, but certain international companies could not - and that's the basis of the WTO dispute.
The US actually has a very similar construct with regard to free trade amongst the 50 US states - it isn't legal for any state to have laws which favor domestic commerce over commerce from parties in other states. For example, in a recent ruling, the Supreme Court struck down a state law that banned companies from directly shipping alcoholic beverages to customers from out of state while allowing domestic producers to do so. Supreme Court said you had to either ban all mail-order alcohol sales or none.
And that's what the WTO is saying. The US is free to ban gambling, so long as they ban ALL gambling, not just gambling done by companies outside the country. And the US would be free to tax gambling, so long as it taxes ALL gambling. So the problem isn't that the US isn't getting a piece - they could allow gambling and tax it and get a piece. The problem is that because of the existing ban on online wagering that pit US casinos against non-US online gaming sites, the US companies were losing business to the non-US companies, so the US banned gambling at the non-US companies, which is exactly the kind of practice the free trade pacts and the WTO are supposed to prevent.
paintball
On the other hand, all those Al Queda terrorists that are using off-shore gambling in Antigua to launder their death money might provide the Whitehouse Junta plenty of ammo to freeze Antigua's assets that are in or pass through US banking.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
No kidding. It might be amusing to watch anti-war Hollywood suddenly discover that, while war is always wrong, a "narrow" use of the US military is sometimes necessary for the greater good.
First, no one is talking about (or they shouldn't be if they are) a blank check to violate copyrights. They would be allowed to violate copyrights of a value equivalent to the estimated value of the loss created by the United States' alleged improper behavior. If that loss is estimated to be $3bn, they could be given permission to violate $3bn in copyrights.
The more important question is why does Antigua respect American copyrights at all? Well, because they gain from respecting them. It's part of free and fair trade. You aren't just allowed to take something from someone. Along the same lines, you aren't allowed to bar someone from importing goods or providing services to your citizens unless they is a defendable reason - such as an authentic health and safety standard.
The WTO is the body that makes sure everyone plays by the rules. It is a voluntary association and people can leave it - and then make whatever laws they want. So, Antigua can leave the WTO and violate copyrights as much as they want - the problem is that WTO countries then can't/won't trade with them and so they loose a lot more than they would gain.
In this case, the United States would have to prove that online gambling is sufficiently worse and different from traditional gambling (which is legal in the US) - a reason why traditional gambling doesn't pose a threat to their population, but that online gambling does. Antigua needs to prove that the US regulations on online gambling don't actually protect the American people, but are rather meant to give American companies the advantage over Antiguan companies.
This isn't some weird global government looking to get rid of sovereignty. This is about using logic to determine when rules are meant to be discriminatory based on national origin and when something is a genuine health or safety standard. The US can make the argument that online gambling becomes too accessible and is therefore a much greater danger than traditional gambling. Antigua can argue that it's the same thing that happens at casinos. A court will decide which arguments hold weight based on evidence.
My god, man, we're talking about pirates here! High seas battles, raped women and children, missing gold, plunder at the bottom of the sea, "arg matey" and worse!
Those cretins are almost as bad as terrorists.
Unless you want to have your next sailing trip interrupted by these cannon-toting freaks, you'd better support a war!
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
It would be amazing. Science and culture would flourish like mad. The creation of art would explode, with new forms appearing at a never before seen rate. Businesses would boom with all the new opportunities. We can only hope this becomes our future one day...
See my reply here.
Also, I would argue (am arguing) that the drive to create is separate from the drive for money. There would still be artists if creating art was punishable by death, it has nothing to do with making money.
The connection between creating art and becoming rich and famous was propagated by the middle men who looked at artists and said, "You know, I could really make a killing by distributing this." That is capitalism.
Now that we are in the "Digital Age" and distribution can be widespread and done by anyone, the middle-men are threatened and are reacting, sometimes by adapting to the new technology, sometimes by suing everyone in sight.
The ideal solution would be to find a way to reward artists, without restricting the distribution of art. That is the goal, remember?
The creator of this post (Jacob Smith) hereby releases it, and all of his other posts, into the public domain.
That, and congress is full of ninjas. It's true.
On the plus side, with this sort of motivation behind Hollywood they might turn out to be good movies.
I don't think America's military might is what scares most countries (excepting those whith which you already have some kind of conflict), but actually economic/financial and political might is the problem. America can fight so many stupid wars before things start to get really ugly internally, the problem is that even when in deficit, the US has incredible economical and financial muscle. Subtle threats to drive a small country's economy down the drain with a few moves can lead to misery just as quick and maybe more lastingly (is that a word?) than a conventional war.
"Luck is my middle name," said Rincewind, indistinctly. "Mind you, my first name is Bad." -- Terry Pratchett
People flock in huge numbers to Florida, Mexico, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, etc. Why would they not go to Cuba if the choice were available, and the price was right?
I think you meant to say "Americans flock in huge numbers to ...".
And that my friend is why Cuba is such a popular destination for the rest of the world. No flocks of Americans.
"The last thing I want to do is deal with a bunch of people who want something."
Major Major
Actually, what they are complaining about is that the US is blocking commercial transactions with Antiguan businesses that would be legal if the were businesses physically located inside the US. The WTO says that's a big no-no.
The US has claimed the moral exemption allowed by the WTO - That the morals of the US do not permit online gambling. However, as Antigua pointed out, the US does permit online gambling - OTB on dog & horse racing is legal interstate, and most forms of gambling are legal intrastate - in those states which have legalized gambling of any nature.
The WTO courts have rightly held that you can't claim a moral exemption for international activities, when it is permitted within your country. Either online gambling is morally offensive to the US & it's not to be allowed at all or it's not and the US has to open up the practice to everyone. The US doesn't get to pick & choose which types of gambling are offensive - it's either morally offensive or it's not.
As a case directly on point, it is currently perfectly legal to place a bet on the Kentucky Derby through the OTB website, it is however illegal to place the same bet on the same Kentucky Derby race through an Antiguan online site. This is why the US lost the case, they were claiming that the an action was morally repugnant to the US when done with an Antiguan business, but perfectly acceptable when done through a US based one.
Personally, I think you would have seen a bigger stink if they had gone for patents instead of copyright. The cries of anguish by the US pharmaceutical companies alone should be clearly audible on Antiguan beaches.
As it is, I would like to put in my request for a legal copy of Antiguan Vistas(tm) to run on my computer - just so I can smack the next BSA person I see with it. "Why yes, it is a perfect copy of Windows Vista - without all the DRM crap & calling home. OOh look here, I see that the source code has been released by the Antiguan Software Coalition."