An international coalition of consumer groups has issued a resolution calling into question global enforcement policy and offering core principles for policymakers to consider in setting new enforcement standards.

The Trans Atlantic Consumer Dialogue on 18 June issued the resolution on the enforcement of copyright, trademarks, patents and other intellectual property rights. The TACD is a trade advisory body to the European Union and United States government, and brings together 80 member organisations from those regions, claiming a direct paid-up membership of some 20 million consumers.

The resolution calls for a halt to the plurilateral negotiation of an Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) led by the United States, until the negotiating texts are made available to consumer groups and other conditions are met.

TACD wants future negotiations to be respectful of civil liberties such as the right to privacy and also demands the inclusion of developing countries in ACTA negotiations

Source: Intellectual Property Watch

Social Democratic MP Jörg Tauss has left his party and is now the first member of the Pirate Party in the Bundestag, ignoring calls that he step down from parliament.

Currently under investigation for possession of child pornography he parliamentarian said he downloaded as part of his work against the trade in such images.

He left the Social Democratic Party (SPD) over the weekend in protest at its decision to support a bill giving the government the power to censor websites containing child porn.

Source: The Local
via: Slashdot

Reclaim The Commons is a manifesto launched at the World Social Forum (Belem, Brazil, January 27-February 1, 2009). …

“Humankind is suffering from an unprecedented campaign of privatization and commodification of the most basic elements of life: nature, culture, human work and knowledge itself. In countless arenas, businesses are claiming our shared inheritance - sciences, creative works, water, the atmosphere, health, education, genetic diversity, even living creatures - as private property. A compulsive quest for short-term financial gain is sacrificing the prosperity of all and the stability of the Earth itself. …”

Source: Open Access News

Lord Carter’s Digital Britain review has been the most comprehensive examination of the media and telecoms landscape in the UK in recent memory. Its impact will reverberate across the industry for some time – regardless of how long the communications minister himself remains in government.

January’s interim report set out five objectives: upgrading and modernising the UK’s digital networks; encouraging investment in the digital economy; ensuring “UK content for UK users”; providing access for all to new digital technologies; and developing the skills needed to enable widespread take-up of public services online.

It also had 22 so-called action points; Carter’s final report tomorrow will have twice that number, spanning everything from digital literacy and protecting children on the internet, to solving Channel 4’s funding crisis and combating online piracy. Here are some of the main areas …

Source: guardian.co.uk

The other day, I asked Christian Engström, a Swede who just this week was elected to the European Parliament, why his political party called themselves the Pirate Party. After all, his party doesn’t actually advocate wanton lawbreaking, file-sharing or keel-hauling – but rather consumer rights and intellectual property reform. Why not just call it the Patent Law Abolition Party?

“Because if that had been the name, you wouldn’t be talking to me,” Mr. Engström said.

Source: The Globe and Mail
Via: techdirt

A coalition of creative industries organisations, including the UK’s biggest trade union, Amicus/Unite, have increased the pressure on the government to act against illegal downloading in next week’s final Digital Britain report, saying that there will otherwise be large job losses in TV, film and music across the UK.

The lobbying effort is backed by more than 15 organisations from the creative industries and, for the first time, Amicus/Unite and the Trade Union Congress.

Source: guardian.co.uk

The Pirate Party, which wants to legalise internet file-sharing, has won one of Sweden’s 18 seats in the European parliament. AFP reports that the Pirate Party won 7.1% of votes with ballots in 5,659 constituencies out of 5,664 counted.

Source: guardian.co.uk

As a candidate for the European Parliament elections on Sunday, the Swedish Pirate Party has “good chances” of winning one, two or possibly even three mandates, it says, referring to Swedish opinion polls.

The nontraditional party would then be the third largest, after the governing Conservatives (Moderatarna) and the Social Democratic Party, Christian Engström, the Pirate Party’s vice-president and top candidate for the European Union elections, told Intellectual Property Watch. He said the Pirate Party is averaging 6-8 percent support in the polls.

Source: Intellectual Property Watch

The UK film and television industry is calling on the government to introduce online ’speed humps’ that would slow down or restrict the broadband access of people who illegally share copyrighted material, and slap pop-up warnings on pirate websites to stem the rising tide of internet piracy.

Source: guardian.co.uk

A UK researcher has spent years interviewing people about whether DRM has affected their ability to use content in ways ordinarily protected by the law. Surprise! It has, even leading one sight-impaired woman to piracy.

Source: ars technica