Today’s leak of the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement intellectual property chapter includes a controversial provision aimed at preventing every country in the world from permitting internet television services like Aereo.
[Swaraj Paul Barooah, SpicyIP, reposted from with author’s permission] In a very welcome and quick response to USTR’s Special 301 Out of Cycle Review (OCR) process for India that opened for comments a couple of days ago (October 14th), the…
Last week, the Government of Karnataka amended the Karnataka Prevention of Dangerous Activities of Bootleggers, Drug-Offenders, Gamblers, Goondas, Immoral Traffic Offenders and Slum Gamblers Act, 1985 (“the Karnataka Goondas Act”). The Karnataka Goondas Act would now also apply to offences…
[Matthew Schewel for Inside U.S. Trade] A confidential Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiating document obtained by Inside U.S. Trade sheds new light on the extent of disagreement that remains over controversial provisions on intellectual property (IP) protection for pharmaceuticals, roughly three…
[Lotti Rutter, Treatment Action Campaign, Link, (CC-BY-SA)] On World Hepatitis Day, 26 organisations and individuals from around the world have called on the South African Department of Health (DOH) and Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to address the public…
Fannie Rascle — French journalist (@fannierascle) working for a website called novethic.fr, interviewed me today for an article about TTIP and transparency. Here are her questions and my answers. European Union documents relating to TTIP could be made public after a European Court of Justice ruling yesterday…
[Library Copyright Alliance Press Release, Link] The Library Copyright Alliance is extremely pleased with today’s decision by the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Authors Guild v. HathiTrust, finding in favor of fair use. The Library Copyright…
[Monika Ermert, IP Watch, Link (CC-BY-NC-ND)] Libraries can digitise individual books in their collections without the consent of rights holders, the Advocate General of the European Court of Justice, Niilo Jääskinen, has written in his application in a case (C-117/13)…
Last week, USTR announced that it was closing a “partially open” meeting of the Industry Trade Advisory Committee on Small and Minority Business. No reason was given for the closing of the meeting. But this led an office in Congress to…
Today I published a report with R Street Institute calling for Congress to restore constitutional copyright through significantly shorter copyright terms. I hope you check it out, as it delves into the impact of our unusually long copyright laws among…
An Op-Ed appeared in today’s New York Times criticizing the United States Food and Drug Administration’s conflation of counterfeit drugs with legitimate medications imported by Americans seeking lower prices for their own use. Click here for the full op-ed on…
USTR demands for hyper-secrecy in the Trans Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) continue to be a major block to continuing negotiations. The current issue under discussion is access to US proposals by EU member states — which are of…