Law Commons^™

A Novel Dataset Measuring Change In Copyright Exceptions, Michael Palmedo

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

Copyrights grant creators long periods of market exclusivity during which they or their agents have the exclusive right to reproduce and distribute their works. However, copyright exceptions limit their scope and strength. The laws on both copyright protection and copyright exceptions vary substantially from one country to the next. This working paper introduces a novel, survey-based dataset that describes changes to 24 countries’ laws on copyright exceptions over time. To explore the data, I construct two indices from subsets of the dataset; one that focus on exceptions related to ICT technologies and another that focuses on educational uses. The indices …

Research Exceptions In Comparative Copyright Law, Sean Flynn, Michael Palmedo, Andrés Izquierdo

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

Recent scholarship has highlighted the positive impact on scholarship of copyright exceptions for text and data mining and of more “open” exceptions for research uses. Until now, however, there has not been a collection and categorization of the world’s copyright laws according to the degree to which they provide exceptions for research. In this report, we release the results of the first such study. We show that every copyright law in the world has at least one exception to promote research uses of copyrighted works, but that such exceptions vary widely between countries. We conclude that the world’s exceptions for …

Non-Patent Intellectual Property Barriers To Covid-19 Vaccines, Treatment And Containment, Sean Flynn, Erica Nkrumah, Luca Schirru

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

As the World Trade Organization considers a proposal to waive or otherwise address intellectual property barriers to the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic, most of the attention given by scholars and policy makers has been focused on patents. The original proposals by South Africa and India, as well as the groundbreaking support of the United States, however, explicitly applied to all forms of intellectual property. This paper documents many instances where non-patent forms of intellectual property create barriers to the global scale up of access to vaccines, treatments, and the ability to contain the virus through social distancing. Addressing …

Submission To Canadian Government Consultation On A Modern Copyright Framework For Ai And The Internet Of Things, Sean Flynn, Lucie Guibault, Christian Handke, Joan-Josep Vallbé, Michael Palmedo, Carys J. Craig, Michael Geist, João Quintais

Testimony and Submissions

We are grateful for the opportunity to participate in the Canadian Government’s consultation on a modern copyright framework for AI and the Internet of Things. Below, we present some of our research findings relating to the importance of flexibility in copyright law to permit text and data mining (“TDM”). As the consultation paper recognizes, TDM is a critical element of artificial intelligence. Our research supports the adoption of a specific exception for uses of works in TDM to supplement Canada’s existing general fair dealing exception.

Empirical research shows that more publication of citable research takes place in countries with “open” …

Submission To South African Parliament's Portfolio Committee On Trade And Industry - Re: Copyright Amendment Bill [B13b - 2017], Global Expert Network On Copyright User Rights

Testimony and Submissions

This submission is on behalf of the Global Expert Network on Copyright User Rights. The Network is an association of over 100 copyright academics from over 30 countries who conduct research and offer technical assistance to governments and stakeholders on the reform of copyright limitations and exceptions to promote the public interest.

Professor Sean Flynn, Counsel of Record, is a former Law Clerk for the late Chief Justice Arthur Chaskalson, is currently a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Cape Town IP Unit, and has been conducting research and leading academic projects in South Africa for over two decades. …

Statements To The Wipo Standing Committee On Committee On Copyright And Related Rights, Electronic Information For Libraries

Testimony and Submissions

As an NGO accredited with permanent observer status at WIPO, EIFL has the opportunity to make interventions at sessions of WIPO committees and meetings

EIFL advocates at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) for an international copyright framework that benefits libraries in developing and transition economy countries. We participate in sessions of WIPO’s Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) that usually meets in Geneva twice a year. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, just one SCCR took place in 2021, in hybrid mode (online for observers and limited physical participation for member state delegates).

We work with Member States …

Eifl And Library Group Comments On Updated Draft Wipo Cmo Toolkit (2021), Electronic Information For Libraries

Testimony and Submissions

EIFL and partner organizations in the library, archives and museum communities responded to a public consultation to provide additional comments on the updated draft WIPO Good Practice Toolkit for Collective Management Organizations (CMOs), released on 27 May 2021. Publication of the updated draft Toolkit follows an earlier consultation that took place in April 2021.

The updated version of the Toolkit contains an expanded section on supervision and monitoring of CMOs (Section 13). We noted three concerns in the updated Section 13, in particular. In our comments, we propose a number of amendments to address the concerns in Section 13, along …

Reforming The Right To Remuneration In The South African Copyright Amendment Bill, Malebakeng Agnes Forere

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

One of the core goals of South Africa’s Copyright Amendment Bill is to provide a right to fair remuneration for all authors and performers. This objective was motivated by the experiences of numerous famous South African creators who, despite their success in the creative industry, died as paupers. The problem that the Bill seeks to address is that the distributors of copyrighted work are dominated by multinational monopolies that are able to exact enormous concessions in their contracts with South African creators. Among the tools to address this problem in the Bill is a new right to a “fair royalty” …

Trademark Issues In The Cannabis Industry Under U.S. Law (Cannabis, Recreational Use), Christine Farley, Erik Ponce, Rachel Santarlas, Zara Snapp

Presentations

By Mexican Group of the International Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property (Association Internationale pour la Protection de la Propriété Intellectuelle, AIPPI)

Not The African Copyright Pirate Is Perverse, But The Situation In Which (S)He Lives-Textbooks For Education, Extraterritorial Human Rights Obligations, And Constitutionalization "From Below" In Ip Law, Klaus Beiter

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

Printed textbooks remain crucial for education, particularly in developing countries. However, in many of these countries, textbooks are unavailable, too expensive, or not accessible in learners’ native tongues. Digital content, for many reasons, does not prove a wondrous solution. Cheaply (translating and) reproducing textbooks would be a strategy. However, reprography is highly regulated under copyright law. Copyright also adds to the cost of textbooks. The availability, accessibility, and acceptability of learning materials constitute essential elements of the right to education under international human rights law.

Intellectual property (IP) law has so far refrained from endorsing the concept of extraterritorial state …

The Missing Goal-Scorers In The Artificial Intelligence Team: Of Big Data, The Fundamental Right To Research And The Failed Text And Data Mining Limitations In The Csdm Directive, Christophe Geiger

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

This article argues that recent strategies of the European Union in the field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) resemble a football team missing a goal-scorer to win any of the competitions with other jurisdictions having more flexible limitations to copyright, in particular with those allowing robust text and data mining (TDM) activities. It analyses the TDM limitations newly introduced in EU copyright law by the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market to show that these provisions not only fail to take duly into account the right to research grounded in the fundamental right to information, but also will not …

Platform Liability Under Article 17 Of The Copyright In The Digital Single Market Directive, Automated Filtering And Fundamental Rights: An Impossible Match, Christophe Geiger, Bernd Justin Jütte

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

The Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (CDSM Directive) introduced a change of paradigm with regard to the liability of some platforms in the European Union. Under the safe harbour rules of the Directive on electronic commerce (E-Commerce Directive), intermediaries in the EU were shielded from liability for acts of their users committed through their services, provided they had no knowledge of it. Although platform operators could be required to help enforce copyright infringements online by taking down infringing content, the E-commerce Directive also drew a very clear line that intermediaries could not be obliged to monitor all …

Brand New World (Parallel Session 1.B. - Trademarks), Christine Farley

Presentations

By American University Washington College of Law, Texas A&M University School of Law, and University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law.

Plenary Session 2 - The Impact Of “Impact” In Ip Scholarship: Citations, Downloads And Why We (Should/Don’T) Care, Christine Farley, Gregory N. Mandel, Leah Chan Grinvald, Kimberlee Weatherall, Paul Heald

Presentations

By American University Washington College of Law, Texas A&M University School of Law, and University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law.

Opening - Welcome And Instructions, Christine Farley, Irene Calboli, Jorge Contreras, J. Glynn Lunney

Presentations

By American University Washington College of Law, Texas A&M University School of Law, and University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law.

“Sacrifice And Recoupment” In The Antitrust Analysis Of Patent Settlements: Actavis Through The Lens Of Brooke Group, Aspen Skiing, And Trinko, Bryan Gant

American University Business Law Review

Patent settlements are typically procompetitive, benefiting not only the settling parties but also the courts and the general public. But in rare cases patent settlements might instead harm competition, and thus raise antitrust concerns. How are courts to determine when antitrust scrutiny should — and, more importantly, should not — be applied to patent settlements? The answer ostensibly came in the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision in FTC v. Actavis, Inc. Under Actavis, antitrust scrutiny of patent settlements may “sometimes” be appropriate where there is a “large,” “unexplained” “reverse payment” from the patentee to the patent challenger. Unless, that is, the …

A Tale Of Two Interoperabilities; Or, How Google V. Oracle Could Become Social Media Legislation, Charles Duan

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

The Supreme Court'srecent decision in Google LLC v. Oracle America, Inc. has provided the latest word on an issue that many have described as "interoperability," and it comes at a time when lawmakers around the world are debating a policy called "interoperability" with respect to majorInternetplatforms. At first glance, these two similarly named policy conversations copyright protection of software interfaces and interconnection among competing Internet platforms, respectively have little to do with each other. Yet they are vitally intertwined: the activities and issues featured in Google are so closely linked to the questions of digital competition that interoperability reforms directed …

Hacking Antitrust: Competition Policy And The Computer Fraud And Abuse Act, Charles Duan

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, a federal computer trespass statute that prohibits accessing a computer "without authorization or exceeding authorized access," has often been criticized for clashing with online norms, over-criminalizing common behavior, and infringing freedom-of-expression interests. These controversies over the CFAA have raised difficult questions about how the statute is to be interpreted, with courts of appeals split on the proper construction and the Supreme Courtset to consider the law in its current October Term 2020.

This article considers the CFAA in a new light, namely its effects on competition. Rather than merely preventing injurious trespass upon computers, …

Trademark Law’S Monopoly Problem: The Supreme Court On Generic Terms As Trademarks, Christine Farley

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

No abstract provided.

Federal Judge Seeks Patent Cases, Jonas Anderson, Paul R. Gugliuzza

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

That probably seems like a bizarre Craigslist ad. It’s not real—we mocked it up for this article. Still, and startlingly, it accurately portrays what’s happening in the Waco Division of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas. One judge, appointed to the Western District only three years ago, has been advertising his courtroom through presentations to patent lawyers, comments to the media, procedural practices, and decisions in patent cases as the place to file a patent infringement lawsuit. That advertising has succeeded. In 2016 and 2017, the Waco Division received a total of five patent cases. In …

The Integration Of Artificial Intelligence In The Intelligence Community: Necessary Steps To Scale Efforts And Speed Progress, Corin R. Stone

Joint PIJIP/TLS Research Paper Series

No abstract provided.