With the U.S. round of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement underway in Chicago, IP and information policy experts from around the world have released a Washington Declaration on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest that challenges the dominant direction of the negotiations on intellectual property in U.S. trade agreements. The Declaration was created through a consultative process with over 180 experts from 35 countries in six continents at the Global Congress on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest, August 25-27 at WCL.

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PIJIP will host the inaugural Global Congress on Public Interest Intellectual Property on Aug. 25-27, 2011. Intellectual property practitioners, academics, and public officials from around the globe will deliberate timely international intellectual property topics including the status of the proposed Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) and the challenges of achieving a balanced IP system in the digital age.

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The American University Intellectual Property Brief publishes semesterly articles as well as daily blog posts of IP news throughout the year. We welcome you to check out our content at http://www.ipbrief.net and subscribe to our email newsletter, RSS feed, Twitter, or Facebook.

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We're excited to announce the launch of Reclaiming Fair Use - a book that empowers creators of all kinds. Professors Patricia Aufderheide, Director of the Center for Social Media, and Peter Jaszi, Professor of Law in the Washington College of Law at American University, urge a robust embrace of a principle long-embedded in copyright law, but too often poorly understood—fair use.

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The past decade has been a turbulent one for the global intellectual property system in general and for the international copyright regime in particular. On the one hand, there is a trend pressing for greater access to knowledge that is fueled by an unprecedented growth in communication and information technologies. This is exemplified by the growth of open access initiatives, open source and collaborative models and demands for greater use of existing limitations, exceptions and flexibilities in intellectual property legislations and possibly the elaboration of new instruments in this area. On the other hand, there is a trend towards stronger enforcement of intellectual property rights beyond existing international standards with initiatives such as ACTA, three-strike measures in some industrialized countries and free trade agreements (TPP).

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Today the United States Supreme Court struck down a Vermont law that limited the sale of physician-identifiable prescription data for marketing purposes. In a 6-3 decision, the Court held that the law was a violation of the First Amendment. Prof. Sean Fiil-Flynn, Associate Director of the Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property at the Washington College of Law served as counsel for amici AARP and National Legislative Association on Prescription Drug Prices. Prof. Fiil-Flynn responds:

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A new book by PIJIP Professor Peter Jaszi, and American University Center for Social Media Professor Patricia Aufderheide contains guidelines for the fair use of copyrighted material by educators, filmmakers and others. Reclaiming Fair Use: How to Put Balance Back in Copyright was recently the subject of this article in the Chronicle of Higher Education.

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Tuesday, April 26, 2011, the United States Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Sorrell v. IMS Health, Inc, et al. The case focuses of the ability of states to protect the confidentiality of health care date, specifically the ability of states to restrict the use of physician-identifiable data for the purpose of pharmaceutical marketing. American University, Washington College of Law’s Program on Information Justice & Intellectual Property’s Sean Flynn and Meredith Jacob had previously filed an amicus curiae brief in this case. The brief, filed on behalf of AARP and the National Legislative Association on Prescription Drug Prices, argued that the Supreme Court should not limit this valuable tool for protecting medical privacy and controlling prescription drug prices. This case raises central questions about the interplay of privacy protections and the First Amendment, and will set the stage for upcoming decisions about consumer privacy, consent, and the sale of data.

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The National Law Review has announced that Washington College of Law LLM Student Guadalupe A. Lopez is one of its Spring 2011 Student Legal Writing Contest Winners. Her paper - "From TRIPS to ACTA: Establishing the Intent to Uphold Access to Medicine in the Face of Ambiguity," is available here: http://goo.gl/4rCeP

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PIJIP recently hosted a a debate between two leading industry advocates with divergent visions of U.S. trade policy on intellectual property and technology matters: Matt Schruers, Vice President for Law & Policy, Computer & Communications Industry Association, and Steve Metalitz, Partner, Michell Silberberg & Knupp LLP.

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