From: John Young <jya@pipeline.com>
Date: Fri, 1 Nov 1996 05:38:25 -0800 (PST)
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Primer on WIPO Treaty
Message-ID: <1.5.4.32.19961101133710.006af7e0@pop.pipeline.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


From: notes@igc.org

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Info-Policy-Notes - A newsletter available from listproc@tap.org
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October 29, 1996

A Primer On The Proposed WIPO Treaty On Database Extraction 
Rights That Will Be Considered In December 1996*

James Love, Consumer Project on Technology


Introduction

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) will
consider in December 1996 a new treaty that would require most
countries (including the United States) to severely curtail the
public's rights to use pubic domain materials stored in "databases."
Some experts say it is the "least balanced and most potentially anti-
competitive intellectual property rights ever created."  The U.S.
Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) is accepting public comments on
this treaty, and a digital copyright treaty that is also troubling.
Comments are due by November 22, 1996, and can be submitted by
electronic mail to: diploconf@uspto.gov.  Copies of the treaty,
commentary, and the PTO federal register notice is available from
http://www.public-domain.org.  This memorandum provides background
information on the treaty and the problems it presents.

[Snip balance of excellent paper]

James Love
Consumer Project on Technology
http://www.essential.org/cpt
email: love@tap.org

*HTML version at http://www.essential.org/cpt/ip/cpt-dbcom.html
Ascii version formatted with 11 pt courier with 1 inch margins.
This is my first take on the treaty, and I would appreciate
comments and corrections.  This is a very important matter that
hasn't received much attention. jl

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We've put this primer at:

     http://jya.com/wipoprim.txt

Thanks to James Love.