The blogosphere is abuzz with speculation that the Transpacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) is much worse than SOPA. Is this true? Since the text is currently top secret, there is no way to tell.  Of course, that’s part of the problem. But, after tracking international intellectual property (IP) issues here a PK for a number of years, I can try to make an educated guess about what may be in TPP’s IP chapter and how it may affect you.

The United States Trade Representative (USTR) is asking for public comment in its Special 301 inquiry for 2012. Special 301 is an annual report that the USTR compiles listing countries that allegedly fail to provide adequate and effective protection for intellectual property rights of US persons. As we have said before, this report has turned into an exercise that arm-twists countries into instituting laws and policies that serve the interests of big content even where these policies hurt the free expression and due process rights of citizens.

This week trade negotiators from 8 countries (including the United States) are meeting in LA behind closed doors to discuss the intellectual property chapter of a new international trade agreement.

The recent outpouring of opposition to SOPA/PIPA was an indication of citizens' outrage, not only at the actual bills, but also at the fact that Congress could be so blind to the public interest in order to please the content industry. While SOPA/PIPA are unprecedented incursions into the Internet architecture, the mindset that caused these bills to go as far as they did, has been at play for a very long time: ratcheting up protections for IP rights holders with little regard for preserving balance in IP laws or due process rights of citizens. 

ACTA (the Anti Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) is making a lot of news these days, with lots of people comparing it unfavorably to PIPA and SOPA. A lot of that coverage has been focused on Europe and particularly Poland, where the Polish government's signing of the agreement has sparked considerable protest.

So is this a big deal, and if so, why is domestic coverage of it so muted in comparison to SOPA and PIPA?

It doesn’t take much to excite the Twitterverse. President Obama in his State of the Union speech made a passing reference to intellectual property enforcement, perhaps to try to appease the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).  It was relatively benign, as he said only that foreign piracy hurts trade, but my reader exploded with “Obama’s flipping on PIPA/SOPA! Betrayal!” While I have no reason to believe that the Administration is backing away from its current hard-line position against PIPA/SOPA, it doesn’t have to in order to show MPAA some love.

This document, put together by PK Staff Attorney Jodie Griffin, lays out the difference between text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) and existing US law.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA or TPP) is an international trade agreement being negotiated among contries of the Pacific Rim such as Australia, Brunei, Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, U.S, and Vietnam. The agreement will encompass more aspects of trade like agriculture and textiles, so it is possible that the intellectual property chapter will get lost among high-priority concerns and will receive heavy industry pressure.

Public Knowledge's Position

Public Knowledge urges the USTR to recognize that an IP chapter in a truly “21st century trade agreement” should reflect the rights and interests of the wide variety of stakeholders affected by copyright.

US copyright law is a set of relationships, a system to reward creators on their work while simultaneously allowing others to comment and criticize their work. This principle, that users like libraries, educators, artists, documentarians, and journalists, also have rights in the copyright system, is recognized in other countries as well.

Public Knowledge's Position

There is a danger in international forums for disproportionate escalation of rights because there is a often lack of transparency, the negotiations are obscure, and the debates are easily disregarded as "far away". When seeking policy changes that would otherwise be unpopular domestically, big industry players often turn to international forums. Furthermore, once harmful provisions are codified in international rules, they are harder to change domestically.