World Trade Organisation decision supports 'legal pirate site' in Antigua
The recent World Trade Organisation (WTO) meeting in Geneva has brought Antigua's plan to run a copyright-free download site for media one step closer to reality.
(The flag of Antigua and Barbuda image by David Benbennick, public domain)
The WTO has given the Caribbean country authorisation to suspend US copyright law, helping plan for a government-run pirate site edge closer to existence.
Preliminary approval for the move was actually given back in 2007 after the country won a gambling related trade dispute against the United States, and the WTO decision confirms this after six years.
Although little is known about the Antiguan plans for the site, TorrentFreak is reporting that the "media portal" will cover TV shows, movies and software.
In a media comment, Antigua's Finance Minister Harold Lovell said that the US had left Antigua "no other option" after the two countries failed to reach a compromise over the remote gambling trade. The US has blocked US citizens from accessing online gambling sites based in Antigua, even after being ruled against by the WTO.
"These aggressive efforts to shut down the remote gaming industry in Antigua has resulted in the loss of thousands of good paying jobs, and seizure by the Americans of billions of dollars belonging to gaming operators and their customers in financial institutions across the world," according to Lowell.
"If the same type of actions by another nation caused the people and the economy of the United States to be so significantly impacted, Antigua would without hesitation support their pursuit of justice," the Finance minister added.
At the moment, there is no time frame for when the media portal would be up and running.
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The injustice to Antigua
Now we get to “intellectual property rights” being given up by the USA in order to renege on its assurances re: electronic gambling (which is the only type of gaming that can be traded across international borders) - make no mistake, online gambling is alive and well in the USA (just today the Governor of New Jersey signed into law an expansion of online gambling in that state).
The USA has demonstrated that it considers protection of gambling industries (such as bloated bureaucratic state lotteries, Las Vegas casinos, etc, etc) more important than the protection of intellectual property! This is the injustice to intellectual property and inventiveness supposedly supported by President Obama.
All inventors – across the board – are at risk because the USA seeks to protect behemoth gambling companies.
In summary, global fair trade is at risk and invention is at risk, because despite what Barack Obama states (re: trade and inventiveness) his government supports gambling operators ahead of those interests.