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Subject: Creative Commons Jurisdiction Teams in Sub-Saharan Africa

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  • From: charles batambuze <batambuze_charles AT hotmail.com>
  • To: <gakuru AT gmail.com>, "dkawooya AT gmail.com" <dkawooya AT gmail.com>
  • Cc: CC Africa <ccafrica AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [ccAfrica] SEACONET Model Copyright law
  • Date: Sat, 3 Nov 2012 08:52:42 +0000

Alex,

You and I know that the Agikuyu are no longer free to sentence anyone to death for stealing for the simple reason that they are no longer on their own but part of the global wider community. So the universal principles of justice somehow limit the excesses of our communities. Take female circumcision for example in as much as it is so dear to some of our communities, it is internationally targeted as a crime of female genital mutilation!

The SEACONET copyright model, therefore can never be truly African because of the various vested interests which we have to contend with. These interests are both local and international. For example, yesterday I had a meeting with the President of the Uganda Publishers Association who is seeking for a partnership with my organization to help protect their investments currently under the threat of piracy! Offline piracy of literature, film and music is very real in Uganda and the solution partly lies in a law that provides for enforcement! And the kind of piracy that happens in Uganda is one where for example schools have money to buy textbooks and the suppliers deliver pirated copies. Some schools are known to send back those poor quality books to the publishers so they can get replacement copies. Of course the publishers normally say NO. So we can not completely dismiss the western copyright construct in the face of this outright theft and especially when we begin to focus on strengthening investments in the creative industries most of which are copyright based.

I personally believe in options and for this reason I am an ardent advocate of online free using Creative Commons. This effort already has a Uganda CC license to be launched soon; about 8 titles of books by Ugandan commercial publishers under CC license etc.  In the debates on the draft SEACONET text I was the lone voice on some of these issues and may not have had as much impact. In Windhoek some two years ago I was nick named Open Access by the RROs people in that meeting because I told them OA was not an enemy!

I know SEACONET will make available the text for public use once it is ready.

Charles


From: gakuru AT gmail.com
Date: Fri, 2 Nov 2012 12:38:53 +0300
Subject: Re: [ccAfrica] SEACONET Model Copyright law
To: dkawooya AT gmail.com
CC: batambuze_charles AT hotmail.com; ookolloh AT gmail.com; ccafrica AT lists.ibiblio.org

Charles,

re: openness, ditto.

Agree, that even in (traditional) African culture private property ownership existed. And theft of such private property was punished very severely. For example, amongst the Agikuyu stealing was punishable by death. A muici (thief) would be taken atop hill, wrapped in dry banana leaves, put inside a large beehive set on fire then made to roll down the hill to a screaming example to other tempted thieves.

But alongside private existed vast, if not much greater, communal property which anyone was free to reasonably use without destroying nature. These included fetching firewood from the God's forest, hunting for meat etc while still protecting the animals. Today, certain communities still protect wildlife from poaching. We still have an inbuilt extended family and community care quite opposite the Westerners and Northerners individualist extremism--where almost everything is owned by a person. Language words and fonts used to on digital literature (perhaps even emails?) are owned by someone.

If Africans were to draft their own model copyright law its content would definitely be quite different from the western copyright construct. Therefore, in as many different ways, all we are asking is for is SEACONET's initiative be open to our scrutiny to guarantee us that their proposal is indeed African or a foreign model forced down our throats?

thanks,

Alex

On Fri, Nov 2, 2012 at 11:23 AM, Dick Kawooya <dkawooya AT gmail.com> wrote:
Yes it will be useful to see the text to judge how good or bad the proposed law is.
True CC Africa or anybody can come up with one. However, the difference here is that SEACONET is partly made up of public/government officials from the region. That raises questions of transparency, how binding is the model law on the countries present, etc. But the first step is making the text public.
dk
On Nov 2, 2012 2:26 AM, "charles batambuze" <batambuze_charles AT hotmail.com> wrote:
Alex,

I am actually attending the ARIPO/WIPO conference in Harare and will probably have a chance to speak to Chavula of SEACONET about progress with the model law. Alex, the model copyright law isn't a bad idea at all! The Africa CC Affiliates if they want could also come up with one.

Charles


From: gakuru AT gmail.com
Date: Fri, 2 Nov 2012 04:49:18 +0300
To: ookolloh AT gmail.com
CC: ccafrica AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [ccAfrica] SEACONET Model Copyright law

I haven't, though two days ago requested an ARIPO/WIPO conference, Harare (Tue-Fri 9th next week) speaker to convey Creative Commons Africa Affiliates' concerns with the 'exclusive' nature of the process behind the so-called "Model Copyright Law" mooted by SEACONET. If somebody else managed, then please share.

On Fri, Nov 2, 2012 at 12:48 AM, Ory Okolloh <ookolloh AT gmail.com> wrote:
Anyone manage to track down this law? 





On Tue, Oct 9, 2012 at 5:17 PM, Aminou Ndala TITA <aminou20022001 AT yahoo.com> wrote:
Hello
 
From the summary I got, the law has nothing to do with the protection of copyright in the online environment. Am I wrong?
 
Regards
 
Aminou


              



--- On Sun, 10/7/12, Dick Kawooya <dkawooya AT gmail.com> wrote:

From: Dick Kawooya <dkawooya AT gmail.com>

Subject: Re: [ccAfrica] SEACONET Model Copyright law
To: "Alex Gakuru" <gakuru AT gmail.com>
Cc: ccafrica AT lists.ibiblio.org
Date: Sunday, October 7, 2012, 3:07 PM

I agree with Alex. It would help to see the model law itself so we know exactly what is being proposed. Beyond that, we've to be wary of attempts to harmonize laws across the board without due consideration for unique circumstances prevailing in different countries. Even in Africa, there are important nuances that might warrant local solutions not to mention regional ones (e.g. EAC). Besides, unquestionable harmonization from advanced economies is what many have been against in WIPO and elsewhere. Meeting WTO deadlines cannot be an excuse to harmonize across the board. Of course I can understand if participating countries will be encouraged to pick and choose what applies to them but presenting the model as the law for everybody to adopt. This is of particular concern given the participation of copyright administrators.
Dick
On Oct 7, 2012 2:43 PM, "Alex Gakuru" <gakuru AT gmail.com> wrote:
Thanks Charles. It would have been great to read the reported original 'model law' proposed. It's a shame SEACONET's website 'documents' page is blank http://www.seaconet.org/?page_id=9   Would anyone have a copy to share?

thanks

On Sat, Oct 6, 2012 at 3:15 PM, charles batambuze <batambuze_charles AT hotmail.com> wrote:
0 Nabotu / September 22, 2012 18:39 SEACONET moots regional model copyright law By Staff Writer

 Lilongwe: SEACONET- the Southern and Eastern African Copyright Network a regional association composed of National Copyright Offices and Collective Management Organisations (CMOs) met in Lilongwe, Malawi recently



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