IPR :I don't agree with Milton -> Re: [WSIS CS-Plenary] Strategic
priorities for WGIG
Hervé Le Crosnier
herve at info.unicaen.fr
Thu Jan 27 22:18:59 GMT 2005
Milton Mueller wrote:
>
> I think there is a broad consensus that IPR is one of the key issues.
> Those who have appeared to dissent from that consensus have raised two
> issues, neither of which detracts from the centrality of IPR to the
> WGIG: i) they have objected to the term "intellectual property,"
> proposing instead PCT, which is not a serious problem, either term could
> be used; ii) they stated that the WGIG was intended to be technical in
> focus, which is plainly wrong and can be proved so simply by reading the
> WGIG's charter.
Sorry Milton,
None of those are the views i've expressed last fall,
neither now.
So for the consensus, please read intimely any position.
WGIG is a political process, a question of regime, as
you always says. But with a slant on technical feasability
and of technical necessity for the conception of a network
for information exchange.
It's the governance of the Internet.
IPR is really another domain, which concern many other things
as medicines, indigenous knowledge, cultural domination through
economy, spreading of scientific knowledge, the nature of
software industry, equal repartition between North and South
of the benefit of globalisation of trade, farmers and GM crops,
the future of biotech industries, the libraries, ... and so, and
so...
And if we choose technical methods to encompass the problem
of IPR equilibrium on the internet, we put all theses others
domains at risk.
Who in the WGIG is conceiving the problem of crop licensing
for poor farmers in the South ?
By nature, Civil society is vast and diverse. It encompass
all the sectors, and decide for a consensus that can ensure
all other parts of the civil society to have their point of
view.
So I maintain : IPR is not top on the agenda of the WGIG,
because it was not top on the whole WSIS (for best and worse)
and because there are other mouvements actually trying to
find new and innovative ways to deal with IPR in information
societies. I refer to the Geneva declaration for change on
the OMPI, and the actually discussed Treaty on medicines
to be proposed to WHO by civil society coordinators.
Hervé Le Crosnier
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