EFF: webcasting dropped from WIPO

[Posted May 5, 2006 by corbet]

The EFF reports that the draft WIPO treaty (covered in the May 4 LWN Weekly Edition) no longer grants 50-year copyright protection to webcasters. "So webcasting is out, but the question is for how long? The U.S., which proposed its inclusion, was not happy about the outcome. It said it was concerned with the 'missed opportunity' to provide protection for new entities, but said that it would reluctantly be prepared to accept the two-track approach -- on the condition that if the WIPO General Assembly did not convene a Diplomatic Conference dealing with 'traditional broadcasting' when it meets in September, any future discussions on a Broadcasting Treaty would include protection for new Internet entities." The DMCA-like DRM provisions are, presumably, still present in the draft.

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Feeling like the slow kid in class...

Posted May 7, 2006 18:17 UTC (Sun) by jzbiciak (guest, #5246) [Link] (4 responses)

Could someone explain this to me slowly, in small words, what this actually means?

Does this just mean that signatories to the Berne Convention are not required to protect webcasts for 50 years?

Also, which 50 years is this? 50 years from the date of creation, or like most other protections, 50 years after the author's death?

Feeling like the slow kid in class...

Posted May 8, 2006 5:42 UTC (Mon) by hingo (guest, #14792) [Link] (2 responses)

I too have problems understanding this...

Webcasts are recordings. Recordings have 50 years of copyright protection (where I live). What's the real issue here?

Somewhere I read that this would somehow mean that also the music played in a webcast becomes owned by the creator of the webcast. But that's so idiotic that even I don't believe that interpretation, and let's face it, we've seen much that would warrant maximum cynisism.

Feeling like the slow kid in class...

Posted May 9, 2006 10:58 UTC (Tue) by zotz (guest, #26117) [Link]

"Somewhere I read that this would somehow mean that also the music played in a webcast becomes owned by the creator of the webcast. But that's so idiotic that even I don't believe that interpretation, and let's face it, we've seen much that would warrant maximum cynisism."

To my understanding, that is pretty much what it would mean...

Co-owned at least, for the copies stemming from them. You could still get a copy from somewhere else that they had no ownership in if you could find such a copy.

A broadcaster or webcaster making a 'cast of a public domain work would get "copyright like" rights over that broadcast such that, if you got the public domain work from them, for you, you could not treat your copy as if it was in the public domain.

What is even wilder, if they were broadcasting something with a copyleft license, if you got a copy from their broadcast, for you it would not be copyleft. Well, not effectively at least.

If this is the case, this would be somehthing that the new GPL3 might want to head off at the pass.

Some links I found on a CC mailing list:

http://www.openbusiness.cc/2006/05/04/closeding-business-...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-love/wipo-carves-up-t...

all the best,

drew

Feeling like the slow kid in class...

Posted May 11, 2006 12:11 UTC (Thu) by kleptog (subscriber, #1183) [Link]

I think it depends on the wording. I think what they mean is that they get certain rights normally reserved for the owner, for example, the right to prosecute for copyright infringment.

Normally a broadcaster doesn't own much of the material it broadcasts so normally they can't go after people copying their broadcasts. I think legally it's called "standing".

The question really is: if I make something (whatever you call open source for music) that is later broadcast by someone else, can the broadcaster complain about copyright infringment if someone copies that stream with my creation in it, even if it's ok by me?

Feeling like the slow kid in class...

Posted May 8, 2006 13:13 UTC (Mon) by andyo (guest, #30) [Link]

The issue is complex. The issue is a threat of giving control over content to the web sites that put it up--the middlemen that add little or nothing to the content. I don't know much about the recent change (just that EFF posting) but it seems like there was enough outrage expressed to force WIPO to move more slowly; they can't just shove it into a larger treaty and hope webcasting is ignored until it's the law of the land(s).

Background at my article The Problem with Webcasting: A cast that can be imprisoning (January 13, 2006).