Category Archives: TPPA

Save the date! Dec 8 Fair Deal event in Auckland

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Fair Deal: 8 December event inviteThe 15th round of the Trans Pacific Partnership negotiations will take place in Auckland from December 3rd to 12th. New Zealand artists are likely to be affected by provisions in the TPP dealing with copyright.

The Creative Freedom Foundation is part of the Fair Deal coalition, which strives to keep the TPP from changing New Zealand’s Copyright Act. We’ve grown to include 11 domestic partners and 9 international allies.

On Saturday, December 8th at Toto Restaurant in Auckland from 6 to 8pm, the Fair Deal coalition will host a public event on the TPP, featuring a number of flash talks from our international and domestic coalition members on TPP issues, intertwined with relevant performances and displays from New Zealand artists (see attached flyer for info on the presenters & artists).

Please join us for this event, which will feature free nibbles and modestly-priced beverages (first come, first served).

How TPP affects NZ artists and what the US wants our police to do next

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Copyright in New Zealand (image courtesy of Wikipedia http://bit.ly/yAcWwi )

Last week the CFF attended a Stakeholders Briefing on the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), a treaty that will affect copyright in New Zealand, the United States and other nations. New Zealanders have just spent in excess of $600,000 to develop an enforcement regime (apparently for the benefit of Rihanna) in the Infringing File Sharing Act, but more changes are on the way that affect public and artistic rights.

Summary of TPP copyright issues

1. The negotiations continue to be secretive even by WIPO standards. Some documents won’t be released for at least four years after the agreement is signed.

2. The US are pushing for New Zealand to adopt:

  • Internet termination for households, businesses, and organisations;
  • A policy for the NZ Police to prioritise copyright enforcement even at the detriment of other police work;
  • The effective removal of Fair Dealing rights by expanding the protectionism of DRM/TPMs, including criminalising the bypassing of DRM/TPMs when exercising legal rights;
  • Allowing copyright holders the ability to ban parallel imports of copyrighted material (eg DVDs), denying New Zealanders the right to purchase overseas content;
  • An expansion of copyright duration to: death of the author plus 70 years, or 105 years from date of publishing for sound recordings and film.

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Call for TPPA Text to be Released

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As we’ve mentioned before, the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) is the next cause for concern in an ongoing line of potential threats to our creative freedom. Like ACTA, the text of this agreement is currently being negotiated in secret by New Zealand and a host of other countries including the US, however leaked documents suggest that a huge array of matters are up for negotiation and if other US Free Trade Agreements are anything to go by we should be very concerned – this could affect the lives and livelihoods of an enormous number of kiwis. Thankfully a group called TPP Watch have started a petition calling for the release of the TPPA text.

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Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) The Next Cause For Concern

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Hot on the heels of ACTA, the Trans Pacific Partnership is the next cause for concern in an ongoing line of potential threats to our creative freedom. Like ACTA, the negotiations are again happening in secret, and leaked reports show that extreme copyright laws are once again on the agenda, although it seems that the NZ Government has an admirable stance going into the negotiations. TechLiberty reports: “The fourth round of negotiations for the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) starts in Auckland today. Nine countries are meeting to develop a free trade agreement covering a wide range of goods, but it looks as though the copyright maximalists are using it as an excuse to push their extremist position yet again…Just like with ACTA, information is escaping and NZ’s position paper on intellectual property has been leaked. It shows that the New Zealand government opposes a further extension of intellectual property rights saying that the economic arguments to do so are weak.”

Part of the document from the New Zealand Government reads: “The expert analyses show that capitulating to US demands in the vain hope of some concessions on dairy access will carry a high price, jeopardising the affordability of medicines under Pharmac and fettering our ability to strengthen our own innovative capacity.”