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Intellectual Property Plan Sparks U.S. Concerns
by William New
A proposed European Union directive on intellectual property enforcement could have a big impact on U.S. telecommunications companies and may cause a replication of the gritty fight in the United States over the legal liability that telecom firms face for the activities of their customers, according to U.S. industry sources.
"The directive is totally imbalanced [in favor of copyright owners] and could result in a global type of forum shopping, with devastating consequences on third parties' business operations," said Sarah Deutsch, vice president at Verizon Communications. The directive is inconsistent with both U.S. and European policy for third-party liability, she said.
Forum shopping occurs when companies look for countries with laws that are more favorable to them in order to bring a court case. With the arrival of the Internet, the grounds for choosing courts in legal disputes are becoming more ambiguous.
The directive seeks to harmonize the disparate intellectual property enforcement of the 15 EU countries. But the version in question, being considered by the European Parliament Legal Affairs and Internal Market Committee, is slanted toward copyright holders, industry sources said.
That claim is particularly noteworthy, one U.S. industry source said, because the drafter of the language, parliament member Janelly Fortou, has family ties to Vivendi Universal, and another parliament member involved holds a position at Bertelsmann. Both companies are top-tier global copyrights owners.
The directive could impact Internet service providers (ISPs), electronics companies, network providers, universities and even intellectual property owners, the source said.
There are several provisions of concern, some of which reflect industry legal battles in the United States. For instance, the clause on the "right of information" could give private companies with a complaint a nearly automatic right to obtain, without filing a lawsuit, the information about telecom users who they believe are infringing on their copyrights, the industry source said. That could be a threat to privacy, the source added.
Another concern involves the criminal law provisions, which do not contain similar protections from liability for ISPs as the EU e-commerce directive. Any participation in intellectual property infringement, regardless of whether the company knew about it, could put a company at risk of liability. That approach could implicate ISPs.
U.S. companies also are wary of a provision allowing injunctions against infringers as well as against "intermediaries whose services are used by third parties to infringe on an intellectual property right." In the United States, a judge must put requests for injunctions to a strict four-part test, and so far, not one U.S. rights holder has won an injunction against an intermediary, the U.S. industry source said.
In addition, the EU plan could require a party to compensate for infringement even if it acted "without fault or negligence" but "caused a prejudice" to the complaining party. And the directive would authorize physical seizure of goods related to infringement, which could be extended to Internet servers and network equipment containing personal data on infringers, the industry source said. Seizures could be approved without notice or a hearing, the draft states.
Canadian Innovators Make Their Mark
Canadian innovators have played an essential role in the development of information technology and the Internet, and a new government-backed book profiles 30 key figures that make Canada one of the most tech-savvy nations.
"Innovation Nation: Canadian leadership from Java to Jurassic Park" describes the business models that have made Canada successful and divides the country's chief actors into five groups. They are the entrepreneurs who have launched companies, the investors, the coaches, academic institutions and infrastructure builders.
The country's tech stars include: James Gosling, co-inventor of the Java software; Yahoo Chief Operating Officer Jeff Mallett; Jeff Skoll, eBay's first president; and Tim Bray, a co-author of extensible markup language, or XML, code that transformed the handling of information on the World Wide Web. Another achiever is Rob Burgess, whose 3-D animation software company helped create films such as "Jurassic Park," "Forrest Gump" and "The Mask."
Numerous others have played low-profile, high-impact roles that are evident in statistics. For instance, more than 75 percent of North American Internet traffic travels over Canadian-made equipment, and Canada is rated top in the world for e-government solutions. It also was the first country to connect all of its public schools, including its native communities, and its public libraries to the Internet.
In other Canadian news, the government last week announced some $300 million in funding for 14 projects to improve border infrastructure. The projects include creation of commercial pre-clearance lanes and other technology upgrades designed to reduce congestion.
Group Of Eight In Decline, Economists Say
At their annual summit next week, the leaders of the Group of Eight (G-8) leading industrialized nations need to take strong steps to reverse the decline in the group's significance, a group of respected private-sector experts said in a report last week.
Since the group's initial meeting as the G-5 in 1975, "the overall record is one of substantial decline, which has become exceedingly costly during an era of accelerating globalization when international policy cooperation has become more rather than less essential," the report said. The original ideas of the group -- to review each other's performances and policies, and to form cooperative strategies -- have faded.
The report came from the "Shadow G-8," a group of 20 participants from the group's eight countries who have high-level expertise in the G-8. The Institute for International Economics is a co-chair of the Shadow G-8. The group's recommendations for this year's summit include that Europe reform its labor markets, Japan "aggressively and completely" deregulate and privatize its services sector, and the United States avoid new tax cuts.
In other news, the European Union and Morocco this week moved to strengthen their scientific and technical cooperation with the completion of negotiations on an agreement to be signed in the next few weeks. The agreement will make it easier for Moroccan universities, companies and research centers to participate in EU research initiatives and open Morocco's activities to European researchers. The agreement also will enable a sharing of intellectual property rights generated by the countries' joint activities.
Also in Europe, the McDonald's fast-food chain is planning to offer wireless, high-speed Internet access via Wi-Fi technology at several restaurants in the Netherlands, Europemedia reports.
Science, Tech Advisers Sought For U.S.-Israel Panel
The Commerce Department is seeking nominees to serve on an advisory panel of the U.S.-Israel Science and Technology Commission created under the recent understanding signed by the two nations. The commission's purpose is to promote cooperative science and technology efforts that encourage high-tech industries in both countries to undertake joint tech initiatives.
Panelists will identify fields and forms of cooperation, recommend activities and prepare periodic reports. Nominations are due by June 2 to Commerce's Technology Administration.
Separately, the third International Interdisciplinary Conference on E-Commerce has issued a second call for papers. The conference, scheduled for Oct. 16-18 in Gdansk, Poland, will cover topics such as electronic marketing, language, artificial intelligence, e-contracting and legal issues, e-negotiation, virtual enterprises, technology, social issues and the "futurology of e-commerce."
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