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The summer special session of United Nation's World Intellectual Property Organization's (WIPO) Standing Committee on Copyright and Related rights (SCCR) ended with an outcome that effectively killed the proposed treaty for protection of broadcast organisations (Broadcast Treaty). The committee called off the Diplomatic Conference that was supposed to take place in November to approve the treaty. Even if the treaty remains on the agenda of SCCR, it is unlikely that there will be any serious push to overcome the vastly different positions on key issues relating to objectives, scope and object of protection.

There were several reasons for this outcome. The treaty was unwanted by many countries. The United States lost interest after webcasting was removed from the scope of the treaty and - perhaps more importantly - after the US technology and telecommunication industries made their opposing position loudly known. There was also disagreement within the North American Broadcasters' Association. This left the EU and Japan in a much weaker position against the countries known as "Friends of Development", who saw little use in new property rights for broadcasters but instead considered the treaty as an opportunity to inject new elements such as competition, access to knowledge and cultural diversity into the global copyright regime.

The second reason was spirited opposition by the rest of the stakeholders (i.e. other than broadcasters) against the treaty. In particular the organizations representing civil society constantly asked questions about the rationale of the treaty and brought transparency to the process by transcribing the discussions during the plenary sessions. This exposed in almost real-time the lack of any real substance to the proponents' arguments.

One can also speculate on the role of the long-time chairman of the committee, Jukka Liedes, in the demise of the treaty. It became widely known that he and Mr. Tilman Lüder (who represents the European Commission) did not agree on a strategy (or much else for that matter). Mr. Liedes also took many times positions that were seen as detached from the reality of the committee as he tried to push the treaty to the Diplomatic Conference. Still, the outcome of the negotiations was always likely to be a failure because of the divergent political situation on global IP policy.

The big question now is what the outcome will mean for WIPO and SCCR. A rather direct hint could be found from this comment by Tom Rivers, external legal adviser to the Association of Commercial Television in Europe (ACT): "If Wipo is not the right forum for this issue to be addressed then broadcasters will need to raise (their) concerns at regional or bilateral level instead".

So, in practice the broadcasters will try to use the sympathy of European Commission civil servants to advance their agenda by forcing the developing countries to accept extensive "investment protection clauses" to their bi-lateral trade agreements. This will be a key issue for EDRI.

Finally, a more fundamental question must asked. Why are these kinds of investment protection schemes, which have nothing to do with creativity or culture, dealt with under the copyright system in the first place? It unfortunately seems that the so-called related rights have become a sweet spot for blatant corporate rent seeking. The European Commission seems to accept all kinds of demands from the stakeholders without the merest hint of economic justification. Even when their own studies find clear evidence that these types of protection are harmful (such as with the sui generis database right), there is no reaction on their part. Isn't it time that European IP policy was based on economic evidence rather than the interests of a small number of large right holders?

Second Special Session of the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) (18-22.06.2007)
http://www.wipo.int/meetings/en/details.jsp?meeting_id=12744

Piracy collapses broadcasting treaty (24.06.2007)
http://uk.biz.yahoo.com/24062007/399/piracy-collapses-broadcasting-tre...

EDRI-gram: Results of the WIPO's SCCR Special Session 1 (31.01.2007)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number5.2/wipo_sccr1

EFF's resource page on the WIPO Broadcasting Treaty
http://www.eff.org/IP/WIPO/broadcasting_treaty/

Some NABA (North American BroadcastersAssociation) members opposed the treaty (20.06.2007)
http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/a2k/2007-June/002418.html

(Contribution by Ville Oksanen - EDRI-member Electronic Frontier Finland)