[WSIS CS-Plenary] Strategic priorities for WGIG

[Jonathan Cave]

At 22:53 27/01/2005, Federico Heinz wrote:
>On Thu, 2005-01-27 at 16:37 -0500, 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
>
>I am not sure that the consensus is in favor of treating "IPR" as a key 
>issue, not even that there is such a consensus. Your painting the people 
>who don't think the WGIG should address an "IPR" issue as "dissenting from 
>the consensus" may be premature.
>
>>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.
>
>Some people have indeed made points similar to the ones you mention, but 
>I'm afraid we have failed to communicate them appropriately. Let me try to 
>explain it anew:
>
>      1. some people feel that "Intellectual Property Rights" as a title
>         is confusing, because it encourages to oversimplify, and lump
>         together regimes that are wildly different, such as copyrights,
>         patents, trademarks and even geographical denominations. What
>         these people advocate is not that WGIG discuss these issues
>         under the "PCT" banner instead of "IPR", but something much
>         deeper: that every time these issues are up for discussion, that
>         each of them be treated separately, according to their nature.
>         So, *if* WGIG is going to discuss patents, copyrights,
>         trademarks and other kinds of state-granted monopolies, it ought
>         to do separating clearly each regime: copyrights on one side,
>         patents on other, trademarks on yet another. Otherwise, any
>         recommendation on "IPR" done by the WGIG are bound to be
>         problematic and ambiguous, because it wouldn't be clear to which
>         regime it applies.

I feel this renders too much to the lawyers. One of the basic points is 
that it is not immediately obvious which regime should apply - they have 
very different characteristics. A minor point is that copyright is far less 
of a state-granted monopoly than patent. Moreover, new regimes are emerging 
which have the force of convention if not yet the colour of law.

I'd be much happier if the group could start from first principles, 
identifying the contribution to IG of different regimes and bundles of 
rights and the possibilities for securing them (and removing 
counterproductive ones). If a partition is desired, it might make more 
sense to separate different types of IP rather than different classes of 
IPR - in other words, separate e.g. designators from business practices 
from creative writing from the codification of technology, etc.

Cheers,

Jonathan

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