Category US Domestic Policies

US-, China- and EU-First Nationalism and COVID-19 Technology Hoarding Push the Rest of the World to the End of the Line

[Brook Baker] With the world racing to find new vaccines and therapies to respond to the escalating COVID-19 pandemic, the world’s biggest economies are pursuing nationalistic policies, racing to the front of the line with sweetheart deals to fund research and development in exchange for preferential access to life-saving health products. These same countries (along with others) have also imposed selfish and unnecessary export controls limiting supply of needed health supplies to other countries.[1] This unbridled nationalism, interlinked with a broken, profit-driven pharmaceutical system risks obstructing access to life-saving medicines worldwide. This should be a moment for transformative, systemic change, but instead of an innovative response and true global solidarity we’re seeing the same old business-as-usual.

Consultation on Implementing Marrakesh in Brazil Closes This Week

Last month, the Brazilian Secretariat of Culture (Secretaria Especial de Cultura) launched a 30 day public consultation on the Presidential Decree regulating the Marrakesh Treaty implementation, ending this week. Contributions can be made directly on the platform or by filling the form on the site. One of the key questions in the consultation process involves whether Brazil should adopt a commercial availability requirement.

Big Win for Open Access to Law – Georgia v. Public.Resource.org

On April 27, 2020, the Supreme Court decided an important case about copyright law and access to the law -- Georgia v. Public.Resource.org, Inc. At issue was whether the state of Georgia owns a copyright in the Official Code of Georgia Annotated (OCGA). The Court held that it does not and that the code in the public domain. This case is a big win for the movement for open access to law. This movement runs parallel with the movement to make scholarly and scientific publications open access. I wrote about the relationship between these two movements in my article, The Movement for Open Access Law, and this case represents a big step forward. Kudos to Carl Malamud and the attorneys who represented him for having the courage of their convictions.

Supreme Court Rules Annotated State Legal Codes Cannot Be Copyrighted

The Supreme Court has ruled 5-4 that copyright protection does not apply to annotations in state's annotated legal code. The ruling in Georgia v. Public Resource.Org affects 23 states, two territories and Washington, D.C. PIJIP Professor Peter Jaszi commented that “This is the beginning of the end of a long journey toward opening all judicial and legislative materials to the public – the modern stage of which began more than thirty-five years ago in the West Publishing cases. The struggle to open governmental information at every level of the administrative state continues.”

Chinese Court Rules that AI Article Has Copyright

A court in the Chinese city of Shenzen has decided that an article that was written by an artificial intelligence program has copyright protection. The article was written by Tencent’s Dreamwriter AI Writing Robot, an internal code at the Chinese tech giant that produces half a million articles per year in subjects such as weather, finance, sport, and real estate.

The Obscure Consumer in the Chinese Intellectual Property Law

[Jyh-An Lee and Yangzi Li] Abstract: Conventional wisdom suggests that an ideal intellectual property (IP) regime should consider various interests, such as incentives for creators and inventors, social access to creative works, market competition, and economic development. Nevertheless, the interest of consumers has long been neglected in IP policy-making. This article systematically reviews recent Chinese court decisions on IP and explores their implicit consumer policy implications. The article reveals that the Chinese courts have occasionally embedded consumer policy considerations when applying the Copyright Law, Patent Law, Trademark Law, and the Anti-Unfair Competition Law. Moreover, this article illustrates how policy goals underlying the IP regime and consumer protection law are consistent or supplementary with each other in the implementation of different categories of IP laws.

Copyright L&E for Nonprofit Performance of Music Found Constitutional in Korea

[Knowledge Commune] The Constitutional Court of Korea upheld Art. 29(2) of the Copyright Act as constitutional. The Art. 29(2) permits a public performance of commercial phonograms and audiovisual works if no profit is received in return from audience, excepting cases as prescribed by the Presidential Decree. This provision has long been under attack by music industries and European Commission.

Remembering … Then and Now – Rights Administration and the South African Publishing Industry Before and After the End of Apartheid

The beginning of the end of apartheid came very suddenly so was a turbulent period with emotions running very high, veering from extreme euphoria at the prospect of a free and democratic South Africa, to an overwhelming sense of fear that this dramatic change might prove illusory. There are memories of the period that remain very vivid, in spite of the time that has elapsed since then, and these remain relevant, not least in understanding the turbulent responses to the introduction of a new copyright regime.

Report and Webinar: Rethinking Trade Treaties & Access to Medicines

The Boston University Global Development Policy Center is hosting a webinar on Wednesday, November 13 from 9-11AM to launch the latest GDP Center report Rethinking Trade Treaties and Access to Medicines: Toward a Policy-Oriented Research Agenda hosted by the Trade & Medicines Working Group. The report synthesizes the state of knowledge on trade and investment treaties on access to medicines and advances a policy oriented research agenda intended to help policy-makers, civil society, and others make more informed decisions as they debate contemporary trade and investment treaties.

How Open Is the Open Data Produced by the U.S. Government?

Although the word open might imply access, many times, it does not imply transmission, reproduction, or re-use of material, as seen currently with most government open data and recently discussed at the GovDatax event. Recent laws require the federal government to make their public data available and they encourage agencies to share information between them. Still, in practice, there is a competing group of laws that restrict access to these very same data with a bulk of copyright restrictions, publicity and privacy rights that might be applicable, as well as contract limitations that fill the restrictions gap when no other law is available.

Assessing Drug Pricing Reform Proposals: The Real Leverage And Benefits Of Competitive Licensing

[Christopher J. Morten and Amy Kapczynski] Leading drug pricing bills in Congress tackle the problem of leverage with two distinct solutions to improve the government’s bargaining position: a tax on drug manufacturers that refuse to agree on a fair price and “competitive licensing,” under which the government accelerates market entry of competitors when a deal cannot be reached. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has endorsed the first approach, recently announcing a bill that would impose a tax on drug manufacturers when they fail to reach an agreement with the government on price under Medicare Part D. Rena Conti and Paul Kleutghen recently argued in a Health Affairs blog post that the second approach—competitive licensing—is impractical because of purported manufacturing, regulatory, and legal hurdles faced by drug companies licensed under the competitive licensing scheme.

Uganda Tells ARIPO: No More Patents for Pharmaceuticals

[Ellen 't Hoen] Uganda has notified the African Regional Intellectual Property Organisation (ARIPO) that pharmaceutical inventions are not eligible for patentability in the country, Managing IP reported. With this notification, Uganda is exercising one of the TRIPS flexibilities specific for least developed country members of the World Trade Organization that allows them not to grant or enforce pharmaceutical patents and protection of undisclosed data.