[Linux-aus] FTA

[Kim Weatherall]

At 02:27 PM 1/12/2004 +1100, Craig Warner wrote:
>Tell me if I'm wrong, but I get this feeling when Howard goes to these 
>regional talk fests now, all he mentions is FTA's.
>
>Afterall Australia has just sign a horror of a deal with the USA and is 
>now in Canberra, laws are being passed to 'enable' the FTA.
>
>Howard talks of advantage but is this in fact a back door method for the 
>USA to force other countries such as New Zealand to adopt Australian Laws 
>which have been change to suit the Americans ie DMCA?
>
>If this is the case, perhaps we should be warning Open Source people in 
>other countries, before their Leaders sign on the bottom line to these 
>FTAs with Australia?

It's probably worth noting, at least for the record, that I don't 
understand Australia to be running around requiring others to take on our 
IP laws, even post USA-FTA.  A better idea of the model Australia uses is 
probably our FTA with Singapore, which is filled with vague things like 'we 
agree to sign up to treaties, cooperate on enforcement.'  It's about 3 
pages long (as opposed to the 30+ in the USA-FTA).

That said, I think there's probably a good chance that some of the 
Australian outposts of content industries would like to see a more robust 
attitude by Australia in these FTAs.

So, yes, it is worth making sure that people in these other countries are 
both alert, and alarmed.


____________________________

Kimberlee Weatherall
Associate Director and Lecturer
Intellectual Property Research Institute of Australia (http://www.ipria.org)
Law School, The University of Melbourne, Victoria 3010
Ph: (61 3) 8344 1120 Fax: (61 3) 9348 2353
Email: k.weatherall at unimelb.edu.au
Web Log: http://weatherall.blogspot.com

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