Copyright Industries Oppose Treaty For the Blind

langelgjm sends in a piece from Wired, which details the background of a proposed treaty to allow cross-border sharing of books for the blind — a treaty which is opposed by an almost unified front of business interests in the US, with the exception of Google. "A broad swath of American enterprise ranging from major software makers to motion picture and music companies are joining forces to oppose a new international treaty that would make books more accessible to the blind. With the exception of Google, almost every major industry player has expressed disapproval of the treaty, which would allow cross-border sharing of digitized books accessible to the blind and visually impaired. Google's chief copyright counsel believes the industry-wide opposition is mainly due to 'opposition to a larger agenda of limitations and exceptions... We believe this is an unproductive approach to solving what is a discrete, long-standing problem that affects a group that needs and deserves the protections of the international community.'"

the bottom line

[jt418-93]

having read more than this article about it:
copyright holders, for the most part, are against ANYTHING that decrease their rights in any form. doesn't matter if it's for blind, crippled orphans. they should pay too. slippery slope and all that. in one of the articles the mafiaa lawyer actually said that. slippery slope in decreasing any copyright restrictions. they have worked too hard to get them increased to see things start going the other way....

gods, i hate the monkeys on this planet sometimes...

Screw the blind on principle

[t0p]

Seems to me a lot of people are replying to this without reading the article. Nothing new there, but if said people did read it, they might stop making some pretty dumb comments. Allow me to quote a relevant passage: -------- Many WIPO nations, most in the industrialized world including England, the United States and Canada, have copyright exemptions that usually allow non-profit companies to market copyrighted works without permission. They scan and digitize books into the so-called universal Daisy format, which includes features like narration and digitized Braille. The Daisy Corp. Consortium, a Swiss-based international agency, controls formatting worldwide and has some 100 companies under its direction across the globe. The largest catalog rests in the United States, in which three non-profits, including the Library of Congress, host some half million digital titles produced by federal grants and donations. As it now stands, none of the nations may allow persons outside their borders to access these works, which are usually doled out for little or no charge. The treaty seeks to free up the cross-border sharing of the books for the blind. ------------ A simple example: A British non-profit organization makes books to give/sell cheaply to blind people in Britain *as is currently allowed by WIPO treaty*. But the Brisish organization can't give surplus books to blind people in Ireland. They have to destroy them. The proposal would allow the British organization to give the books to blind foreigners. Just like "piracy" huh? (idiots) Apparently, the industry opposes this on "principle". That's good. It's okay to fuck over the blind so log as it's a principled fucking-over.

we already have this in the United States

[osssmkatz]

bookshare.org legally operates out of an exemption from copyright law that allows the visually impaired to subscribe to a library of ebooks in an accessible format. (DAISY)

I imagine the treaty just extends this internationally.

--Sam