InfoJustice Roundup February 12, 2019

Updated Study Finds Revenues from the New Creative Economy Grew 15% to $7 Billion in Just One Year

[Re:Create Coalition] Today the Re:Create Coalition released the second annual report on the economic value of the New Creative Economy, documenting that 16.9 million independent, American creators earned a baseline of $6.8 billion from posting their music, videos, art, crafts and other works online in 2017. Building upon last year’s study, the updated report found the number of new creators grew by 2.4 million (16.6%) and total revenues grew by 14.8%. Moreover, these results cover only nine leading online platforms for Americans participating in the New Creative Economy: Amazon Publishing, eBay, Etsy, Instagram, Shapeways, Tumblr, Twitch, WordPress and YouTube. Click here for more.

WHO backs South Africa’s TRIPS proposal on public health

[D. Ravi Kanth] The World Health Organization (WHO) has thrown its weight behind a South African proposal for “promoting public health through competition law and policy” at the World Trade Organization, saying that “effective use of competition policy could be in the best interests of patients and health systems.” In the face of intense opposition from the United States, Japan, and the European Union to the South African proposal at the WTO’s Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Council meeting on 8-9 November 2018, the WHO had stated unambiguously that “health is a human right and no one should get sick or die just because they are poor or they [poor] cannot access the services they need.” Click here for more.

Comment for the 2019 Special 301 Review

[Sean Flynn and Mike Palmedo] …PIJIP’s research indicates that American firms in industries that rely on copyright limitations enjoy better outcomes when our trading partners’ limitations are more like fair use. Specifically, US firms in technology and related sectors do better in countries where copyright exceptions permit fair uses and practices of any type of work, by any user, and for any purpose – as long as the use itself is fair to the owner. Click here for more.

See also: All Special 301 Comments on regulations.gov, Docket No. USTR-2018-0037

TB Activists for First Time Challenge TB Drug Patent In India, In Bid to Prevent J&J from Extending Monopoly

[MSF Press Release] Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is supporting a patent challenge filed in India this week by two tuberculosis survivors, to prevent pharmaceutical corporation Johnson & Johnson (J&J) from extending its monopoly on the tuberculosis drug bedaquiline. Nandita Venkatesan from Mumbai, India and Phumeza Tisile from Khayelitsha, South Africa, who filed the patent challenge at the Mumbai Patent Office, both survived drug-resistant TB (DR-TB) but lost their hearing because of the toxicity of the treatment. They are now fighting to ensure that newer drugs like bedaquiline – which are safer and more effective – are made affordable and accessible to everybody with DR-TB, to replace painful and toxic drugs that need to be injected. Click here for more.

2019 Will Be a Busy Year for User Rights’ Advocates at WIPO

[Teresa Nobre] In the age of connectivity, it is not enough to fight for better copyright laws for users in certain regions of the world. We need to advocate for baseline international standards that allow cross-border uses of copyrighted materials, for purposes such as access to knowledge and education, in each and every country of the world. That is why public interest advocates, Communia included, keep investing their energies in the international discussions on copyright exceptions, using their capacities of permanent observers of the WIPO’s Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR). Click here for more.

Ensuring Equality: IFLA Submits Comments to New Zealand Marrakesh Treaty Implementation Consultation

[International Federation of Library Associations] Following a call for comments by the government of New Zealand Te Aotearoa on draft legislation designed to implement the Marrakesh Treaty, IFLA has made a submission. This highlights the need to reject provisions that go beyond what the Treaty requires, and to respect the fundamental principle of non-discrimination. Click here for more.

The Consequences of Invention Secrecy: Evidence from the USPTO Patent Secrecy Program in World War II

[Daniel P. Gross]  Abstract: This paper studies the effects of the USPTO’s patent secrecy program in World War II, under which approximately 11,200 U.S. patent applications were issued secrecy orders which halted examination and prohibited inventors from disclosing their inventions or filing in foreign countries in the interests of national security. Click here for more.