Comments on: IPR and Art? http://www.korakora.org/wordpress/2007/06/30/ipr-and-art/ Fats Lasay Tue, 02 Dec 2008 20:01:43 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.4 by: Fats http://www.korakora.org/wordpress/2007/06/30/ipr-and-art/#comment-6375 Thu, 11 Oct 2007 12:36:00 +0000 http://www.korakora.org/wordpress/2007/06/30/ipr-and-art/#comment-6375 My interest in the IPR issue was agitated by a newspaper feature four months ago, where the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IP Philippines) celebrated World IP Day with member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). The centerpiece of the local celebration was the opening of an art exhibition in a gallery space called “Alab Art Space” located at the ground floor of the IP office building. “Alab” boasts of being the first art space in an IP office in Southeast Asia. News of the IP celebration was published in a special section called “Exhibits Asia” in The Philippine Star, Thursday, April 26, 2007. Some observations: 1. There were three news articles: (a) IP Philippines celebrates World IP Day, encouraging creativity among Filipino artists, entrepreneurs, inventors; (b) BSA awards citation to Pilipinas Anti-Piracy Team; (c) Pilipinas Anti-Piracy Team cracks down on users/sellers of pirated software in Davao City. 2. Advertising was by Lacoste, Business Software Alliance (BSA), Microsoft, Vera Law, BNU Intellectual Property Attorneys, iProbe (investigation and consulting firm), and the Pilipinas Anti-Piracy Team (PAPT) consisting of the National Bureau of Investigation, Optical Media Board and Philippine National Police. 3. The special section of the newspaper celebrating World IP Day included not a single mention of alternative IP domains such as the commons, open-access, open-source and copyleft licensing. I think that the IPO and the Philippine government has been very irresponsible with their programs on IPRs. While it is true that their mandate is towards IP protection, their information campaign should present the public with the broadest unbiased picture of the domain that they subject to their protection campaigns. Isn’t there anything else in the IP domain but Microsoft, anti-piracy and creatives-inventors being celebrated as paranoids of any imitation of their work? Whatever happened to public domain, the commons, the collateral costs of strict IPR implementation and downstream licensing, the social costs of monopoly through IP legislation? Part of the mandate of the IP Philippines is training, campaigning and servicing for the protection of intellectual property right (IPR) as an important strategic tool for national development in the current global knowledge economy. Towards this, the IP Philippines has signed an MOU with the US Patents and Trademarks Office for the joint effort of safeguarding local and US IPRs in the Philippines, upgrading Philippine intellectual property law to be at par with international standards, and the creation of mechanisms by which patented technologies may be commercialized. Is commercial interest and profit all there is to creativity? Whatever happened to social welfare and responsibility? It is utterly disgusting that the Philippine government, the IP Philippines, the IPO and the WIPO seem only to be capable of promoting economic progress through socially inefficient monopolies. The showcase of the IPR mandate is the arts. And there are good reasons for this. First is that Philippine art has been successfully shaped within the context of a western capitalist society, fitting perfectly with the ideology of intellectual property rights (aka intellectual monopoly). Within such an environment, one can get away with fallacious statements such as this: “Protection of intellectual property rights helps stimulate creativity and innovation. This hastens the growth in their respective sectors, which leads to national development.” - IP Phils director-general Adrian S. Cristobal, Jr. If this was true, then the period from ancient human history to the 19th century would have been utterly devoid of any creative or innovatory output because there were then no ‘protection of intellectual property rights’! I certainly hope that we haven’t yet locked ourselves away in a Catch-22 situation, and that Filipino artists are still capable of thinking before they contribute to the IP campaign. My interest in the IPR issue was agitated by a newspaper feature four months ago, where the Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IP Philippines) celebrated World IP Day with member states of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). The centerpiece of the local celebration was the opening of an art exhibition in a gallery space called “Alab Art Space” located at the ground floor of the IP office building. “Alab” boasts of being the first art space in an IP office in Southeast Asia.

News of the IP celebration was published in a special section called “Exhibits Asia” in The Philippine Star, Thursday, April 26, 2007.

Some observations:

1. There were three news articles: (a) IP Philippines celebrates World IP Day, encouraging creativity among Filipino artists, entrepreneurs, inventors; (b) BSA awards citation to Pilipinas Anti-Piracy Team; (c) Pilipinas Anti-Piracy Team cracks down on users/sellers of pirated software in Davao City.

2. Advertising was by Lacoste, Business Software Alliance (BSA), Microsoft, Vera Law, BNU Intellectual Property Attorneys, iProbe (investigation and consulting firm), and the Pilipinas Anti-Piracy Team (PAPT) consisting of the National Bureau of Investigation, Optical Media Board and Philippine National Police.

3. The special section of the newspaper celebrating World IP Day included not a single mention of alternative IP domains such as the commons, open-access, open-source and copyleft licensing.

I think that the IPO and the Philippine government has been very irresponsible with their programs on IPRs. While it is true that their mandate is towards IP protection, their information campaign should present the public with the broadest unbiased picture of the domain that they subject to their protection campaigns. Isn’t there anything else in the IP domain but Microsoft, anti-piracy and creatives-inventors being celebrated as paranoids of any imitation of their work? Whatever happened to public domain, the commons, the collateral costs of strict IPR implementation and downstream licensing, the social costs of monopoly through IP legislation?

Part of the mandate of the IP Philippines is training, campaigning and servicing for the protection of intellectual property right (IPR) as an important strategic tool for national development in the current global knowledge economy. Towards this, the IP Philippines has signed an MOU with the US Patents and Trademarks Office for the joint effort of safeguarding local and US IPRs in the Philippines, upgrading Philippine intellectual property law to be at par with international standards, and the creation of mechanisms by which patented technologies may be commercialized.

Is commercial interest and profit all there is to creativity? Whatever happened to social welfare and responsibility? It is utterly disgusting that the Philippine government, the IP Philippines, the IPO and the WIPO seem only to be capable of promoting economic progress through socially inefficient monopolies.

The showcase of the IPR mandate is the arts. And there are good reasons for this. First is that Philippine art has been successfully shaped within the context of a western capitalist society, fitting perfectly with the ideology of intellectual property rights (aka intellectual monopoly). Within such an environment, one can get away with fallacious statements such as this:

“Protection of intellectual property rights helps stimulate creativity and innovation. This hastens the growth in their respective sectors, which leads to national development.” - IP Phils director-general Adrian S. Cristobal, Jr.

If this was true, then the period from ancient human history to the 19th century would have been utterly devoid of any creative or innovatory output because there were then no ‘protection of intellectual property rights’!

I certainly hope that we haven’t yet locked ourselves away in a Catch-22 situation, and that Filipino artists are still capable of thinking before they contribute to the IP campaign.

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