An incredibly broad and diverse coalition of tech companies, consumer groups, telcos and others have co-signed a paper urging the US government to reject the dread WIPO Broadcast Treaty. The Broadcast Treaty creates a new right for broadcasters to control who can copy the programs they transmit, even if the copyright belongs to someone else (and even if the copyright holder wants their programs to be copied, as with Creative Commons licensing.) The Treaty is bloodied and beaten, with support evaporating. The US's commitment to it is wavering badly and with pressure like this, it's not likely to survive for much longer.
Four or five years ago, I started attending WIPO meetings at the UN, fighting to kill this treaty. At the time, we couldn't get any of the tech companies whose asses were on the line to sign onto a letter or show up. Most of them were in Hollywood already, supporting the made-in-the-USA version, the Broadcast Flag.
What a difference half a decade makes: now the same tech companies and telcos have figured out that selling out to Hollywood doesn't make them rich, it makes them into the love slaves of a pack of technophobic plutocrats who honestly believe that it's both possible and desirable to make computers worse at copying.
Device regulation unacceptable. The Non-paper's call for global legal rules that would regulate
the 'making available' of 'devices capable of decrypting an encrypted broadcast' would
presumably require wholesale regulation of general purpose computers and other devices, and
have significant harmful consequences for the technology industry generally. Moreover, many in
our group have serious concerns that the technological protection measure and rights management
rules set forth in the Non-paper will have the practical impact of stifling technical innovation and
limiting otherwise lawful, beneficial uses of broadcast and cablecast content by the public.
The coalition includes AMD, Intel, Google and HP, EFF and Creative Commons, the CEA and Tivo, Verizon, AT&T and USTelecom and many, many others. Remember, EFF is presently suing AT&T for $150 per customer per day for its role in the NSA illegal wiretapping crimes — so think of how profound it is that they're in coalition here.
See also:
Public hearing on Broadcast Treaty in DC, May 9
US Senate: Broadcast Treaty subverts copyright!
WIPO anti-podcasting treaty refuses to die
America to US gov't: kill the Broadcast Treaty!
