Will try to keep this short and snappy. I’m feeling hopeful this week that the Government will show us it’s got some balls.

After all, we have a fairly major international treaty (trade agreement) a bit hard to know what to call it, being negotiated in our capital.

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (and don’t be fooled by its name) is being negotiated in secret by the US, Canada, Japan, the European Union, South Korea, Mexico, Switzerland, Australia and New Zealand.

It claims to be about counterfeiting of goods. That’s a valid thing. But it’s not about counterfeiting. It’s about intellectual property and about placing limits on how the internet is used by citizens in all those countries to share information and create content.

Today I called on the government to show some courage and demand that the ACTA talks are made public. Most of the participating countries claim they want transparency.

Yesterday I attended a public conference organised by InternetNZ which drew together more than 100 NZ stakeholders alarmed that their rights and those of all NZ citizens will be compromised under this secret deal.

They released a declaration and a petition. I advise you to have a look. And to ask questions. And to sign.

Everyone reading this post, your families, your friends and colleagues could be affected.

No case been provided for this treaty.

New Zealand’s greatest strength (aside from our environment and our primary production sector) is our intellectual capital. That includes our capacity to be innovative and resourceful as well as creative.

We must nurture, protect and enable these strengths. We mustn’t trade them away and compromise our ability to be innovative by allowing a trade agreement that limits and threatens our creators. As well as the people who want and need to access material for non commercial use.

So I say to the NZ Government listen to what you are being told by your citizens and stand up for the public good.

I can’t put it better than the comment posted by  commentator Colin Jackson  on my last post Pay attention New Zealand:

What a pity international governments don’t seem to be able to make an agreement to ration finite resources like tuna, atmospheric carbon or fossil fuels, but instead devote their time to making an international agreement enforcing controls over something that costs no resources to copy.

There are a growing number of parliamentarians in the countries represented at the ACTA secret talks who are raising concerns and calling for transparency and for the true reasons for ACTA to be discussed in an open environment. It would be good to see those concerns expressed across our parliament.

PS: Not short but maybe snappy?

Concern is mounting about the content of an international trade agreement on copyright being negotiated in secret at a conference in Wellington next week. All New Zealanders should pay attention.

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) talks are ongoing. It’s Wellington’s turn next week. They’re being held in secret because dominant countries the US and Japan are refusing to allow the draft text of negotiations to be made public. Why is that?

ACTA is essentially about toughening the enforcement of a range of intellectual property rights. But what is the actual issue? Who needs protecting? And where is the public interest?

The NZ Government is calling for transparency. That’s good. It’s one of a a number of countries doing the same. But it doesn’t have enough clout. Concern has been mounting around the world over recent months about what these talks are about. Largely it’s been confined to the internet community. But it’s going mainstream, and it’s in our faces next week.

Last night, the TV3 website reported on a leak from Canada which suggests that Border guards would be allowed to comb through passengers’ personal computers, iPods and MP3 players looking for copyright protected material.

The leak says that the draft agreement – to be negotiated over five days in Wellington – would also place more responsibility on internet service providers to become content police who prevented users from sharing pirated content.

Punishment proposed for repeat offenders included a ban from the using the internet for up to 12 months.

Copyright legislation poised to come to the NZ Parliament does not go nearly as far as this. But it does include a provision to terminate internet accounts for repeat copyright infringers. The NZ Labour Opposition opposes this. For good reasons.

There are many questions to be answered around the ACTA talks on copyright and intellectual property.

For instance who will bear the cost of increased copyright enforcement? Who gains from it? And when will New Zealand do some economic analysis on what the net impact on NZ of ACTA would be?

In the meantime, the the digital economy bill was rushed through the UK parliament yesterday before the election. It goes a lot further than NZ’s proposed copyright laws.

Under the terms of the bill, internet service providers will be obliged to send letters to any of their subscribers linked to alleged infringements.

Copyright holders will be able to apply for a court order to gain access to the names and addresses of serious infringers and take action against them while ISPs would be able to suspend accounts of offenders.

A wave of opposition to this Bill is growing momentum. This is an interesting analysis

Why are law-makers heading down this route? It flies in the face of reality. What lies behind the Digital Economy Bill and ACTA?

The best thing the NZ Govt could do is to release its negotiating position to its citizens. Let’s all be in this discussion. Transparency is by far the best policy.

Background

ACTA is proposed as a plurilateral trade agreement for establishing international standards on intellectual property rights enforcement. It is being negotiated between the US, Canada, Japan, the European Union, South Korea, Mexico, Switzerland, Australia and New Zealand. Unfortunately, the negotiations have extended beyond trade and physical counterfeiting to potentially cover non-commercial infringement of copyright material by ordinary citizens and issues of digital rights management.

For more info see here