Government Officials Push For Copyright Reform

Tom Pullar-Strecker reports on Stuff that Government officials are keen to liberalise our copyright laws.

This is according to an official briefing given to ICT Minister Amy Adams, released under the Official Information Act.

Well good luck with that. Our government seems determined to do a trade deal with the US at almost any cost, a deal that would inevitably result in New Zealand toughening up its copyright laws for the benefit of the US entertainment industry.

It seems that, while officials understand the importance of balancing the rights of content creators with the need to encourage innovation, ICT Minister Amy Adams appears keen to put any review of our copyright laws on the back-burner. From a trade perspective it is easy to understand why, because moves to modernise our copyright laws would probably impact on any chances of a trade deal being struck with the US.

But the fact remains that copyright does need to modernise. A legal system that makes unlawful ordinary, everyday web behaviour is a legal system that needs to change.

I don’t have any particular faith that a modernisation of copyright laws will occur soon, regardless of who forms the next government. It’s easy for opposition parties to decry our outdated copyright laws, but governments have to balance such concerns with the need to stay onside with trade partners. The last Labour government was directly responsible for the section 92A debacle, so, while Labour’s Clare Curran may appear to strongly favour copyright reform, I’d put my money on it being business as usual after 2014.

Change will occur, but I doubt New Zealand will be in the vanguard of copyright reform while Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations continue.

PM Gets Date With Obama: Will Key Put Out?

Labour may have a whole tax policy ready to be released in time for the election campaign, but John Key was quick to respond. Key today showed us the central piece in National's re-election campaign.

From the Herald:

Prime Minister John Key has got his long-awaited date with "POTUS," the President of the United States, Barack Obama, at the White House.

Mr Key will meet Mr Obama on July 22, Washington time, or early July 23 New Zealand time.

Mr Key has met Mr Obama on several occasions including in April last year when he was invited by Mr Obama to his Nuclear Security Summit in Washington.

He went the White House on that occasion but to meet with Vice-President Joe Biden.

But this will be the first one-on-one with Mr Obama. 

Smile, shake hands, repeat.

Yes, I know Key will be waving the flag for all of us, and that we should all be glad that little NZ is being permitted to talk to the grownups for once. But I also wonder what concessions Key may have made to get facetime and photo-ops with Obama. We're currently negotiating a trade deal with the US, and IP matters are of some concern to the US. These negotiations are taking place in secret, and so the timing of Key's visit is intriguing. Will Key and Obama discuss the Trans Pacific Partnership? Will New Zealand sacrifice Pharmac and agree to stricter copyright laws in return for access to US markets and a handshake with the President?

What's more likely is that Obama is merely being polite in extending the invitation to the White House. He probably sees plenty of leaders from other tin-pot nations and failed states, so it's probably no big deal to him, even if it is to us. Sometimes a photo-op is nothing more than that.

TPP IP Provisions Shouldn't Be Imposed Without Debate

I've been a bit slow off the mark in analysing the potential impact of the Trans Pacific Partnership negotiations, but as a busy  IP lawyer I kind of find myself working within the laws we do have rather than the ones we should have. It's not often that I get the chance to consider IP law reform issues.

I had read some of the stuff on the TPP, but not until attending a seminar by Wellington academic Suzie Frankel this evening have I felt even remotely informed on the topic.

It's pretty clear that if we go with the TPP it will require a degree of bending over backwards on IP law matters in favour of the US. The US is keen to ensure that signatories to the TPP have strong IP protections in place. These protections would in many cases be much stronger than the protections we currently have in place. Some of the most notable changes demanded by the US are:

• increasing the duration of copyright to the life of the author plus 70 years (currently it is plus 50), and to 95 years for "works for hire"
• eliminating parallel importing
• extending the scope of patentable subject matter to include methods of treatment of humans
• fixed penalties for copyright infringement
• a requirement for NZ to accede to a number of IP treaties it has not ratified.

There's lots more, besides, including in the areas of digital copyright and pharmaceuticals.

You can debate whether these protections are good or bad for New Zealand. And indeed we should have that debate. But negotiations are going on behind closed doors, and it's likely that we will have a set of laws foisted upon us that don't take heed of our own economy's innovation requirements. What's good for the US pharmaceutical and entertainment industries may not always be good for NZ, a nation that is still developing as a "knowledge economy".

The Australian Productivity Commission undertook a review of free trade agreements after the US-Australia free trade agreement was signed. It has been largely accepted that Australia's agreeing to stronger IP laws at the behest of the US was the price Australia had to pay for a free trade agreement. But the Productivity Commission's report concluded that future free trade agreements should not include IP provisions unless a full economic assessment of their effects had been undertaken. The imposition of IP laws without any consideration as to their effect on the economy is likely to be damaging to innovation.

The reality is that we will probably cave in on a number of measures, if we get concessions on agriculture. Politicians like to talk about innovation and the knowledge economy, but when they're pushed they never have the actions to back up the rhetoric. Meat, dairy and kiwifruit always take precedence.

The biggest concern in all of this is not the proposed changes under the TPP, but the secrecy of the negotiations and lack of public debate.