Project-disco.org, here.
Friday, August 09, 2013
On the question of copyright infringement by hyperlink (in email)
Pearson Education, Inc. et Al., Plaintiffs, V. Lazar Ishayev and Yelena Leykina, No. 11 Civ. 5052 (PAE), here.
My Take on the WIPO Marrakesh Treaty/2
(Post n.1 here).
Paradoxically, perhaps, the question of an adequate protection of the rights to read of people with print disabilities became particularly pressing with the advent of the digital society.
Paradoxically, perhaps, the question of an adequate protection of the rights to read of people with print disabilities became particularly pressing with the advent of the digital society.
For the general reading population, the pervasive deployment of information and communication technologies makes available many innovative and exciting ways in which copyright material can be enjoyed. The same technology has also pushed doors of opportunity open to provide new solutions to meet the needs of print disabled people. For instance, a visually impaired person can now take a traditional printed text and convert it to an accessible format by using main stream and increasingly affordable technology like Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software, scanning devices, screen readers or an electronic (refreshable) Braille display. Moreover, e-books hold the promise of providing greatly increased accessibility for print disabled persons compared to the analogue media. As it already happened in the past, new general purpose technology, i.e. innovations not conceived having the needs of specific categories of users in mind, can greatly benefit also the print disabled. Thus, Thomas Edison correctly anticipated in 1878 that the then newly conceived phonograph player would have led, eventually, to the availability of “[p]honographic books, which will speak to blind people without effort on their part.”
Even with our propitious technological advances, however, print disabled people still encounter significant difficulties in accessing written resources. Electronic texts, for instance, are often inaccessible because of the non-availability of specific text-to-speech or text-to-braille capabilities, or because of the need to buy dedicated, and often relatively expensive, equipment. Moreover, deliberate hardware limitations such as those found in popular e-readers hamper accessibility. Most importantly, whilst written materials today are commonly created as digital works, the formats employed by the publishing industry are seldom genuinely accessible, delaying or even blocking “off the shelf access” for the print disabled.
[This blog's "Feuilleton de l'été 2013" continues - possibly next week]
Minority Report? The EC’s public consultation on minority shareholdings
Kluwercompetitionlawblog.com, here.
Thursday, August 08, 2013
My take on the WIPO Marrakesh Treaty/1
Hundreds of millions of people worldwide encounter severe
distress in trying to access the written word in their education and private
life. Only by employing appropriate technologies, such as for instance the
method first developed by Louis Braille in 1829, written works can to be made accessible to people who suffer from print
disabilities. The creation of accessible versions of copyrighted works and
their distribution to the beneficiary persons, however, normally require the
consent of the respective rightholders.
Whilst international treaties and
conventions in the area of intellectual property generally permit
exceptions and limitations to the rights of the IP holder to be provided, their
nature and scope have been largely left to national legislators to determine. By
1982, only seven member States of the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO)
enacted provisions in that respect, and twenty-five years later exceptions
and limitations for the benefit of print disabled person were present only in 57
member States - out of the then 184-strong overall membership.
According to a study commissioned by the Royal National
Institute of the Blind and covering books published in the United Kingdom in
the period 2004-2010, just some 7 per
cent of them were accessible to blind people and others living with a print
disability,
0.25 per cent of which in traditional
formats like hard copy braille and human voice audio, and 6.80 as accessible
e-books. Unsurprisingly, the situation is considered to
be much worse in developing and least-developed countries, where the majority
of persons with visual impairments or with other print disabilities live.
In 2006, the text of the United Nations Convention on the
Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) was adopted and entered into force
two years later. The text of Convention strongly reaffirms the right to read for people
with disability. The
WIPO Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons who
are Blind, Visually Impaired, or otherwise Print Disabled, concluded on June
27, 2013, aims at addressing
the self-evident paucity of available works in accessible format copies (“book famine”).
The newly adopted Treaty sets an elaborate international legal framework in the
form of, first, an obligation for contracting parties to adopt in their respective
national legislations exceptions and limitations that permit the reproduction,
distribution and making available of published works in accessible formats.
Second, the Treaty provides for the cross-border exchange of accessible format
works created based on limitations and exceptions.
The Marrakesh Treaty takes a resolute step towards a
more satisfactory balance between the print disabled persons’ legitimate need
to access copyrighted works and the necessary protection of the rights of the
copyright holders. The Treaty is also a première
on the international stage, being the first multilateral, binding legal
instrument primarily devoted to the establishment of exceptions and limitations
in copyright law. In fact, much of the considerable efforts put into the development
of the international copyright framework so far focused almost exclusively on
defining and protecting the rights needed to promote the important aim of
encouraging and rewarding creativity. Restriction or limitations upon authors justified
by the broader “public interest” were almost exclusively left
to national legislators, albeit within the boundaries set by the relevant
treaties and conventions.
The so-called three-step
test, arguably the most significant among those boundaries, took central
stage throughout the nearly five years of arduous Treaty negotiations. The
final text adopted in Marrakesh contains one direct reference to the test in
the Preamble, two in Agreed statements, Article 5.4 deals with the so called "Berne gap", and Article 11 sets the obligation, for
the Contracting Parties adopting the measures necessary to ensure the
application of the Marrakesh Treaty, to comply
with the three-step test as
formulated in the different international mandatory legal instruments under which
they are bound. While the language of the three-step
test has not changed since its original formulation in the1967 Stockholm Revision of the Berne Convention, its
interpretation remains highly controversial. In this respect, the adopted Treaty is also particularly relevant since it
sheds some light on questions that timely, subsequent revisions of the Berne
Convention should have already helped clarify.
(to be continued, hopefully soon; ACW).
For further material see the label visually impaired and copyright (actually a misnomer, in light of the final Treaty)
All future episodes here.
For further material see the label visually impaired and copyright (actually a misnomer, in light of the final Treaty)
All future episodes here.
Wednesday, August 07, 2013
Copyright and the Digital Economy
Submission by the Australian Digital Alliance and Australian Libraries Copyright Committee in response to the Australian Law Reform Commission’s Discussion Paper, here.
Tuesday, August 06, 2013
Monday, August 05, 2013
Sunday, August 04, 2013
Saturday, August 03, 2013
Thursday, August 01, 2013
Wednesday, July 31, 2013
Tuesday, July 30, 2013
Standard Essential Patent Disputes and Antitrust Law
US Senate Judiciary Committee - Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights. Written testimonies here.
Monday, July 29, 2013
Friday, July 26, 2013
Thursday, July 25, 2013
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Cloud Computing: An Overview of the Technology and the Issues facing American Innovators
Hearing, Subcommittee on Intellectual Property, Competition, and the Internet, here.
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Monday, July 22, 2013
Introduction effects of the Australian plain packaging policy on adult smokers: a cross-sectional study
M. Wakefield, L. Hayes, S. Durkin, R. Borland, here.
Protecting Shared and Widely Distributed Traditional Knowledge: Issues, challenges and options
International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development, here.
Saturday, July 06, 2013
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Competition in the Context of Financial Crisis
American Bar Association Section of Antitrust Law 60th Spring Meeting, the Antitrust source,here.
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
AG Jääskinen on search engines and lack of responsibility for personal data appearing on web pages they process
Case C-131/12, Google Spain SL, Google Inc. v Agencia Española de Protección de Datos, here.
Monday, June 24, 2013
Saturday, June 22, 2013
Friday, June 21, 2013
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Rechtsstreit um exklusiven Zugriff von Juris auf Urteile des BVerfG geht weiter
Institut für Urheber- und Medienrecht, hier.
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