[DMCA-Activists] Human Rights Implications of "Intellectual Property"

[Seth Johnson]

(Forwarded from Patents list.  Subscription required for the
article proper, but Hartmut's comments are good.  -- Seth)

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [Patents] The Human Rights Implications of
Intellectual Property Protection
Date: Fri, 29 Nov 2002 21:37:48 +0100
From: PILCH Hartmut <address@hidden>
To: address@hidden
CC: address@hidden

see

http://www3.oup.co.uk/jielaw/hdb/Volume_05/Issue_04/050861.sgm.abs.html  

Journal of International Economic Law  

Volume 5, Issue 4, December 2002: pp. 861-882  

The Human Rights Implications of Intellectual Property
Protection  

Audrey R. Chapman1  

  A variety of human rights organizations and agencies have
begun to  realize that the manner in which creative works,
cultural heritage,  and scientific knowledge are turned into
property has implications  for human rights .... 

I wonder how many of these organisations have already
realised that patents curtail individual liberties in a very
drastic manner which is unknown from copyright or other more
legitimate forms of what people call "intellectual
property". 

When will human rights organisations start to realise that
the US is the world wide leader of human rights violations
in this area?

When will human rights activists realise that the freedom of
publication, as guaranteed by Art 10 of the European
Convention on the Protection of Human Rights (ECPHR) has
been grossly neglected by the European Commission and even
more by the Council of the European Union?

By demanding program claims, the latter are proposing to
entrench patents as a limit on the freedom of publication,
although the exclusion right conferred by a patent can in no
case have a status of legitimacy that is anywhere near that
of a third person's human and civil rights, which, according
to Art 10 ECPHR are the only legitimate conditions for
limiting the freedom of publication.

The CEC and CEU have so far not even mentioned the freedom
of publication in their proposals.  Nor has anyone in the
US.  The US is currently putting intense pressure on the
whole world to introduce/eternalise unlimited patentability
according to the US model.  The US demands concerning SPLT
are a direct assault on human rights.

I hope that human rights organisations can finally discover
this problem. We are here not dealing with just another
attempt to extend the scope of the meaning of "human rights"
for political purposes, but with fending off an assault to
the heart of the concept of human rights, which is taking
place under our eyes, because we wrongly believe that our
countries have an independent judiciary which will
effectively defend our basic rights in all fields.

-- 
Hartmut Pilch, FFII & Eurolinux Alliance  tel.
+49-89-12789608   
Protecting Innovation against Patent Inflation
http://swpat.ffii.org/
130,000 signatures against software patents
http://www.noepatents.org/