They go into session today at 10am to discuss how to report the week’s events to the WIPO General Assembly, so officially, nothing is decided yet, but it appears as though WIPO will not be approving a diplomatic conference. Jukka Liedes, who has apparently chaired the WIPO copyright committee for all but two days over a twenty year period, may try to find a way to keep this alive, but many delegates are determined to move on to something else. Continue Reading
"Today the WIPO SCCR decided against scheduling a diplomatic conference to create a new treaty on broadcasting, and set a high bar for doing so. Technically, the subject of the Broadcasting Treaty will continue to be on the agenda of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights, but with a fairly tough hurdle before it can move to a diplomatic conference — after there is agreement on the objectives, scope and object of protection, topics for which there is no agreement in sight.
My more recent Huffington Post blog on the negotiations is here, including this update:
I arrived at WIPO yesterday for Day 1 which started at 12pm. The delegates and NGOs went for lunch at 1pm and the meeting started again in the afternoon. I’m not sure it was because of jetlag but the meeting did not make much sense. The Chair was re-elected (of course) and he just talked, talked and talked.
Day 2
May 30, 2007, "The New US Trade Agenda and Access to Medicines"
March 16, 2007, Robin Hanson on “Why Grants Won Over Prizes in Science.”
March 15, 2007. Sakiko Fukuda-Parr presents on "The Gene Revolution: GM Crops and Unequal Development."
Prize4Life is an effort to accelerate treatments for Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). It was created by 32 year old Avichai “Avi” Kremer. According to news reports Kremer was diagnosed with ALS in 2004, and has only a few years to live. He started Prize4Life to raise money for prizes to stimulation research.
Here are some extracts from this moving story in the March 28 issue of the Boston Globe: