[WSIS CS-Plenary] Some More Questions About IPR

[Gurstein, Michael]

Unfortunately, I don't have as much time to devote to following and contributing to these issues as I would like but around the matter of Intellectual Property Rights I would ask whether and how the following issues directly concerned with IPR and indirectly concerned with the Internet and ICTs in general are being accomodated.  (In the context of ICTs or the Internet and IPRs surely these matters are of interest given the way in which the world is being transformed by ICTs and the related matter that many of the IPR issues are arising precisely because of the ease of information dissemination and management presented by ICTs and the Internet):
 
1. since much of human knowledge is lodged in and derived from (in many cases "stolen" from) local communities and in this I would include virtual communities as well as geo-local communities, what provisions are being made to structure an IPR system so that local communities can be made aware of their IPR rights, can develop a means to establish their rights in this area, and have access to appropriate mechanisms to cost-effectively and efficiently enforce those rights including in the electronic media? 
 
2. since even the most sophisticated of intellectual property draws heavily from a universal base of knowledge which has long been understood as a common heritage (public good)--language, culture, mathematics, science--what provision in IPR developments are being made to ensure that there is a contribution by those in possession of IPR back to this common heritage to ensure its continued health, well-being, growth and universal accessability?
 
3. what provisions are being made for those who provide a considerable protion of the contrbution to individual intellectual property as for example through community or national payments for school and post-secondary education systems to ensure that their "rights" to the outputs of those systems as for example in medical, scientific or technical training is recognized and enforced and that suitable payments are made back to these co-owners by the ultimate beneficiaries--high salaried professionals, developed countries importing professionals from LDC's, corporations hiring and benefiting from the contribution of these professionals and so on. (as an example, I saw a recent calculation that Developed Countries have received benefits equivalent to almost a trillion dollars through the importation of professionals educated and trained in Less Developed Countries.)
 
Surely if we are going to be taking the notions of "intellectual property" seriously, then the rights of all who have a claim to such "property" should be taken into account in these discussions.
 
Mike Gurstein