[pp.int.general] PublicACTA: Wellington Declaration & Petition

[Edison Carter]

Haven't seen any discussion on this here yet, so I just though I
should mention / crosspost about the results of publicACTA held two
days ago.



---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Mark Foster <blakjak at blakjak.net>
Date: 11 April 2010 22:01
Subject: [nzlug] Cross-Post: PublicACTA Outputs: Wellington
Declaration & Petition
To: nzlug at linux.net.nz, aucklug at linux.net.nz
Cc: nzlug-announce at linux.net.nz


Greetings everyone, and apologies for the cross-post. This issue bears
some publicity!

The Wellington Declaration generated by the folks who attended the
PublicACTA event this weekend in Wellington, is something I believe we
LUG'rs should be getting behind.

Refer the following:

http://publicacta.org.nz/wellington-declaration/
http://publicacta.org.nz/sign-the-wellington-declaration/

If you support the statements made in the URL above - and really, I'd
be surprised if you don't - please sign the electronic petition at
this URL:

http://www.gopetition.com/online/35443.html

All signatures added before Tuesday morning NZ Time will be appended
to the Declaration when it is communicated to the NZ Government
negotiators, who (it is hoped) will circulate it to all the ACTA
delegations.



Background:

ACTA (the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement or ACTA) is a
controversial international treaty being negotiated in a series of
secret meetings.

ACTA is proposed as a plurilateral trade agreement for establishing
international standards on intellectual property rights enforcement.
It is being negotiated between the US, Canada, Japan, the European
Union, South Korea, Mexico, Switzerland, Australia and New Zealand.
Unfortunately, the negotiations have extended beyond trade and
physical counterfeiting to potentially cover non-commercial
infringement of copyright material by ordinary citizens and issues of
digital rights management.

PublicACTA was organised by InternetNZ to give the public opportunity to
critique the known and likely content of ACTA proposals.

Several issues abound in ACTA; the scope of the agreement is much
wider than simply an agreement around trade, and the ramifications
should it come into force will be dire for New Zealanders.

The NZOSS, which many of you will know of and know that I am also
involved with, have taken their stance regarding ACTA to the
Government:

http://nzoss.org.nz/news/2010/nzoss-submission-acta

Please be aware of ACTA, and if you support the position being taken
by InternetNZ, NZOSS and many, many other groups and NGOs both in NZ
and worldwide, show your support.


Cheers
Mark Foster
Administrator - NZLUG, AuckLUG