US Wants WIPO To Host IP Maximalist Agenda Day; Public Interest Groups Not Invited [Updated]

from the isn't-this-for-the-public-interest dept

See the update at the end

We've already written about how WIPO caved to US pressure (along with a few other countries) in delaying a decision on whether or not the Pirate Parties International group can act as an observer at WIPO meetings. However, in the KEI report that revealed that decision, there was also a separate story worth highlighting as well: the news that the US is pushing for WIPO to hold an intellectual property maximalist day, but has no interest in hearing what public interest groups have to say.

In another development, the US said it is asked that WIPO set aside a regular day for corporate right holder groups. One member of the US delegate said they wanted a "Davos type" format, with CEOs of leading companies interacting with government delegates and WIPO officials. When asked, have you proposed similar event for consumer, public health and development groups, the answer was no. The US said its proposal at WIPO for the right-holders day had a lot of support. It also comes at the same time that the pharmaceutical and processed food industries are seeking more direct roles in the governance of the World Health Organization (WHO), under a "WIPO Reform" negotiation.

This is, of course, not particularly surprising, though it is troubling. Considering, again, that we're told that the purpose of these laws is to benefit the public, even as these companies often pretend it's really just about benefiting them, it would seem that any such event should have a very high level of participation by the public itself, including various public interest groups.

Update: Some good additional info from Nick Ashton-Hart who was in the room when this was proposed, and who says that it's not as bad as the original report suggested. Instead, he points out that the request did not come from industry sources, and isn't about big rightsholders, but about actually getting real innovators and inventors to come and tell WIPO officials what they do -- which could actually be useful. I'm still concerned about how this would be set up in reality, but perhaps it's not as bad as it sounded from the original report.

Filed Under: copyright, crony capitalism, maximalists, public interest, wipo

Crony Capitalism: Big Companies Sponsor Fancy Dinner For TPP Negotiators

from the not-cool dept

We've talked about the ridiculous Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement negotiations, which are being held with incredible levels of secrecy, and which appear to include a wishlist of every copyright reform change that Hollywood wants, with little to no public scrutiny. The USTR, who's in charge of negotiating the agreement for the US claims that there's unprecedented transparency -- and that may be true if you're talking about the unprecedented lack of transparency in the negotiations. And where it gets really ridiculous is that while the public has no access to the information, the big company lobbyists have pretty much full access. We already spoke about the recent meetings in Hollywood, where TPP negotiators got to party with the Hollywood elite -- but civil society/public interest groups who tried to hold an open meeting in the hotel (and reserved space and everything) were kicked out of the hotel.

The latest is the news that tonight (as we post this), a bunch of big companies who employ some of the key lobbyists supporting the extreme nature of TPP... are hosting a fancy, expensive dinner in Washington DC. The dinner is sponsored by the US Chamber of Commerce, Philip Morris, Chevron, PhRMA, Microsoft, Pfizer, Amgen, Dow Chemical, among others... and the ambassadors from the TPP countries will all be in attendance (though we've heard, but don't have confirmation, that Australia just pulled out after realizing how bad this looked).

The next round of TPP negotiations take place next week in Australia, so it's nice that the corporate interests pushing an extreme version of the agreement get to wine and dine all of the key negotiators at an expensive and closed off dinner in DC, huh? Public interest groups? They just found out about the dinner today and (as you might expect) really aren't welcome.

What's amazing to me is how incredibly tone deaf the USTR and the US government is to how this appears. The USTR is negotiating a massive agreement that will change IP laws in pretty significant ways which clearly could favor some of these large companies. And just days before they're set to negotiate... they're letting some of the biggest special interests supporting an extreme vision for TPP buy them a fancy dinner? Even if you can believe that they're not actually influenced by this, do they not realize just how bad this looks?

Filed Under: copyright, crony capitalism, dc, dinners, sponsorship, tpp, trademark, ustr
Companies: amgen, chevron, dow chemical, microsoft, pfizer, philip morris, prma, us chamber of commerce