RSA LAUNCHES CHARTER ON IP

The Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) today launched its Adelphi Charter on Creativity, Innovation and Intellectual Property. The purpose of the Charter is to ensure that intellectual property serves the purpose of stimulating creativity, and that the public interest is fairly protected.

The Charter calls upon governments throughout the world to respect the following fundamental principles:

• The purpose of intellectual property laws is to enhance creativity and innovation [the IPKat certainly agrees that that’s one purpose…]


• All intellectual property rights must be measured against the public interest [the IPKat agrees]


• The public interest requires a balance to be struck between the monopoly rights implicit in intellectual property laws and the free competition that is essential for economic and creative vitality [the IPKat says that we already do so by (i) limiting the scope of protection and (ii) providing defences]

The RSA also proposes an Adelphi Public Interest Test which it would like governments to utilise:

• There must a presumption against extending intellectual property [the IPKat disagrees – ALL proposals for reform should be treated on their merits and sometimes it will be in the public interest to extend IP rights]


• Change should be allowed only if it is shown to bring economic and social benefits [possibly – thought this ignores moral rights claims to IP, which the IPKat suspects that a lot of authors, even those who are sceptical about IP, subscribe to to some extent]


• The burden of proof must lie with the advocates of change [the IPKat suspects that this is already the case, but this point rather misses the issue. What’s going to be decisive isn’t who the burden of proof lies with, but instead the point at which that burden of proof is found to be met]


• Throughout there must be wide public consultation and a comprehensive, objective and transparent assessment of the costs and benefits [agreed – but this is often the case, to the credit of the relevant authorities]