WTO Awards Caribbean Country Right to Ignore US Copyright 460
The WTO's recent ruling on Antigua's complaint against the US over the banning of online gambling resulted in a payment to the island nation much less than they asked for. It appears, though, that this payment was just part of the WTO's compensation package for Antigua/Barbuda. Via Kotaku, the Hollywood Reporter notes that the Caribbean country can now freely ignore US copyright laws - legally. This dispensation is apparently limited to some $21 million a year. "The WTO often takes decisions awarding trade compensation in cases where one nation's policies are found to break its rules. But this is only the second time the compensation lets one country violate intellectual property laws. In this case, Antigua will -- in theory -- be allowed to distribute copies of American DVDs, CDs and games and software with impunity. 'That has only been done once before and is, I believe, a very potent weapon,' Antigua's lawyer Mark Mendel said. 'I hope that the United States government will now see the wisdom in reaching some accommodation with Antigua over this dispute.'"
Internal or export? (Score:4, Interesting)
abandonment of sovereignty? (Score:3, Interesting)
Since when did "free trade" translate into an abandonment of sovereignty in favor of having an unelected global organization dictate national policy? If the people of the United States (or any country) want to ban online gambling then what business of the WTO is it? At least when the WTO steps in over protective tariffs that makes SOME sense. If a product is completely outlawed though, how the hell is a free trade issue?
Can the Netherlands file a WTO complaint because some of their products (cannabis coffee shops) illegal in the United States? Can the United States file a complaint because some of our exports (pornography) are illegal in Saudi Arabia? Where the hell does it end?
Not Really ... read carefully. (Score:4, Interesting)
So they get to "violate" $21M USD worth of IP, then they are infringing. So 21 million MP3's (if iTunes is considered fair market value). Apple claims 2.5 million downloads per week, so presuming everyone from iTunes now downloaded from Antigua at the same rate, they'd be done in 8.4 weeks. Anything past that would be punishable IP infringement.
But again, those numbers are all suspect, what is the real dollar amount of IP? The point being, though, this isn't a free flowing well, it is finite and capped each year. So enjoy it for a few weeks, Antigua. Christmas in January.
Re:abandonment of sovereignty? (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah we do that all the time. But on this one specific issue I fail to see the problem -- is there something that treats American horse-racing betting sites different then ones from overseas?
This has been in the works for some time. (Score:5, Interesting)
Before Bush came into office the US had never lost a single case at the WTO. Now he has lost at least two. The last one I remember was against Europe with regard to an import tax on steel. Here is a link or two:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3291537.stm [bbc.co.uk]
http://themanufacturer.com/us/detail.html?contents_id=1726 [themanufacturer.com]
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article77803.ece [independent.co.uk]
In that case the US backed down fairly quickly as the tariffs Europe was going to impose were all designed to damage the economy in places Bush needed to get re-elected. One example given was taxing Florida oranges heavily and making them far more expensive than those from elsewhere. This is what every last tariff was designed to do. The European Union chose products where the same item could be obtained elsewhere for a competitive price (but not after a 30% tax hike was imposed on the US produce).
In this case turning Antigua into a file sharing haven will be an annoyance, but probably not as dire as what Europe was aiming for. This is especially true when you look at the amounts involved. In this case 21 million dollars per year is fairly small compared to the 2.2 billion that the last dispute could have cost had the US not backed down.
Re:Hah. (Score:0, Interesting)
Re:abandonment of sovereignty? (Score:3, Interesting)
The U.S.A. agreed to abide by the rules and has called for sanctions on other countries based on the rules. The fact that the U.S.A. a HUGE proponent of WTO has chosen to ignore a treaty that is supposed to become the "law of the land" when it is ratified is troubling. IMHO, I think the WTO should have the power to impose "punitive" sanctions (not merely economic damages) because entities like the U.S. can basically step all over the smaller signatories of the treaty.
Re:A victory for internet users worldwide (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:A victory for internet users worldwide (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:abandonment of sovereignty? (Score:3, Interesting)
I thought of online gambling as just flat out illegal in some areas.
So why can't a cannibis shop sell mail order through the internet to the US and make the same complaint.
Re:Hah. (Score:1, Interesting)
"A bi-partisan study by two of America's leading economists -- Dr. Robert Shapiro, former adviser to President Bill Clinton, and Dr. Kevin Hassett, adviser to Senator John McCain -- estimates the value of IP to the U.S. economy to be worth between $5 trillion and $5.5 trillion, or about 45% of U.S. GDP, and greater than the total GDP of any other nation."
http://www.cfif.org/htdocs/freedomline/current/in_our_opinion/thailand.htm [cfif.org]
Why Music? (Score:3, Interesting)
Microsoft? Apple? Diebold? Cisco? Oracle?
A single person with access to code and a $21 million a year grudge to burn might already be shopping for a 1-way ticket to Antigua.
-Rick
Re:A victory for internet users worldwide (Score:2, Interesting)
While this is true enough, the main part of the problem is when pirate outlets get nice and bold quality service fronts on them. Bit Torrent is pervasive and easy enough for a geek, or for a geek to hand-hold someone through the process a few times, but other services like AllTunes and AllOfMp3 were truly easy to use, fantastic quality services. People are willing to pay for the quality service... and now Antigua gets to set up such things with little hassle.
RIAA does all of its "evil is happening" when people are file trading, or have their media in public folders so they can imply they're trading. But the truth is that most users don't share and don't even have public folders, yet they certainly want the goods. If there is easy to use great services to obtain the cheapest media, then a whole lot of downloading direct from this outlet will happen without RIAA being able to do a dang thing because people wont be putting what they download out in the public space.
Take netflix... lots of people subscribe to netflix and just rip the movies to disk and send them back. They're not trading them, they just want the movies. I'm sure that less than 5 percent (probably much less) will be traded or even put in a public folder. People do use Netflix as a great and cost effective way to get a nice movie library with high quality rips. Antigua has a chance to be this service for people but at a much cheaper price, and most likely getting to keep the disk itself.
Re:A whole new market (Score:3, Interesting)
Kind of fitting, isn't it? A pirate ship going to the Caribbean...
I, for one, will be happy to donate $$ to help ship servers and personnel from Sweden to Antigua (as long as it can't be traced. Now it's a multinational effort with Swiss bank accounts!
WWIII == Cold War; WWIV == War on Terror (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:yea,, (Score:3, Interesting)
Facts are facts, and opinions are opinions. I find that bit media outlets are much more prone to separating the two than self-proclaimed "free media" mavens.
license and reverse engineering? (Score:2, Interesting)
Just to start off the idea: As some of us are aware, Office 2007 prohibits reverse engineering of the product in it's EULA. So for example, I can't buy a copy of Office 2007, install it, and run a disassembler against it to ... let's say ... figure out the Word2007 save file format. It's prohibited. If I did this and published my findings, Microsoft would say, "You violated your license agreement, and you're liable for the damages caused by ruining our control of the format, we get all the fruits of your labor, plus fines, oh, and to top it all off, the moment you broke the EULA, you broke copyright because you no longer had a right to have that copy of the software, so we'll see you in federal court too." So nobody reverse engineers this way. But it's the most effective way.
With me so far? Ok, so now we've got this Antigua WTO decision and someone outside the US can buy a copy of Antigua Productivity Suite 2007 which happens to be a legal copy of Microsoft Office 2007 with the EULA stripped off. Instead of licensing it, they are purchasing a copy. Just like purchasing a book. They could cut it up, post details about how it works internally, and lots of other interesting stuff.
Am I on to something, or missing something?
Of course this could also be used against a GPL work, like Linux. Since the teeth of the GPL lies in the idea, "your copyright license depends on these terms, and if you don't agree, you have no license to copy." Well, Antigua could make a copy now. I could buy it, get no source, and have no right to the source. Maybe I could buy a copy of Linux with source, but not be bound by the GPL in things I do with it?
Re:Time for allofmp3.com.ag (Score:3, Interesting)