[bookshare-discuss] Re: Fw: Copyright Treaty Backing Cross-Border Sharing of Books for Disabled Users Survives Resistance From the EU and US
- From: Chela Robles <cdrobles693@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 4 Jun 2009 22:30:01 -0700
We've come a long way and the best is yet to come, I'm cheering and smiling,
Chela Robles
On 6/4/09, EVAN REESE <mentat3@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> This is indeed good news.
>
> Evan
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Bob Acosta" <boacosta@xxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: <bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Thursday, June 04, 2009 5:08 PM
> Subject: [bookshare-discuss] Fw: Copyright Treaty Backing Cross-Border
> Sharing of Books for Disabled Users Survives Resistance From the EU and US
>
>
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Ardis Bazyn" <abazyn@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> To: <CCB-L@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; <ccb-presidents@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; "blind
>> students of California" <California-BlindStudents@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>;
>> <nabsboard@xxxxxxx>
>> Sent: Thursday, June 04, 2009 10:49 AM
>> Subject: Copyright Treaty Backing Cross-Border Sharing of Books for
>> Disabled
>> Users Survives Resistance From the EU and US
>>
>>
>> Copyright treaty backing e-books for disabled readers survives US and EU
>> resistance
>>
>> Copyright treaty backing e-books for disabled readers survives US and EU
>> resistance
>>
>> OUT-LAW News, 03/06/2009
>>
>> A proposed treaty that would change copyright laws to allow the supply of
>> books across borders for the benefit of blind people has survived
>> resistance
>> from
>> the US, UK, France, Germany and other countries.
>>
>> A committee of the World Intellectual Property Organisation agreed on
>> Friday
>> "to continue without delay" its work on "facilitating the access of blind,
>> visually-impaired and other reading-disabled persons to
>> copyright-protected
>> works."
>>
>> At the heart of this work is a treaty proposed by the charitable
>> organisation World Blind Union (WBU) and written with the help of the UK's
>> Royal National
>> Institute of Blind People (RNIB) .
>>
>> RNIB campaign manager Dan Pescod attended the five-day meeting in Geneva.
>> Pescod told OUT-LAW today that the UK and the US were among a group of
>> countries
>> that did not support the treaty and preferred 'soft options', though they
>> stopped short of formally opposing it.
>>
>> Around 95% of books are never published in any format other than standard
>> print, according to the WBU. But visually impaired people need books in
>> other
>> formats, such as large print, Braille and audio. People with other
>> disabilities, such as cognitive impairments, can also find themselves
>> 'print
>> disabled'.
>>
>> "Imagine if you walked into a bookshop or library, and were told that you
>> were only allowed to choose from five percent of the books on the shelf,"
>> said
>> WBU president Dr William Rowland in a speech last year. "What would such
>> a
>> limited choice do to your education, to your leisure reading
>> opportunities?"
>>
>> The WBU, RNIB and others have prepared a draft treaty that would relax
>> copyright restrictions to allow the creation and supply of accessible
>> books
>> without
>> the need for prior permission from the copyright owner. The treaty
>> requires
>> this generally to be done on a non-profit basis.
>>
>> In some countries, it is already legal to create accessible books without
>> permission. It was made legal in the UK by the Copyright (Visually
>> Impaired
>> Persons)
>> Act, passed in 2002. But that law is limited in scope. The rights are
>> limited to visually-impaired persons - so while a person with dyslexia
>> might
>> benefit
>> from a large-print book, or an electronic book which can be played using
>> text-to-speech conversion software, the law does not facilitate that
>> person.
>>
>> Also, the UK law, like equivalent laws in other countries, does not allow
>> the supply of a digital book to a customer overseas.
>>
>> The WBU treaty, if signed and ratified in its present form, would lift
>> these
>> restrictions. It seeks to protect all 'reading disabled' persons and it
>> allows
>> the supply across borders of accessible works, as a Braille hard copy or
>> as
>> an e-book. At present, a tiny fraction of books that are available in
>> accessible
>> formats can be supplied across borders because their export requires the
>> agreement of rights holders.
>>
>> Pescod said publishers have until recently seen little money to be made
>> from
>> converting books into accessible formats, meaning that the work is
>> normally
>> done by voluntary organisations like RNIB.
>>
>> "If we make an accessible version of a book in the UK and want to send
>> that
>> to another English-speaking country where they don't have the resources to
>> make
>> books accessible, we should be able to do that," he said. "But the
>> copyright
>> law as it stands doesn't allow the transfer of that accessible info. The
>> exceptions
>> in place in national legislations stop at the border."
>>
>> The preamble to the treaty notes that "90 percent of visually-impaired
>> persons live in countries of low or moderate incomes." These countries
>> tend
>> to have
>> the most limited ranges of accessible works, hence the need for a right to
>> supply across borders.
>>
>> Pescod said that voluntary organisations in Chile, Columbia, Mexico,
>> Nicaragua and Uruguay have only 8,517 books in alternative formats between
>> them. However,
>> Argentina has 63,000 books and Spain 102,000. All these countries speak
>> Spanish.
>> . Spain and Argentina will not share their libraries with their Latin
>> American colleagues, though, for fear of breaking copyright laws, he said.
>>
>> The proposed treaty would also allow for the circumvention of digital
>> rights
>> management (DRM) where necessary to render a work accessible. Some books
>> are
>> published in a digital format that is not compatible with the assistive
>> technologies used by disabled people.
>>
>> Lobbying for legislative change in the UK, the RNIB noted recently that
>> DRM
>> schemes "can react to assistive technology as if it were an illicit
>> operation."
>> It also said that "while e-book readers may have the facility to reproduce
>> synthetic speech, the rights holder can apply a level of security which
>> prevents
>> this from working."
>>
>> The WBU treaty would allow a company to buy an e-book, hack the DRM and
>> redistribute a DRM-free version of the work, provided copies are supplied
>> exclusively
>> for disabled customers.
>>
>> Pescod said that main objective of RNIB and the WBU for the week was to
>> have
>> the treaty formally proposed within the WIPO committee. Their second
>> objective
>> was to have it accepted as a viable proposal. "These were met," he said.
>> "Brazil, Ecuador and Paraguay tabled the treaty as a proposal."
>>
>> That put the treaty before WIPO's Standing Committee on Copyright and
>> Related Rights. It was strongly supported by delegates representing South
>> American,
>> African and Asian countries. "India and China were particularly
>> supportive,"
>> said Pescod. Wealthier countries, it seems, were less enthusiastic.
>>
>> "Many publishers and rights holders and some states say we need a 'soft'
>> solution," said Pescod. "RNIB should work with rights holders and others
>> to
>> resolve
>> this, they say."
>>
>> Pescod said these groups want a 'stakeholder platform' to discuss the
>> sharing of files, but not a treaty. "We're more than happy to speak," he
>> said. "But
>> where we part company is that the stakeholder platform is looking at one
>> set
>> of solutions only." It would address some technical challenges, he said;
>> but
>> it would not address other issues, including the production of
>> unprofitable
>> Braille works, or the extra work needed to describe images.
>>
>> "We're insisting that you need to work with rights holders - and we'll
>> continue to do that - but we still need a treaty which would do three
>> things: encourage
>> national copyright exceptions for disabled people in all countries; allow
>> transfer of accessible books in all countries; and allow tightening of
>> rules
>> on DRM systems that can block accessibility."
>>
>> "No country opposed the proposal [for a treaty] outright," said Pescod.
>> "Those who wanted to suggest that they weren't happy with it used more
>> coded
>> language,
>> like saying discussions were 'premature' or that they wanted to take it
>> back
>> home and discuss it [at a national level]."
>>
>> The published conclusions of the committee include the unattributed
>> objection "that deliberations regarding any instrument would be
>> premature."
>>
>> "Those attacking this [treaty] fear it is going to undermine copyright
>> law,"
>> he said. "We disagree completely. Ensuring access for a bunch of people
>> who
>> the market was not selling to in the first place doesn't undermine
>> copyright
>> law."
>>
>> "This whole idea that it's 'premature' is bizarre," he said. "A WIPO and
>> UNESCO working group looked at this in 1982. If that's premature, at what
>> point
>> does it become mature and ready to go?"
>>
>> Pescod said that support for the stakeholder platform instead of a treaty
>> is
>> coming only from those who are not disabled. "They're not blind and they
>> know
>> better? I would question that," he said.
>>
>> The UK was represented in two capacities: as a member of the European
>> Union
>> and as a member of the so-called 'Group B' countries, a WIPO term that
>> refers
>> to 17 EU member states, the US, Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand,
>> Norway, Switzerland and the Vatican. Neither the EU nor Group B
>> representatives
>> supported the proposal. "Both are sceptical," said Pescod.
>>
>> According to another meeting attendee, James Love of Knowledge Ecology
>> International, a group that promotes access to knowledge, the opposition
>> from the
>> US and other high-income countries "is due to intense lobbying from a
>> large
>> group of publishers that oppose a 'paradigm shift', where treaties would
>> protect
>> consumer interests, rather than expand rights for copyright owners."
>>
>> Ville Oksanen, a member of European digital rights group EDRi said Group B
>> and the EU "did their best to derail the process of getting the treaty
>> under
>> serious consideration." He described the given reasons as "rather
>> perplexing" and described them as excuses designed to avoid being seen as
>> opposing help
>> for disabled people.
>>
>> "It remains to be seen how sceptical they will be next time," said Pescod.
>> "At the end of the day, though, we are happy with the way things went."
>>
>> On Friday night the WIPO copyright committee reached agreement to discuss
>> the treaty at its next meeting in November, in spite of the objections. In
>> the
>> meantime, the committee's conclusions note that "Member States will
>> continue
>> to consult on these issues at national level and report on the activities
>> and views on possible solutions."
>>
>> James Love is confident that the treaty will make progress.
>>
>> "Group B came in the May [copyright committee] meeting to block any
>> agreement to discuss a treaty," he told OUT-LAW. "We'll be back in
>> November,
>> discussing
>> a treaty. The members of Group B will not be able to consistently avoid
>> dealing with the treaty proposal. They will have to say yes or no in terms
>> of moving
>> this forward, and to explain why."
>>
>> "The core issue will be, what will it take to liberalize the cross-border
>> movement of accessible works created under copyright limitations and
>> exceptions?"
>> said Love. "Given how harsh the access reality is for people who are blind
>> or have other reading disabilities, Group B cannot long avoid addressing
>> this
>> topic. There will be more and more data, and fewer and fewer chances to
>> claim strategic ignorance."
>> <http://www.out-law.com/page-10059>
>> Ardis Bazyn
>> For inspirational speaking, business coaching, or writing:
>> www.bazyncommunications.com
>> Check out my books and other products
>> To order Avon products: www.youravon.com/abazyn
>>
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--
Chela
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