Consumers have a wide range of deals to choose from this weekend as CE companies and retailers are dividing their promotional dollars between Valentine’s and Presidents Day sale campaigns.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation partnered with several countries, including Russia and Vietnam, to “defend” against their being “unfairly bullied” by the U.S. Trade Representative’s annual Special 301 report, said an EFF blog post Monday. The USTR report reviews IP protections and other market practices in foreign countries, highlighting those nations with the most problematic IP standards (see 1502060043). Countries like Russia and Vietnam are being asked to “to adopt failed U.S.-style copyright, patent, trademark, and trade secret rules,” said EFF. “This would be absolutely fair enough, if the standards by which the other countries were assessed were globally-agreed standards, and if their adherence to those standards were assessed objectively, using a consistent and predictable methodology,” it said: “But they're not; rather, the USTR has free reign to castigate its trading partners for whatever reasons it can come up with.” The "mere listing of a country on the Priority Watch List has applied a heavy extra-legal influence on that country to amend its intellectual property laws and policies to accord with the USTR’s unilateral demand,” said EFF’s filing to the USTR.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation partnered with several countries, including Russia and Vietnam, to “defend” against their being “unfairly bullied” by the U.S. Trade Representative’s annual Special 301 report, said an EFF blog post Monday. The USTR report reviews IP protections and other market practices in foreign countries, highlighting those nations with the most problematic IP standards (see 1502060043). Countries like Russia and Vietnam are being asked to “to adopt failed U.S.-style copyright, patent, trademark, and trade secret rules,” said EFF. “This would be absolutely fair enough, if the standards by which the other countries were assessed were globally-agreed standards, and if their adherence to those standards were assessed objectively, using a consistent and predictable methodology,” it said: “But they're not; rather, the USTR has free reign to castigate its trading partners for whatever reasons it can come up with.” The "mere listing of a country on the Priority Watch List has applied a heavy extra-legal influence on that country to amend its intellectual property laws and policies to accord with the USTR’s unilateral demand,” said EFF’s filing to the USTR.
Chile, China, India, Indonesia, Russia, Thailand and Vietnam should be added to the U.S. Trade Representative’s “priority watch list” in its annual Special 301 report, the International Intellectual Property Alliance said in a news release Friday. The USTR report reviews IP protections and other market practices in foreign countries, highlighting those nations with the most problematic IP standards. The Association of American Publishers, the Entertainment Software Association, the Independent Television & Film Alliance, MPAA and RIAA are IIPA members. Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Mexico, Switzerland, Taiwan and United Arab Emirates should be added to the 301 report’s general watch list, said IIPA. The USTR should have “special engagement” with Italy and Spain, it said. “No country, including the U.S., is immune from the harms posed by high levels of unfair practices on the Internet,” said RIAA Executive Vice President Neil Turkewitz in a separate release. But there are “distinctions to be made between the efforts of different countries, and today’s filing highlights practices in some of the countries that have been least responsive in addressing piracy.”
Chile, China, India, Indonesia, Russia, Thailand and Vietnam should be added to the U.S. Trade Representative’s “priority watch list” in its annual Special 301 report, the International Intellectual Property Alliance said in a news release Friday. The USTR report reviews IP protections and other market practices in foreign countries, highlighting those nations with the most problematic IP standards. The Association of American Publishers, the Entertainment Software Association, the Independent Television & Film Alliance, MPAA and RIAA are IIPA members. Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Mexico, Switzerland, Taiwan and United Arab Emirates should be added to the 301 report’s general watch list, said IIPA. The USTR should have “special engagement” with Italy and Spain, it said. “No country, including the U.S., is immune from the harms posed by high levels of unfair practices on the Internet,” said RIAA Executive Vice President Neil Turkewitz in a separate release. But there are “distinctions to be made between the efforts of different countries, and today’s filing highlights practices in some of the countries that have been least responsive in addressing piracy.”
Chile, China, India, Indonesia, Russia, Thailand and Vietnam should be added to the U.S. Trade Representative’s “priority watch list” in its annual Special 301 report, the International Intellectual Property Alliance said in a Jan. 6 news release (here). The USTR report reviews IP protections and other market practices in foreign countries, highlighting those nations with the most problematic IP standards. The Association of American Publishers, the Entertainment Software Association, the Independent Television & Film Alliance, MPAA and RIAA are IIPA members (here). Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Mexico, Switzerland, Taiwan and United Arab Emirates should be added to the 301 report’s general watch list, said IIPA. The USTR should have “special engagement” with Italy and Spain, it said. “No country, including the U.S., is immune from the harms posed by high levels of unfair practices on the Internet,” said RIAA Executive Vice President Neil Turkewitz in a separate release (here). But there are “distinctions to be made between the efforts of different countries, and today’s filing highlights practices in some of the countries that have been least responsive in addressing piracy.”
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is asking for comments to put together its annual Special 301 review. The review identifies the level of intellectual property rights protection globally, broken down by country and degree of protection. IPR violators are placed on the Special 301 Watch List and Priority Watch List. USTR also can label a country a Priority Foreign Country, the most severe classification of an IPR violator. The agency chose to not give India that label in the 2014 Special 301 review, despite pressure from the pharmaceutical industry (see 1410140100). The following are important deadlines for the review, as outlined by USTR:
The Obama administration’s independent review of Indian intellectual property rights protections falls far short of forcing real changes to that country’s IP policies, said incoming Senate Finance Committee chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, in a Dec. 12 statement (here) that said the administration has now closed its investigation. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said in late April it would complete the Out-of-Cycle Review after it declined to name India a Priority Foreign Country, the most severe classification of an intellectual property rights violator, in its annual Special 301 Watch List report (see 14101021). “If we are to successfully address India’s on-going disregard for the protection of U.S. intellectual property rights, it’s vital the Government of India and the Obama Administration act to develop a strong and meaningful action plan with concrete timetables for implementation,” said Hatch in the statement.
Online counterfeit operations continue to inflict more harm on the fashion industry than traditional open-air marketplaces globally, and enforcement efforts against the rogue websites are failing to scale back counterfeit sales, said the American Apparel and Footwear Association in comments filed on Oct. 24 to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (here). USTR asked for industry comments on Sept. 25 to help craft its 2014 Special 301 Review of Notorious Markets (see 14092518).
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative will not reconsider its decision not to name India a Priority Foreign Country, the most severe classification of an intellectual property rights violator, as part of USTR’s Out-of-Cycle review on the country, the agency said on Oct. 14 (here). The pharmaceutical industry pushed USTR hard to slap that label on India in the agency’s Special 301 Watch List report in April. USTR asked the public for comments in recent days related to its review.