COMMENTARY--A distinguished group of academics, government representatives and businesspeople this week came out with a set of recommendations which, if taken seriously by governments around the world, could have a drastic effect on the software industry.
The proposals, by the Commission on Intellectual Property Rights, would also have a drastic effect on the lives of millions of people in the developing world. All areas of intellectual property are addressed in the Commission's report--including health, as well as agricultural and genetic resources and traditional knowledge. All these issues receive intermittent coverage in the mainstream Western media (usually when some tribal uprising threatens to affect a company's stock price) and most had an airing at the recent summit on sustainable development in Johannesburg.
What is less often talked about is the effect that technology has on development. The opportunity is vast: it took centuries, if not a full millennium, for books to reach an audience of millions, thereby spreading knowledge, scholarship and development throughout the Western world. Television accomplished a similar degree of penetration within decades, and the Internet in a matter of a just few years.
But while the opportunity for developing nations to benefit from the spread of the Internet and IT in general is huge -- witness India's software industry -- Western corporate interests threaten to stymie the Internet revolution in developing nations before it starts. This is why the Commission's proposals are so interesting, and why they should be applauded.
Basically, the Commission's proposals would see the dreaded shrink-wrap contracts that restrict what people can do with the software they buy declared void; reverse engineering would be encouraged, as would government sponsorship of open-source software; and copyright protection would be significantly relaxed. For a start, that would mean a stop to the spread of laws such as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which makes it illegal in the United States to circumvent copyright protection mechanisms, even when the purpose of circumvention does not violate copyright laws. That particularly heinous piece of legislation is currently making its way to Europe in the form of a new directive which is likely to be enacted in the national laws of member states next year.
Whatever the claims for protection of intellectual property in the West, copyright laws have--with a few exceptions like Bollywood--failed to stimulate the growth of copyright-protected industries in the developing world, according to the Commission on IP Rights.
Most developing countries, especially the smaller ones, are net importers of copyrighted materials and the main beneficiaries are foreign rights holders, who are overwhelmingly based in rich Western nations.
International treaties such as the Berne Convention call for flexibility in copyright enforcement to allow some copying for personal educational use--this is the "fair use" concept that all copyright laws contain. Sadly, fair use is being eroded by media and software industries too arrogant to believe that laws and international treaties apply to them.
Take Microsoft's Palladium platform, which is being developed for Digital Rights Management. Like much e-book software currently available and in development, Palladium enables to copyright holder to claim all his or her (or its) rights, but removes the fair use rights of the individual. Some products allow for an e-book, for instance, to be 'lent' from one PC or PDA to another, but this is hardly suitable for educational use. And it is entirely unsatisfactory for many in the developing world.
Some organizations are taking steps in the right direction. The extension of free online access to academic journals for developing countries is a good example of what can be achieved, says the Commission. There is also of course Project Gutenberg, the brainchild of Michael Hart, who in 1971 decided that it would be a really good idea if lots of famous and important texts were freely available to everyone in the world.
Sadly, many media organizations seem more infatuated with the idea of hacking the PCs of anyone who dares to share their intellectual property with a friend, than with aiding the spread of knowledge and art.
Indeed, software and media industries in the West prefer to avoid the issue of fair use rights in technology and if pressed, they will say there is no easy solution. But according to the Commission on IP Rights there is--for the developing world at least: simply tip the scales back in favor of individuals and institutions who need access to software, e-books and so on for their development.
Weak levels of copyright enforcement have had a major impact on the diffusion of knowledge and knowledge products throughout the developing world, according to the Commission. The Commission is unequivocal in its assessment: stronger protection of and enforcement of international copyright rules would have a damaging effect on the ability of developing countries to develop their human resources and technological capacity.
