Proposed Final ACTA Text Published 148
ciaran_o_riordan writes "The US Trade Representative has published a text which, subject only to a last legal review, is proposed to be the final text of ACTA. The differences between this text and last month's, from the Tokyo round, are mostly cosmetic but there's an important positive change giving signatories the option of excluding patents from section 2. As for software patents, most harm has been avoided. If signatories make use of the section 2 exclusion option, there might be no harm at all. Lobbying for this will be important. Meanwhile, the many problems regarding Digital Restrictions Management, and the extra powers given to businesses to obtain personal and identifying information about accused copyright infringers "in the Digital Environment" are still there (mostly section 5). Earlier texts were much worse. The improvements in recent months are surely due to public outcry, leaving us indebted to the anonymous friends who scanned and leaked the various secret versions and the activists who made text versions and spread them across the Internet. There's a chance we can still influence the text in this legal review phase, but the bigger task ahead will be working on the national implementations. It's not yet clear what procedure the US will require for its own ratification."
No problem here (Score:3, Insightful)
Right?
Copyrights? (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember, the original goal of copyright was to give exclusive copy rights to the authors for a limited period in exchange for their work to become public domain after that limited period.
A lot more people would agree to abide by copyright laws if they had not been twisted into the lifetime + 50 years locks that they are now.
Wow. (Score:2, Insightful)
and, any fool who believes their house of representatives wont ratify it, in ratification required countries, should think again - if it wouldnt pass, your government wouldnt have got elected and sign it. you have a government that signs it, signifying enough seats in the house, so chances are very high that it will pass. all its needed would be lobbies spending a bit more money than you. which, they have, and you, as people dont.
enjoy capitalist democracy. the one with the gold makes the rules.
Re:No problem here (Score:5, Insightful)
Not if you get on them HARD right now.
Many in the Senate are still stinging from the voter rebuke that just occurred, and the rest are not in a mood to pick a fight with the voters.
The entire thing should simply be rejected due to the excessive secrecy with which it was negotiated. Even if this treaty gave a gold brick to every citizen, capped punishment at one dollar and 50 cents, and baked you pies every Wednesday, the mere fact that they had to build a world wide conspiracy of silence to try to get this one over means it should be Dead On Arrival in the Senate.
But I suspect it might never go to the Senate. Obama will simply try to impose it by edict as a "trade agreement" without treaty status.
Treaties modify the US Constitution. People have to realize that.
Re:idiot (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:No problem here (Score:5, Insightful)
No, people don't need to realize that, since its not true.
The Constitution, treaties ratified by the Senate, and federal laws adopted under the authority granted by the Constitution together form the "supreme law of the land", superceding the constitution and laws of the states (U.S. Const, Art. VI) but the only thing that modifies the U.S. Constitution is amendments to the Constitution adopted under Article V.
Putting falsehoods in bold print doesn't make them true.
Re:idiot (Score:1, Insightful)
Yeah, it is not like the DMCA didn't get support from both sides of the Democratic-Republican Party too.
Re:Wow. (Score:3, Insightful)
Part of the cause of that is the lack of proportional representation, though. So people get stuck in the whole "Go ahead, throw your vote away" dilemma.
They end up voting for the lesser of two corporate ruled evils, as opposed to a party that is more in line with what they actually want.
Well, that coupled with People believing myths due to either propaganda or outright stupidity (ie. republicans being for small govn't, which is patently false these days; or that dems are going to implement any sort of democratic social reform... maybe token measure here and there, but it's still by the corps, for the corps.)
Being an outsider looking in, the whole setup looks like sheer lunacy to me, but...
Re:idiot (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hopenchange! (Score:4, Insightful)
If you didn't vote Republican in 2008, you asked for this.
I've found that...
If you voted you asked for this.
If you didn't vote you are responsible for letting it happen.
is true of about 2/3rds of what the governement does... if not more.
Re:Wow. (Score:3, Insightful)
they have to survive, they have to take care of their Farmville.
FTFY.
OK, not universally true, but true to an extent that pretty much guarantees the success of...OOH SHINY!
"Panem et circenses." Our culture surely has the "circenses" part down pat.
Re:Copyrights? (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, you'd be able to show your kids Disney's rendition of Cinderella, which I suppose would never exist if brothers Grimm had eternal copyright. Want to watch some old loony tunes? Perhaps one of my favourite films, Dr. Strangelove. There is plenty of stuff that is greater than 14 years old, and still relevant.
You know how many films and cartoons use pieces of classical music like Tchaikovsky, etc? Nothing like that is possible with the current bordering-on-perpetual copyright setup. If nothing ever enters into the public domain, things sort of stagnate.
Of course people would still pirate, There's no getting away from that.
The benefit is you would be free to use older material, incorporate it into your own, etc. As it stands most things are lost to the wheel of time before you'll be able to build on them, or include them in your works, and so on. It's detrimental to creativity as a whole, as I see it.
It's not just about wanting to see free movies. Maybe you want to make a short film, and have a song from the 40's in the background. You're probably going to have to pay royalties for that.
Re:Hopenchange! (Score:4, Insightful)
I voted Independent in 2000.
In Florida.
My bad.
Re:Hopenchange! (Score:4, Insightful)
Aww, isn't that cute? The little AC still thinks he has a major party looking out for his interests!
Re:idiot (Score:3, Insightful)
acta proceedings were prepared during bush years, with republican senate and house. it was well underway in 2006 when democrats got the houses. and it was already being negotiated in 2008. not that it would matter much, since democrats are too in the pockets of the private interests. but, the head of the snake, were republicans.
I think it might be more accurate to say the head of the snake were politicians.
Because you know... ACTA and more powerful, more draconian, more extensive copyright and business method/software patent protections are one of the few things there is bipartisan support for.
The fangs of the snake will be whatever president signs ACTA, if it gets signed. Because the clincher is approving the rule -- no matter who drafted it
And no... neither republicans nor democrats "really" decided what should go in it. This was done by corporations that have become scarily powerful, so scarily powerful they can apparently buy enough supporters now to get whatever laws they want.
The opposition who aren't getting their numbers artificially increased by corporations paying people, don't really stand a chance, unless there is a full-blown revolt by the masses.
Let go a little and POUNCE! (Score:3, Insightful)
Earlier texts were much worse.
Stalin: Let's execute all dissidents and paint the Mausoleum green!
Minister: Why green, comrade Stalin?
Stalin: I knew there would be no objections about the first part.
Re:No problem here (Score:1, Insightful)
No, because there were no State Constitutions. There was only one State Constitution [wikipedia.org] (MASS) predating the US Constitution.
Most states still had Charters.
Um, no. The Wikipedia article you linked to lists the effective date of the current constitution of each state; however, many of the early states have rewritten their constitutions over time. According to Yale Law School [yale.edu] 10 of the original 13 colonies adopted constitutions in 1776-7, on recommendation of the Continental Congress.
The words "The Constitution" everywhere else in The Constitution refer to the Constitution of the United States (as proposed).
The words "The Constitution" only appear twice in the Constitution. First in the presidential oath of office and again in the clause at issue. The term "this Constitution" appears 12 times, including 4 times in Article VI alone.
While the wording does require careful reading, it clearly should be read as "the Constitution [of any State] or Laws of any State."
Re:Copyrights? (Score:2, Insightful)
True, but that's not the purpose of eternal copyrights, the purpose of eternal copyrights is to prevent old content from displacing the value of new content.
For instance Soulja's latest album is new and it will sell but it's value would sharply fall if people could freely use Coolio's musical archive, anywhere, be it parties, night clubs, ringtones, friking lifts, anywhere anyhow including youtube videos and birthday videos, etc.
The current archive of copyrighted contents is HUGE and that's only counting miscellaneous works, there are also hits like the original star wars movies and the Beatles, Elvis etc that never get old.
Look for instance how Nintendo squashed the fan made sequel to Chrono Trigger, they didn't buy it because they know it won't sell but they don't want it to be freely available for this reason.
The content industry as a whole depends on keeping the public domain line a century ago to keep their current products relevant.
Pirates! (Score:5, Insightful)
The treaty spends a lot of time on "pirated copyright goods", and the bits about "counterfeit trademark goods" seem tacked on. I could find no mention of the public good, the rights of licensees, fair use, public domain, media transfer/backup copies, etc. There is a good bit about the minimum civil and criminal procedures and penalties that should be in place and made available to businesses and rights holders. It seems to be exclusively intended to ensure that organizations like the RIAA can sue and harass "pirates", and god willing, get them a healthy jail sentence too. This is interesting in that it might provide some cover for rights-holder actions that are an abuse of the court system (mass filings) and criminal harassment.
Re:No problem here (Score:5, Insightful)
The "Supremacy Clause" of the U.S. Constitution is contained in Article VI:
Yes, it is. Too bad you don't understand what it says.
No, it proves me right. Let me refresh your memory on what I said, which was:
The Constitution, treaties ratified by the Senate, and federal laws adopted under the authority granted by the Constitution together form the "supreme law of the land", superceding the constitution and laws of the states (U.S. Const, Art. VI)
And -- that's exactly what Article VI says. To avoid any confusion from reading too much at once, and with your oddly placed emphasis, lets break it down. First it defines what the supreme law of the land shall be:
"This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land;"
IOW: The Constititution, federal laws, and ratified treaties are the supreme law of the land.
Then it goes on to say what it means for those things to be the supreme law of the land:
"and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding."
IOW: The things that are defined as "the supreme law of the land" in the first clause (the Constitution, federal laws, and ratified treaties) are binding on State judges and superceded the constitutions and laws of the states.
It does not say that treaties modify or supercede the federal Constitution, any more than it says that federal statute law modifies or supercedes the federal Constititution. It just says that, taken together with the federal Constitution, treaties and federal laws supercede state constitutions and laws, and are binding on state judges.
Re:Hopenchange! (Score:1, Insightful)
Don't blame yourself, the guy that people think would have been better than GWB couldn't even manage to win his home state.....
Re:idiot (Score:3, Insightful)
Democrat/Republican both = politician (Score:3, Insightful)
Once you get a contract which is paid a fixed rate no matter what your performance, it doesn't make too much difference what you do during that time. In a contractor position where your job is mostly about "networking" not networking, but "networking", in reality, as long as your talking with your friends and bitching about your enemies, you are in fact doing your job.
So, while you have this 2-6 year contract, you have the perfect opportunity to find what's next. Treat busting a teenager with coca chewing gum from Columbia as a major drug crime, advocate the need for coca chewing gum detectors in the airports and you can get an officer position at a security firm lined up with a limo and personal driver when you're done with your current job.
It makes no difference if you're democrat or republican. They're both so full of shit that they had to paint their offices brown so as not to worry about the splatter marks when they hit their desks in exclamation (while yelling at the inanimate object displaying the broadcast of a modern alternative to the Greek arenas).
The real bitch of it is, as the house grows, it becomes easier and easier for a politician to spend all their time on their next job because they can easily be lost in the crowd.