A couple of days ago, PC World ran a piece where Commerce Minister Simon Power was quoted saying NZ officials were ‘pressing for greater transparency’ in future Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) negoitations.
He disputed media claims that the negotiations were being held in secret, saying agendas, reports and summaries for each of the seven previous ACTA rounds had been published on the Ministry of Economic Development website.
“As with any negotiation, however, it is important that when working towards an agreement on complex issues, participants are able to exchange views in confidence. For this reason, the participants in ACTA have agreed that the actual text under debate should be kept in confidence between the participants.”
ACTA did not focus on the private, non-commercial activities of individuals and would not impact on the internet experience of the average New Zealander, Power said.
“ACTA will not involve cutting internet access, and internet service providers will not be made to filter or monitor their networks.”
I’ve searched the National Party website for a media statement saying how and when he will do that, but can’t find anything. Am a bit unsure what he means. I guess it’s easy to say “I’ll press for more transparency” and then come back and say”Well I tried my best but it didn’t work”.
And today, writing in Computerworld, Juha Saarinen asks whether ACTA is harmless or a horror? He writes:
Is the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) a harmless attempt to quietly harmonise intellectual property laws and enforcement around the world, or a threat to civil liberties that will require fundamental legislative changes to implement?
The views of officials and lobby groups differ widely on what ACTA entails.
ACTA negotiations will be held in Wellington 12-16 April at the Intercontinental Hotel, according to a leaked agenda document. There is widespread concern in New Zealand and abroad about what is contained in those discussions and who is pushing what negotiating positions. New Zealand is not a big player, but we have considerable amount at stake.
InternetNZ’s Johnathon Penney says the spirit of the treaty will have to be adhered to under international law, and New Zealand can’t enact legislation that contradicts ACTA. As it stands, ACTA is essentially an extension of the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act or DMCA, according to Penney and introducing it will alter New Zealand law, especially the Copyright Act.
Simon Power needs to show New Zealanders how he will attempt to achieve more transparency in these talks. Not just pay lip service.
Agreed.
Europe certainly doesn’t seem to be in favour of keeping things secret either. Chances are the EU will pull out if the talks are not opened. It is ridiculous that the public have to spy on ACTA proceedings and rely on leaks to get any information whatsoever.
Question for the ministers concerned: What new rights will the New Zealand public get out of this treaty?
Also, is there any mention in the treaty of valid exceptions to copyright such as fair use, satire, research, public interest, bypassing market segmentation, backups, non-profit use etc?
Just been to a briefing by MED and MFAT officials. I would say there has been a change in engagement tone since MFAT became involved.
“ACTA did not focus on the private, non-commercial activities of individuals and would not impact on the internet experience of the average New Zealander”
Well what it boils down to is the definition of “commercial scale” infringement. If you deliberately or mistakenly make copyrighted material available through your new broadband connections and 1000s of copies are made by others…is that commercial scale? I bet there are organisations out there that would argue it is.
The other interesting phrase is “in the course of business”. In other words, you make money out of the infringements. ISPs and other digital businesses carry a huge risk here because they could all be argued to be making indirect money from other peoples’ online activities.
BUT, the fundamental flaw with ACTA is that there is no attempt to balance the new, improved, international enforcement regime with better citizens’ rights.
Equally, no analysis has been done about the exposure of NZ businesses to extra risk and, indeed, there has been no analysis carried out on the value of the NZ “IP Export Sector”. Without this information how on earth do we know what we are protecting and whether it has greater value than the higher risk exposure to abusive legal threats that NZers will inevitably face.
I went to a briefing yesterday with someone from MFAT. He said that nothing that is legal in NZ now will become illegal as a result of ACTA – its just about enforcement. But he also acknowledged that the deal is not done yet.
I have a number of problems with this. First of all, it’s not up to other countries to tell us how to enforce. Secondly, if we suddenly start enforcing something that might have consequences for the Net itself. And while this may the current state of the ACTA draft text, who knows what it will say in the end?
I don’t have a problem with people being pulled up for copyright infringement. I do care that its done in such as way as it doesn’t damage the Net by cutting bits of it off, or by making ISPs liable for things they can’t control.
The ACTA presentation contained a number of untested assertions, such as that strengthening IP protection would benefit New Zealand innovation. That’s far from clear. MED has also admitted that no economic analysis of the effect of strengthening IP enforcement on New Zealand. Such studies as do exist internationally are generally self-serving ones commissioned by people with the most to gain.
It’s clear that the New Zealand government has bought into the rhetoric that equates piracy with copyright infringement. Piracy is murder and robbery on the high seas. It’s not copying files. Yet MFAT distributed a glossy leaflet about ACTA which was full of the term “piracy”.
Jon Penney has just blogged about one of the core assertions of ACTA, that it’s just about enforcement:
http://publicacta.org.nz/why-acta-isnt-just-about-enforcement/