Centre for Internet and Society

Consilience 2018

Admin — 2018-05-12T02:04:39Z

National Law School of India University, Bangalore organized The Future of Blockchain Technology: Evolving a Framework for its Adoption and Regulation in India on May 5, 2018. Swaraj Barooah panel on "e-Governance and Public Service Delivery using Blockchain Technology" at Consilience 2018.

Click to view the agenda
Keynote speaker profile here
Session 1 speaker profile here
Session 2 speaker profile here
Session 3 speaker profile here

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/consilience-2018

Consilience 2010 Report

praskrishna — 2011-08-22T13:25:25Z

A report of the proceedings

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/publications/consilience-2010

Connecting the Next Two Billion: The Role of FOSS

praskrishna — 2014-09-10T05:04:58Z

Sunil Abraham was a speaker at this event organized by ICFOSS at the APrIGF in Noida on August 4, 2014.

Specific Issues of Discussions & Description

Connecting the next two billion users on the Internet poses unique challenges that must be addressed. The next two billion users will have very different profiles as compared to the first billion in terms of factors such as geography, demography, gender, disability, technology access, language access, and connectivity devices. In addition, with the coming of the Internet of Things, the users of the Internet may also include devices, sensors and sensor networks. Further, the context of the Internet itself may be changing, particularly in relation to efforts by various State and non-State actors to restrict freedom of access to the Internet and freedom of expression on it.Free & Open Source Software (FOSS) has now assumed greater significance in the light of revelations related to arbitrary surveillance conducted by states. This issue highlights the need to use audited technology and infrastructure to prevent the wanton violation of privacy of citizens. FOSS can be used to build shared community infrastructure that will protect users from privacy abuses. As most of the online applications run on top of free software, there is also a need for greater collaboration between the industry and free software community to ensure security and robustness of software to prevent incidents like the heartbleed bug vulnerabilities. As the next two billion comes online, FOSS assumes great significance for building a safe and secure Internet and robust communication platforms.The panel will discuss the following issues:• Relevance of FOSS as an access enabler and source of robust, cost-effective andfreedom-preserving software• The importance of FOSS in preventing arbitrary surveillance• Co-operation among businesses and free software community to develop secure.

Building community communication infrastructure using FOSS to restrict the dependence on centralised services.

Moderator and Speakers

Moderator: Ms. Mishi Choudhary, Executive Director, SFLC.IN, New Delhi
Dr. Rahul De, IIM Bangalore (Remote)
Dr. G. Nagarjuna, Free Software Foundation of India (Remote)
Mr. Prasanth Sugathan, Counsel, SFLC.in
Mr. Satish Babu, Director, ICFOSS
Mr. Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore
Mr. S. Ramakrishnan, Media Lab Asia/Govt. of India

Workshop Organizer

This workshop will be jointly organised by International Centre For Free and Open Source Software (ICFOSS), an autonomous institution under the Government of Keralamandated with the objectives of co-ordinating FOSS initiatives within Kerala, as well as linking up with FOSS initiatives in other parts of the world and SFLC.IN, a donor supported legal services organisation that works to protect freedom in the digital world.The details of the contact person for the workshop is given below:Name: Mr.Satish BabuDesignation: DirectorOrganisation: International Center for Free and Open Source Software (IC-FOSS).

For more details see the APrIGF website.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/apr-igf-delhi-2014-connecting-the-next-two-billion-the-role-of-foss

Conflict of interest cloud over CCI chief

praskrishna — 2015-08-23T16:27:14Z

The chairperson of the Competition Commission of India (CCI) and three of the six commission members are participating in a conference organised by Assocham and sponsored by private companies like Ericsson, trade associations and two legal firms specialising in intellectual property cases. This, civil society organisations argue, raises issues of conflict of interest in a quasi-judicial body like CCI participating in a conference organised by private parties that have cases before the commission.

The article by Rema Nagarajan was published in the Times of India on August 7, 2015.

For instance, the event partner Ericsson is facing CCI investigations on matters related to standard essential patents (SEPs), one of the conference topics, and issues related to licensing of technologies on fair and equitable terms.

The vice president and head of the legal section of Ericsson also has a speaking slot in the inaugural event. The brochure clearly states that the event partner on payment of Rs 5 lakh gets several privileges including a speaker's slot in the inaugural and business sections.

Several civil society organisations including Alternative Law Forum, Centre for Internet and Society and IT for Change from Bangalore, Knowledge Commons Collective, National Working Group on Patent Laws, and Software Freedom Law Centre from Delhi have written to the CCI protesting against its participation in the conference.

In their letter to CCI chairperson Ashok Chawla, they pointed out that the day-long conference titled Interface between Intellectual property (IP) and Competition Law, being held in a five star hotel on August 7, was focusing on issues being adjudicated by CCI. While Chawla is listed in the brochure as giving the inaugural address, CCI members GP Mittal and MS Sahoo are chairing two technical sessions and a third member SL Bunker is giving a special address at the valedictory function.

Other speakers include Rajiv Aggarwal, Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks, representatives of Google, Intel, Microsoft, the UK IP Office, senior advocates from three Indian law firms specialising in IP and representatives of international law firms and consultancy firms.

"It is a well-set precedent that judicial and quasi-judicial bodies never directly or indirectly discuss matters pending before them. The conference is centred on discussing issues that are currently under the investigation of CCI along with commercial entities, including one which is facing the investigation," stated the letter adding that all the judicial or quasi-judicial bodies were expected to avoid not only actual conflict of interest but also perceived conflict of interest.

The civil society signatories pointed out that the event was not an academic event but a commercial one organised by a chamber of commerce along with the industry with clear commercial objectives. "The participation of CCI in the event would compromise the credibility and independence of CCI. Therefore, CCI as a guardian of public interest should not be subject to the lobbying efforts of IP owners. Providing privileged access to lobbying efforts of private enterprises like Ericsson, Qualcomm, Microsoft and Intel would cast a dark shadow on the neutrality of CCI," stated the letter requesting Chawla not to participate in the conference and to direct CCI members and CCI staff involved in investigations to avoid participation.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/the-times-of-india-august-7-2015-rema-nagarajan-conflict-of-interest-cloud-over-cci-chief

Conference on Standards Settings Organizations (SSO) and FRAND, NLSIU

rohini — 2016-04-02T18:12:41Z

Rohini Lakshané attended the Conference on Standards Settings Organizations (SSO) and FRAND held at NLSIU, Bengaluru on March 21 and 22, 2015. It was organised by the MHRD Chair on Intellectual Property Rights, Centre for Intellectual Property Rights and Advocacy (CIPRA), National Law School of India University, Bengaluru in association with Intel Technology India. This post is a compilation of notes from the conference.

Programme Schedule

Significant Takeaways
It is anti-competitive to seek to exclude competitors from the market by seeking injunctions on the basis of SEPs, if the licensee is willing to take a license on FRAND terms. In these circumstances, the seeking of injunctions can distort licensing negotiations and lead to unfair licensing terms, with a negative impact on consumer choice and prices. -- EU Competition Policy Brief, Issue 8, June 2014. This is a very important issue for India as it thinks about how it can attract foreign investments. India has a unique opportunity to learn from these lessons from around the globe and craft India-specific solutions. India has the intellectual capability and the institutions capable of crafting these solutions, and in doing that we can support Make In India. India needs to be mindful about what is happening in the [South Asian] region. China has moved aggressively to try to curb FRAND abuse. The People's Court in China ruled in Huawei vs. InterDigital that for 2G, 3G, and 4G patents, the license fees of royalties should not exceed 0.019% of the actual sale price. Apple also stated that Ericsson was calculating royalties on the sale price of the iPhone or iPad, whereas the royalty should be calculated on the value of the baseband chip that runs this technology in the mobile device. If such litigation occurs in India, what would be India's position? If a building block contains the technology pertaining to a patent, then royalty should be calculated on the smallest possible patent practising unit and not the entire product. The government of India has adopted a royalty free (RF) approach to licensing open standards. Non-essential claims are excluded from disclosure. Pending patent applications are not. Only 16% patents declared as SEPs are actually SEPs, according to a study. The Delhi High Court has passed interim orders restraining the CCI from deciding these cases. Our appeal to the courts is that these patent infringement lawsuits should not be viewed in isolation. They should not be viewed as merely contractual issues between the licensor and the licensee. They should be seen in the context of their economic effects and their adverse effect on competition. The CCI should be enabled to deal with such cases. Matheson: The phrase "compulsory license" sends a shiver down every corporate's spine every time it is used. International experience is that the judicial system has been the only forum where we have been able to have due process to enable us to construct cases properly in order to explain to the judge or to the jurors how the system works. That has produced very sensible solutions to this problem. Handing it off to the government to institute a compulsory license wouldn't be fair to the SEP holders.

SSOs and FRAND: Licensing issues

John Matheson, Director of Legal Policy (Asia Pacific), Intel

The role of licensing policy

Ensuring market access
Standards often depend on patented technology, which is accessed through the Promise to License on FRAND terms.
It is equally critical to ensure that standards can be implemented without unfair legal games.
It is essential to prevent patent hold-up.
Reasonable compensation

Patent holders remain entitled to fair compensation and benefit from the proliferation of their technologies via standardisation.

Why FRAND?

A FRAND commitment embodies certain fundamental principles that have been recognised widely by the courts and regulators.

The fundamental purpose of a FRAND commitment is widespread adoption of the standard.

Because of the peculiar nature of SEPs, the process is open to abuse.

A FRAND commitment is aimed at preventing patent holders from exploiting a hold-up value and extracting unreasonable royalties and concessions that could otherwise follow from being in a very unique position. Often, the holders of the IP have a single solution to an interoperability or connectivity conundrum that technology is facing.

Why are SEP license negotiations different from Non-SEP ones?

In the context of non-SEPs, one may be negotiating to obtain a license to a patent for a particular feature. If the licensor is being difficult, one can discard the feature to include something else. In a competitive market, this negotiation is focused on the value of the invention to be licensed. Thus one can redesign to avoid a particular claim and, in turn, avoid injunction.

On the other hand, it is necessary to either obtain a license for or infringe an SEP to manufacture the mobile device. There is no workable alternative or workaround to obtaining a license for the desired technology. With the threat of an injunction looming over the negotiations, the prospective licensee is under pressure to obtain a license. So the market negotiations for SEPs and non-SEPs are very different. One-way negotiations raise the possibility of a patent hold-up, and abuse of the standard implementer.

IP policies inevitably involve compromise.

Common areas of misunderstanding include:

Valuations or meaning of "reasonable". Valuations of IP under consideration.
Injunctive relief or exclusion orders
Discrimination or refusal to license
Patent transfer (It requires a continuation of the FRAND commitment, and shouldn't get differential treatment in the IP policy.)

Competition authorities in the US and EU have asked SSOs to reconsider policies to reduce ambiguity in the context of these areas of misunderstanding.

The ex-ante or the incremental value of the SEPs before the standard is set needs to be understood. The SSOs look at several different ways to solve a connectivity problem. The patent owners bring their patents into the standards body and claim that theirs is the best way to solve that problem. The market and consumers want an uncomplicated solution which works and is as cheap as possible. In many cases, there is one single winner, simply because we need one solution. In exchange for being the winner, the FRAND discipline is quid pro quo.

European Commission's response to two different patent lawsuits:

In the Samsung and Motorola cases, the Commission clarifies that in the standardisation context where the SEP holders have committed to:

License their SEPs
Do so on FRAND terms

It is anti-competitive to seek to exclude competitors from the market by seeking injunctions on the basis of SEPs, if the licensee is willing to take a license on FRAND terms.

In other words, if there is a bona fide commitment on the part of the licensee to agree to that test, then it is anti-competitive to seek an injunction.

In these circumstances, the seeking of injunctions can distort licensing negotiations and lead to unfair licensing terms, with a negative impact on consumer choice and prices. -- EU Competition Policy Brief, Issue 8, June 2014.

Anyone who needs access to connectivity or needs interoperability requires to get a SEP license, and if that license is required to be obtained within a time limit, it almost -- by definition -- is not going to work. Patent licenses take years to negotiate, and they're incredibly complex. For example, a patent policy may offer up to 12 months to agree on a license, but that is not the way the market works. So we cannot expect policies that put forth time limits to work in the SEP arena. What we can expect is that the implementers make a bona fide commitment to seek a license.

Motorola vs. Microsoft, Germany:

Motorola sought injunctive relief against Microsoft in Germany. Microsoft moved its distribution centre from Germany to the Netherlands. This resulted in loss of jobs, relocation costs ($11.6 million), and annual increased operating costs of $5 million for Microsoft.

Samsung vs. Apple, Germany

Similarly, on the basis of one patent, a temporary injunction was granted on the sale of the Apple iPad and iPhone. Apple was forced to agree to terms it didn't want to agree to, so that the sale of its products would resume.

This is a very important issue for India as it thinks about how it can attract foreign investments. India has a unique opportunity to learn from these lessons from around the globe and craft India-specific solutions. India has the intellectual capability and the institutions capable of crafting these solutions, and in doing that we can support Make In India.

SEP holders that make FRAND commitments should not be allowed to obtain injunctions against alleged infringers, except in limited circumstances. This formula has been adopted by the IEEE, which has solved this problem. India has the opportunity to leapfrog a lot of patent litigation by adopting the IEEE test.

Learn from what happened with Microsoft in Germany. What kind of message do you want to send to the foreign community about investing in India? Do you want to use the scare tactics of injunctions or do you want to adopt a policy that will avoid litigation?

India needs to be mindful about what is happening in the [South Asian] region. China has moved aggressively to try to curb FRAND abuse. The People's Court in China ruled in Huawei vs. InterDigital that for 2G, 3G, and 4G patents, the license fees of royalties should not exceed 0.019% of the actual sale price.

Reasonable Compensation Considerations

Royalty based on the smallest unit that practices the standard.
Technical value of patented technologies vs. alternatives.
Overall royalty that could reasonably charged for all SEPs.

Non-discrimination

A commitment to license every implementer of the relevant standard.

Transfer

FRAND commitments follow the transfer of a patent to subsequent proprietors.

Dr. Krishna Sirohi, Impact Innovator, GISFI, President, I2TB

As per the Make in India programme, we have to achieve zero imports by 2020. Product development in India by Indian companies will happen with collaborative research and development and IPR sharing through licenses. We are looking at national capacity building through product development and patent uses.

Global Information and Communication Technology Forum for India (GISFI) is a standards setting body involved with standardisation and research. It is a telecommunications standards development body (TSDO) set up with the approval of the DoT. It has peer relationships with ITU, OMA, TTC and a bunch of other SDOs. Internet of Things (IoT), mobility and security are its three major research programmes.

GISFI is working towards defining 5G in India. The 5G standardisation theme in India is called WISDOM (Wireless Innovative System for Dynamic Operating Mega Communications). GISFI is considering the perspective of the Indian user, the network capability, the network architecture, network development and the Indian revenue model, strategic and special purpose networks, inclusive growth, and network security.

However, some India-specific aspects such as illiteracy and lack of basic civic infrastructure need to be considered in the standardisation process.

GISFI plans and stages for 5G definition and adoption

Stage 1 (2014-2018): National agenda for strategic research, innovation and experimentation

Focus on Digital India and Make in India programmes.

Stage 2 (2016-2019): Standardisation

Stage 3 (2017-2021): Product Development

Stage 4 (2019-2023): Early Development

Technical understanding required for IPR issues

Enhancement applicable to general scenarios
- Traffic capacity
- Cell coverage
- Edge cell performance
- Intercell interference
- Network congestion
- Mobility
- Energy consumption
Enhancements targeting new use cases
- machine-type communication
- national security
- public safety services
Carrier aggregation
- Higher throughput owing to intra and inter-band transmission bandwidth of more than 20 MHz.
- Reduced network congestion owing to load-balancing across multiple carriers.
- Improvement in mobility and reduction in inter-cell interference.
Enhanced MIMO
- Improved spatial diversity and multiplexing
- Improved beam-forming
- Multiple access with multi-antenna transmission
Coordinated Multi-Point Operation (CoMP)
- Reduction in intercell interference owing to coordinated scheduling or beamforming (CS/CB)
- Transmission from multiple distribution points (base stations, RRH) in a coordinated way (Dynamic point selection, and Joint transmission)

What do SSOs handle IPR in different parts of the world and what are the issues they face?

GISFI has adopted ITU's IPR policy.

In SSOs, the FRAND principle works well only when participating entities have equal or almost equal IPR clout, and can reciprocate with their own patents every time other entities share their patents. It is difficult to create a balance between entities that only own IPR and those that only consume IPR.

Most of the members of SSOs are IPR owners. The entities that develop [technological] solutions without owning the IPRs are usually not a part of SSOs. However, additional strategies need to be implemented for realising the "Make in India" goal. The goal of zero imports by 2020 can only be achieved if a large number of small companies use these standards to develop products locally. So small manufacturers should be represented even at the highest levels of the standards development body. An IPR policy should be defined/ modified to factor in these needs.

Evaluation of LTE essential patents declared by ETSI

Cyber Creative Institute, June 2013: http://www.cybersoken.com/research/pdf/lte03EN.pdf

A large number of LTE patents are held by a handful of companies. There is no Indian owner of any LTE SEP.

Ericsson sued Apple in the US over infringement of its LTE patents. As of January 2015, Apple countersued Ericsson in a federal court in California and claimed that it did not owe any royalties to the latter.

Apple also stated that Ericsson was calculating royalties on the sale price of the iPhone or iPad, whereas the royalty should be calculated on the value of the baseband chip that runs this technology in the mobile device. If such litigation occurs in India, what would be India's position? If a building block contains the technology pertaining to a patent, then royalty should be calculated on the smallest possible patent practising unit and not the entire product.

Dr. Kumar N. Shivarajan, CTO, Tejas Networks

TSDSI's (Telecommunications Standards Development Society of India) IPR policy states that a member's technology will become a part of a standard as long as the member licenses it on FRAND terms to other members.

By 2017, 70% of the global equipment spend will be on LTE.
TD-LTE subscriber base in India has been projected to reach 67 million by 2017.
Most of the data connections in India are still on 2.5G.
Smartphones have become affordable but 3G continues to languish in India; 4G yet to take off.
The number of 3G connections in India grew from 30 million to 33 million from 2013 to 2014.

Is 5G the answer to India's access problems?

The mobile industry is aiming to go beyond traditional 4G LTE in 2015 and there is increasing focus on adding new bells and whistles to 4G and realise 4G+.

LTE Licensed-assisted access (formerly LTE-Unlicensed)
LTE Direct/ Peer-to-peer
LTE-M for machine to machine communication
CoMP

Countries forming 5G groups to take an early lead:

China: IMT-2020 (5G) Promotion Group
Korea: 5G Forum
EU: 5G Public Private Partnership (5G-PPP)

5G in its current form is souped-up 4G.

Key India-specific requirements for 5G standard development

5G must factor in the Indian requirement for DSL-like connectivity: Always ON, low latency, affordable cost
To minimise costs, 5G must minimise the use of BTS sites and focus on spectral efficiency.
5G should allow virtual network operations enabling multiple operators to use the same physical network infrastructure.
5G must work well in Indian propagation environments: concrete buildings blocking signals, dense barriers.
5G infrastructure should be green as electricity shortfall is a problem. India has 400,000 cell towers. 10% of them are not connected to the electricity grid. More than 70% experience power outages longer than 8 hours per day, and work on diesel-powered generators. As a result, 25% of the operational costs of telcos are their energy bills. India imports 3 billion litres of diesel annually to run these cell sites.

India can try to get a headstart in owning the IPR that would eventually go into the 5G standard.

Prof. Ramakrishna, MHRD Chair, NLSIU, Bengaluru

The attitude of an SSO towards patented technology determines the objective of its IPR policy. For example, an SSO may want to:

Promote widespread implementation of a standard without unnecessary IPR implications.
Ensure transparency and certainty about the declaration of patents and patents' claims as SEPs.
Ensure that every patented technology is available at a reasonable fee, comparable to the value of the technology.

What happens when IP ownership is transferred to another owner? It continues to be a part of the SSO but things get complicated.

New owners, third parties, subsidiaries, and affiliates fall under the purview of the IPR policy, by extension.

IP and Disclosure policies of Indian SDOs

BIS (Bureau of Indian Standards) and TEC (Telecommunication Engineering Centre) do not have IP policies of their own. TEC refers to the ISO/IEC IP policies wherever the technology is equivalent or the same.
GISFI disclosure requirement: Each member is required to inform GISFI in a timely manner of essential IPRs. But members are not under any obligation to conduct IP searches. GISFI's IPR policy is based on that of ETSI.
DOSTI (Development Organization of Standards for Telecommunications in India) is not functional.

IPR policy for open standards in e-governance

The government of India has adopted a royalty free (RF) approach to licensing open standards.

Mandatory Characteristics of Open Standards:

The patent claims necessary to implement the standard should be made available royalty free for the lifetime of the standard.
The standard shall be adapted and maintained by a not-for-profit organisation.
The standard shall have a technology-neutral specification.

The RF approach and the maintenance by a non-profit may be a disincentive for IP owners.

IEEE patent policy:

IEEE invites participants to disclose patent claims essential to a standard under development. Upon disclosure, the patent holder needs to submit a letter of assurance that states:

License(s) will be made available without compensation or at a RAND rate.
A commitment to enforce the essential patent claims against any entity complying with the standard.
Or state its unwillingness or inability to license its essential patent claims.

Common patent policy for ITU-T/ ITU-R/ ISO/ IEC

Recommendations/ deliverables are non-binding -- ensure compatibility of technologies and systems on a worldwide basis.

The "code of practice":

It is desirable that the fullest available information should be disclosed although ITU, ISO or IEC are unable to verify the validity of any such information.

Major types of IPR policies:

Participation-based IPR policies

These are common in small, informal bodies such as consortia.
Members are bound by the terms of membership to commit to licensing SEPs on RAND or RF terms.
SEP holders notify the standards body in case RAND or RF licenses are not available after the draft standard has been published.

Commitment-based IPR policies
- These are commonly followed large, standards setting bodies.
- These bodies identify SEPs to a draft standard through disclosure and submission of licensing commitment.
- Parties may seek alternative solutions or work on a withdrawn standard is the the alternative solutions don't work out.

Basic building blocks of commitment-based IPR policies

Disclosure policies:

Disclosure is important for
- sending requests to SEP holders to make licensing commitments
- ensuring that experts' groups make informed decisions on inclusion of patented technologies
- providing information to prospective standards implementers about the SEP owners

Two forms of disclosure:

A call for patents is made at the start of meetings. This is more informational than binding.
Later, the member states its intentions regarding licensing the patent on RAND terms.

How disclosure obligations arise (and commitments are binding):

IEEE has by-laws that are binding on members.
ITU, IEC, and ISO: It is via a resolution or recommendation.

(Indicative list)

General disclosure procedure:

The nature of disclosure rules concerning self-owned patents depends on the status or the role of the entity.

A "submitter" is a participant in the working group making a conscious decision to submit its technology to the SSO for a license or free of royalty.
A participant in a working group may submit its technology to the SSO free of royalty, on RAND terms, on RAND terms with the right to charge a fee, or with a refusal to license it. (A working group participant who discloses technology is usually a technology expert. When someone who does not have adequate knowledge of patents discloses technology, it has complicated implications.)
A non-working group participant (third-party) may also submit its technology.

ANSI has left it to the accredited SSO to decide the terms of disclosure for participants of working groups. It has not laid out a policy in this regard. Other organisations have laid out obligations on the submitter to disclose SEPs.

Nature of disclosure terms for patents owned by third-parties:

ETSI: It is obligatory.

ITU/ ISO: Obligatory only for participants of the working groups.

IEEE: Entirely voluntary

Non-essential claims are excluded from disclosure. Pending patent applications are not.

Working groups prefer early disclosure so that they may adopt or discard the claim as early as possible in the standard setting process.

ITU: Disclosure from the outset

IEEE: During meetings of the working group

ETSI: "Timely manner"

AFSI: At a sufficiently mature level

There is no mandate for updating the disclosure in case a standard evolves.

Most SSOs make disclosed patents public. Failure to disclose patents may result in accusations of abuse of monopoly or anti-trust/ anti-competitive activities.

It is difficult to identify all potentially essential patents due to the complexity of specifications.

Some SSOs don't require IP disclosure at all. The obligations to license on FRAND terms would be sufficient.

Only 16% patents declared as SEPs are actually SEPs, according to a study.

It makes sense for rightsholders to go for blanket disclosures instead of disclosure of specific patents.

Vinod Dhall, ex-chairperson of the Competition Commission of India (CCI):

Our competition law is new, so there aren't any cases pertaining to patent litigation and involving the competition law, which we can treat as precedents. In one of the mobile phone patent litigation cases in India, the implementer has approached the CCI claiming that the licensor has been abusing its dominant position in the market by charging unreasonable royalties.

The Delhi High Court has passed interim orders restraining the CCI from deciding these cases. Our appeal to the courts is that these patent infringement lawsuits should not be viewed in isolation. They should not be viewed as merely contractual issues between the licensor and the licensee. They should be seen in the context of their economic effects and their adverse effect on competition. The CCI should be enabled to deal with such cases.

Questions-answers round:

What are the criteria for declaring a patent an SEP?

T. Ramakrishnan: SSOs have no role in declaring that a patent is an SEP. The SEP holder declares that their patent is essential to a technical standard. Most of the time, the SEP may turn out to be a non-SEP at a later stage. Statistically, 16 out 100 claimed SEPs are actually SEPs. There is no way for SSOs to tell if a patent is an SEP. IP policies of most SSOs state that they don't search [if a patent is an SEP]. The members of SSOs are under no obligation to search.

The commitment to license an SEP on FRAND terms is more important to an SSO [than determining if the patent is indeed an SEP].

Can compulsory licensing be implemented with government intervention in India so that the Central Government can fix a royalty and put an end to patent litigation?

Matheson: The phrase "compulsory license" sends a shiver down every corporate's spine every time it is used. International experience is that the judicial system has been the only forum where we have been able to have due process to enable us to construct cases properly in order to explain to the judge or to the jurors how the system works. That has produced very sensible solutions to this problem. Handing it off to the government to institute a compulsory license wouldn't be fair to the SEP holders.

With respect to the "safe harbour" approach towards SEP-based injunctions, what does the licensee need to do to prove to the courts that it is a willing licensee, in the event that licensing negotiations fail or take a long time?

Matheson: It gets down to the licensee showing its willingness to negotiate. The licensee cannot make a half-hearted attempt and decline to negotiate or decline the licensor's offer and then disappear. They should physically engage in the negotiation. If and when it gets to a judicial environment, the judges know when people are telling stories and when parties are bona fide. They can tell a ruse when they see one, and I think it is one of the things you observe in practice.

Ramakrishnan: The licensee should be able to demonstrate that it is willing to pay the royalty and should deposit an amount towards royalty. One recommendation from AIPP states that instead of using the terms "willing licensee" and "willing licensor", use "good faith response". For "good faith" we have very well established criteria. The entire licensing process should end within 12 months of starting. If the negotiations fail or if the process takes longer, then they should agree upon an arbitrator to fix FRAND terms. These are indicators that demonstrate the licensee being a "willing licensee" or a "good faith" licensee.

Often technology changes before the legal action can be taken or the lawsuit completed, and the patent over which litigation has happened may no longer be relevant to the technology. How do patent holders deal with this situation?

S.K. Murthy, Research Scholar, NLSIU: Even if the technology becomes obsolete, damages can be claimed retrospectively.

Matheson: You have a commitment to a FRAND solution, so that when you enter the protracted negotiation, you know that at the end of it you will get a fair solution. That's not always the case when you are dealing outside the FRAND world. You're dealing with a FRAND incumbent, not with unlicensed patents.

Why is putting a time limit to negotiations not a good idea? Also, IEEE seems to have done well by taking the threat of negotiations out of its way. Is it practical in India, because injunction is still the most potent weapon to protect intellectual property rights in India currently?

Matheson: Licensing is incredibly complex. There can be claims to the validity of the patent, there are claim charts to be drawn, there is expert evidence to be put together. Litigation over patents can take 2 to 3 years. To say that there must be a solution [arrived at] within a smaller framework gives the licensor the opportunity to wait around till the end of that period and assert its patents through an injunction. If you're leaving injunction at the table, you will not have a fair solution. The licensee will always be at a major disadvantage. The IEEE solution is a good one because it has taken the time limit away, but at the same time the policies that would adopt that solution need to include the discipline to ensure that the negotiations are bona fide.

What percentage of the sale price should be provisioned by a product developer for royalties? Can a mechanism be drawn up for this purpose?

Justice Ratnakala: Definitely. Such a mechanism should be drawn up in the near future.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/conference-on-standards-settings-organizations-sso-and-frand-nlsiu

Conference on Standards Setting Organisations (SSOs) and FRAND

praskrishna — 2015-04-10T15:07:38Z

Rohini Lakshané participated in this event organised by MHRD Chair on Intellectual Property Rights, Centre for Intellectual Property Rights and Advocacy (CIPRA), National Law School of India University, Bangalore, in association with Intel Technology India Pvt. Ltd on March 21 and 22, 2015.

Concept Note

There is a relentless effort among public and private companies to build products that conform to national and international Standards. Among several advantages of standardization, seamless interoperability between devices from several manufacturers play an important role. Standards play an important role in spurring the Innovation culture of a country and contribute to consumer benefits. Members of the Standards Setting Organizations (SSOs) may contribute their inventions/technology while forming a Standard. Needless to say, the members of the SSOs may have chosen to procure patents for their inventions/technology, which are contributed to formation of Standards. Further, one among (i.e., winning technology) the several available technologies may be chosen as a Standard and the patents covering such winning technology is generally termed as “Standard Essential Patents” (SEPs).

Generally, SSOs have their IPR policies to (a) enable disclosure of such SEPs to the SSOs; and (b) ensure that licenses are available to standards implementers to practice such SEPs. A commonly used model or principle to ensure that licenses are available to standards implementers is generally referred to as FRAND (Fair, Reasonable and Non-discriminatory). Even though FRAND is a widely accepted model there have been at least some genuine legal issues related to practice of FRAND in the SSOs. Legal systems, legal fraternity, and the businesses around the world are attempting to resolve these legal issues related to practice of FRAND.

Issues related to practice of FRAND are equally important to India as we are moving up the innovation value chain and embarking on a “Make in India” journey. This Conference is designed to enhance awareness on issues related to practice of FRAND and probable solutions thereof. This Conference is aimed to bring together honourable members of the judiciary, members of the law firms, legal fraternity, law students, and premier educational institutions to increase the awareness on FRAND related issues in SSOs.

Click to download the Programme Schedule

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/conference-on-standards-setting-organisations-and-frand

Concerns raised ahead of proposed India-US trade treaty

praskrishna — 2012-06-17T07:45:37Z

As efforts are on to step-up discussions on the proposed Bi-lateral Investment Treaty (BIT) between India and the US , concerns are being raised on the dispute settlement mechanism between an investor and the State.

Article was published in the Business Line on June 13, 2012

The already existing bi-lateral treaties and their enforcement through investor-State-dispute mechanisms already undermine the domestic policy space and the justice system in our country, said 15 public interest organisations in a joint-letter to the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh.

“The investor-State dispute clause in such agreements clearly grants foreign companies the right to initiate dispute settlement proceedings against the Government in secret arbitration forums outside the Indian judicial system,” the letter said.

Illustrating this, the letter cited recent disputes threatened by foreign investors, including: the tax-related challenge of British telecom company Vodafone; UK hedge fund; the Children's Investment Fund's threat to sue India over its policy to regulate the price of coal in India; and Russian telecom company Sistem and Norwegian telecom company Telenor's threat to sue over the cancellation of 2G licenses of their joint ventures.

India's first recorded investor-State dispute — Enron vs the Maharashtra Government — was initiated by a consortium of US companies including Enron, under the India-Mauritius BIT, which has already resulted in a billion dollar arbitration award against India, the letter said.

The Government needs to be consistent with its approach of excluding investor-to-State dispute clauses from investment agreements, reportedly under negotiation with the EU and other countries, said the letter signed by organisations across the board — the Bharatiya Krishak Samaj, Centre for Internet and Society and Centre for Trade and Development.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/concerns-raised-ahead-of-proposed-india-us-trade-treaty

Compilation of Mobile Phone Patent Litigation Cases in India

rohini — 2018-02-08T14:41:17Z

This working paper is an attempt to chronicle information about big-ticket lawsuits pertaining to mobile technology patents filed in India. All information presented in this paper has been gathered from publicly available sources. Interns Nayana Dasgupta, Sampada Nayak and Suchisubhra Sarkar (in alphabetical order) provided invaluable research assistance. This paper was first published as a blog post on the CIS website on March 15, 2015. It was periodically updated till October 31, 2017 to reflect new developments in the different lawsuits at the Delhi High Court and the cases with the Competition Commission of India.

Abstract

Nearly three years after litigation over patents and designs associated with big-ticket mobile technology started in the US, the first salvo in the patent wars was fired in India. Sweden-based Ericsson, a provider of communications infrastructure and services, sued home-grown budget smartphone manufacturer Micromax in early 2013. Patent litigation in the arena of mobile phone technology has steadily risen since. Lei Jun, the chairman of China's largest smartphone manufacturer Xiaomi has said that facing a patent lawsuit "can be considered a rite of passage for a company that is coming of age". This paper is an attempt to chronicle lawsuits pertaining to mobile technology patents filed in India. The first part of this paper, “Compilation of lawsuits” is an attempt to chronicle the significant developments in big-ticket lawsuits pertaining to mobile technology patents filed in India. The second part, “Commonalities and differences in the lawsuits” is an attempt to join the dots between the developments that were either remarkably common or notably different. All information presented in this paper has been gathered from publicly available sources and is up-to-date till the time of writing (October 31, 2017). This paper has been published as a part of the Pervasive Technologies project at the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS).

View paper on SSRN.

Access the court orders and other references in the paper.

Edit logs

Edited, April 2, 2015: To add section "6. Vringo vs. ZTE"

Edited, April 3, 2015: To add section "7. Vringo vs. Asus"

Edited, October 23, 2015: To add sections "8. Ericsson vs. iBall", "9. Ericsson vs. Competition Commission of India", "10. Ericsson vs. Lava". To update "Ericsson vs. Micromax" from “Micromax has challenged……”

Edited, April 15, 2016: To update "9. Ericsson vs Competition Commission of India... In a judgement dated March 30, 2016, the court dismissed all the writ petitions and applications pertaining to the role of the CCI before it and made these observations..."; "8. Ericsson vs iBall"; "10. Ericsson vs. Lava"; and "6. Vringo vs. ZTE".

Edited, April 29, 2016: To update "Ericsson vs. Xiaomi...On April 22, 2016, the Delhi High Court vacated the interim order passed in December 2014..."

Edited, January 13, 2017: To update "Ericsson vs. Gionee... In July 2014..."

Edited, February 8, 2018: To upload copy of working paper.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/compilation-of-mobile-phone-patent-litigation-cases-in-india

Competition Commission of India chairman's participation in Assocham conference raises conflict of interests

praskrishna — 2015-09-19T15:33:11Z

The article by Rema Nagarajan was published in the Times of India on August 6, 2015.

This, civil society organisations argue, raises issues of conflict of interest in a quasi-judicial body like CCI participating in a conference organised by private parties that have cases before the commission.

For instance, the event partner Ericsson is facing CCI investigations on matters related to standard essential patents (SEPs), one of the conference topics, and issues related to licensing of technologies on fair and equitable terms. The vice president and head of the legal section of Ericsson also has a speaking slot in the inaugural event. The brochure clearly states that the event partner on payment of Rs 5 lakh gets several privileges including a speaker's slot in the inaugural and business sections.

Several civil society organisations including Alternative Law Forum, Centre for Internet and Society and IT for Change from Bangalore, Knowledge Commons Collective, National Working Group on Patent Laws, and Software Freedom Law Centre from Delhi have written to the CCI protesting against its participation in the conference.

In their letter to CCI chairperson Ashok Chawla, they pointed out that the day-long conference titled Interface between Intellectual property (IP) and Competition Law, being held in a five star hotel on August 7, was focusing on issues being adjudicated by CCI. While Chawla is listed in the brochure as giving the inaugural address, CCI members GP Mittal and MS Sahoo are chairing two technical sessions and a third member SL Bunker is giving a special address at the valedictory function.

Other speakers include Rajiv Aggarwal, Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trademarks, representatives of Google, Intel, Microsoft, the UK IP Office, senior advocates from three Indian law firms specialising in IP and representatives of international law firms and consultancy firms.

"It is a well-set precedent that judicial and quasi-judicial bodies never directly or indirectly discuss matters pending before them. The conference is centred on discussing issues that are currently under the investigation of CCI along with commercial entities, including one which is facing the investigation," stated the letter adding that all the judicial or quasi-judicial bodies were expected to avoid not only actual conflict of interest but also perceived conflict of interest.

The civil society signatories pointed out that the event was not an academic event but a commercial one organised by a chamber of commerce along with the industry with clear commercial objectives. "The participation of CCI in the event would compromise the credibility and independence of CCI. Therefore, CCI as a guardian of public interest should not be subject to the lobbying efforts of IP owners. Providing privileged access to lobbying efforts of private enterprises like Ericsson, Qualcomm, Microsoft and Intel would cast a dark shadow on the neutrality of CCI," stated the letter requesting Chawla not to participate in the conference and to direct CCI members and CCI staff involved in investigations to avoid participation.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/times-of-india-rema-nagarajan-august-6-2015-competition-commission-of-india-chairman-participation-in-assocham-conference-raises-conflict-of-interests

Comparison of National IPR Strategy September 2012, National IPR Strategy July 2014 and Draft National IP Policy, December 2014

amulya — 2016-03-08T01:49:07Z

This is an analysis of the first draft of India's National IPR Policy with an earlier document "India's National IPR Strategy".

Nehaa Chaudhari provided inputs, analysed, reviewed and edited this blog post.

As part of our IPR Policy Series, we have so far CIS has submitted comments to the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion on the proposed IPR Policy and the first draft of the National IPR Policy, traced the development of the National IPR Policy, evaluated how the IPR Policy holds up to WIPO’s suggestions , filed RTI’s regarding the formation of the IPR Think Tank and the functioning of the Sectoral Innovation Council.

In this blog post Amulya.P compares the National IPR Strategy September 2012 prepared by the Sectoral Innovation Council, the National IPR Strategy July 2014 and the Draft National IP Policy, December 2014 to understand the commonalities and differences between the three.

Vision/ Mission

The vision stated in the IPR Strategy, July 2014 is “To develop India during the decade of Innovation into a major Innovative competitive and knowledge based economy by strategic utilization of IP as an engine for accelerated growth and sustainable and inclusive development.” This is comparable to the vision statement laid out in the Draft National IP Policy, December 2014 (Draft Policy) that states as follows: “An India where IP led growth in creativity and innovation is encouraged for the benefit of all; an India where IPRs promote advancement in science and technology, arts and culture, traditional knowledge and bio-diversity resources; an India where knowledge is the main driver of development, and knowledge owned is transformed into knowledge shared.” The Mission Statement laid out in the Draft Policy reads as follows “Establish a dynamic vibrant balanced intellectual property system in India to : foster innovation and creativity in a knowledge economy, accelerate economic growth, employment and entrepreneurship, enhance socio-cultural development and protect public health, food security and environment among other areas of socio-economic importance”

Clearly the Draft Policy strives for more balance and envisions IPRs as not only a tool to ensure social welfare alongside economic growth, but also envisions IPR as a tool to ensure the sharing of knowledge.

Objectives/ Approaches

The objectives of both the September 2012 National IPR Strategy and the July 2014 National IPR Strategy are more or less to “ Transform India into an innovative economy that would be reflected in high rankings in development and innovation indices from a global standpoint and develop, sustainable and innovation-promoting IPR management system in India while ensuring that the IP system continues to have appropriate checks and balances conducive to social and economic welfare and to a balance of rights and obligations. Besides measures that need to be taken, the strategy also needs to have an implementation matrix and a time bound schedule.”

In addition to this, the September 2014 IPR Strategy Document lays down a four pronged approach- to promote respect for IP, to simulate creation of IPRs ,creation of new IP regimes to address needs of the country and strengthening protection of IP, and to facilitate commercialization of IP. The IPR Strategy of July 2014 expands on this to include the establishing of cost effective, efficient, service oriented administration, institutional capacity building and development of human capital and the integrating of IP components of national sectoral policy and the Addressing of IP issues in international fora.

The Draft Policy though has enumerated seven objectives throughout the report. They are: a) “To create public awareness about economic social and cultural benefits of IP among all sections of society for accelerating development, promoting entrepreneurship, enhancing employment and increasing competitiveness”.b) “To stimulate creation of growth of IP through measures that encourage IP generation.”c) “To have strong and effective laws with regard to IPRs that are consistent with national priorities and international obligations which balance the interests of rights owners with public interest.” d) “To modernize and strengthen IP administration for efficient, expeditious and cost effective grant and management of IP rights and user oriented services.” e) “To augment the commercialization of IP rights, valuation licensing and technology transfer.” f)”To strengthen the enforcement and adjudicatory mechanisms for combating IP violations, piracy and counterfeiting, to facilitate effective and speedy adjudication of IP disputes to promote awareness and respect for IPRs among all sections of society.” f) “To strengthen and expand human resources, institutions and capacities for teaching, training, research and skill building in IP.”

Clearly the Draft Policy lays more emphasis on raising public awareness about the benefits of IP, strengthening the enforcement and adjudicatory mechanisms to combat violations and on balancing different interests during the creation of new IP laws and regulations.

Raising Awareness

While the September 2012 IPR Strategy speaks of raising awareness as a tool in encouraging creation of IP and facilitating commercialization of IP, the Draft Policy envisions an elaborate awareness raising and publicity program. Some of the schemes suggested in the Draft Policy include: Adoption of the slogan “Creative India: Innovative India” and launching an associated campaign on electronic , print and social media by linking IPRs and other national initiatives such as Make in India, Digital India, Skill India and Smart Cities. Reaching out to industry, MSMEs, R&D institutions, science and technology institutes, universities, colleges, inventors, creators, farmers/plant variety users, traditional knowledge holders, designers and artisans through campaigns tailored to their needs and concerns. Promoting the idea of high quality and cost effective innovation as a particularly Indian competence leading to competitive advantage, Involving of eminent personalities as ambassadors to spread awareness of India’s IP, Using audio visual material in print/electronic/social media for propagation, Creating moving exhibits that can travel to all parts of the country, Establishing Innovation and IPR museums, announcing a National IPR day and celebrating world IPR day etc.

The Draft Policy has a much more elaborate program for awareness raising and publicity and this is reflected throughout the document with almost every stakeholder and department being involved in the awareness programme.

MSMEs

The July 2014 IPR Strategy and the September 2012 IPR strategy both call for very similar policies with regard to MSMEs. Both lie emphasis on educating and incentivizing MSMEs to create new IP and formalize existing ones, on government intervention in setting up IP facilitation centers to bring about collaboration between the facilitation centers and the activities of existing industrial clusters, provision of access to databases on patent and non-patent literature to enable prior art research to IITs and NITs free of cost so that they can assist MSMEs or individuals with determining novelty in their inventions free of cost and other provide assistance with the patent application for a fee. While the September 2014 strategy called for identifying such institutions, the July 2014 Strategy does. Both of these strategies however, call for favorable tax treatments toward MSMEs for R&D Expenditures. Both also call for support mechanisms to offset IP costs and facilitate technology transfer through in-licensing from publicly funded research.

The Draft Policy discusses MSMEs in less detail, but still calls for creation of educational materials for MSMEs and highlighting special mechanisms for them to develop and protect IP, encouraging IP creation by establishing and strengthening IP facilitation centers especially in industrial and innovation university clusters, Introducing “first-time patent” fee waiver and support systems for MSMEs and reduce transaction costs in other ways (e.g. prior art search). It does not specifically mention favorable tax treatment to MSMEs or access to databases to determine novelty or provision of assistance with patent application or call for government intervention to better the IP facilitation centers.

Academia and Research Organisations

The July 2014 IPR Strategy and the September 2012 IPR strategy again recommend similar strategies when it comes to academia and research organisations. They both recommend some sort of education/awareness rising targeted at researchers and innovators regarding precautions to be exercised before patent application such as not selling inventions to company at early stages / not publishing research to public etc. they also recommend promoting university startups to motivate scientists to take up technology ventures. They both promote encouraging IITs and other similar institutions to undertake research on national issues like poverty, health, food, security, energy, information technology, bio-technology etc. They both recommend that IP creation be a key performance indicator for universities and institutions that participate in publicly sponsored/collaborative research and development and that this be gradually introduced in Tier 1 and Tier 2 institutions. And finally they both recommend that basic concepts of IP creation and respect for IP as part of formal education at school/college/university/vocational level including a course on IPR that is to be included in the curriculum of all technical programmes recognized by AICTE and in post grad/research programme in science and applied fields in universities.

The Draft Policy recommends all this and more. It recommends the formulation of institutional IP policy/strategy in higher education, research and technical institutions. Even though it recommends educating researchers and innovators regarding IP and precautions to be taken with respect to protecting their invention before publishing, it doesn’t go into detail or state that there is a need to protect against inventions being sold prematurely to companies. The Draft Policy also recommends that public funded research organisations and private sector are to be tapped to create campaigns highlighting the process of IPR creation and the value generated therefrom. It also recommends that IITs NITs etc. be encouraged to focus on research in areas such as nanotechnology, data analytics and ICT in addition to areas such as food security, healthcare and agriculture. Further in addition to creating educational material about IPR at school and university levels, the Draft Policy also calls for online and distance learning programs for all categories of users that focus on IPR. And for IP courses/modules to be introduced in all major training institutes such as judicial academies, National Academy of Administration, Police and Customs Academies, IIFT, Institute of Foreign Service Training, Forest Training Institutes etc., creating IPR cells and technology development and management units in such institutes. The Draft Policy also recommends that IPR be a compulsory subject in all legal educational institutions, NIDs NIFTs, agricultural universities and management institutes, and making IP teaching a part of accreditation mechanism in institutes under the purview of UGC, AICTE MCI as well as IITs and IIMs.

Large Organisations

The September 2012 IPR Strategy recommends that the government encourage large organisations to take a long term view of R&D and make research investments to create strong self-reliant tech portfolio and also acquire the scale to build strategic global positions, it recommends that the government encourage these organisations to share their expertise and resources for national benefit through PPPs, development of high technology base requires strategic relationships with overseas players, it recommends that it be made mandatory for MNCs to align with innovation strategy and the National Innovation systems and that the MNCs be encouraged by the state to leverage their standing and reach to ensure inflow of best practices and investments.it also recommends sops and preferential treatment in public contracts to large Indian organisations with a strong culture of IP creation. And that these organisations be encouraged to tap open innovation platforms and tie ups with academia. The July 2014 IPR Strategy recommends more or less the same strategies with regard to large organisations.

The Draft Policy recommends that public funded research organisations and private sector be encouraged to create campaigns highlighting the process of IPR creation and its value, that MNCs and large organisations develop IPR programs for their employees, that government encourage large organisations to create, protect and utilize IP in India and that the government create an industry-academia interface for encouraging cross-fertilization of ideas and IPR driven research and innovation in jointly identified areas. It makes no mention of requiring large organisations to align with the National IPR Policy, to ensure best practices but also doesn’t particularly mention tax cuts or other sops to encourage large organisations with a strong IP culture. The Draft Policy makes no mention at all of open innovation platforms. In large parts the Draft Policy is vague and lacks specifics with regard to strategies toward large organisations.

Startups and Individuals

The September 2012 IPR Strategy and the July 2014 IPR Strategy both make separate recommendations aimed at startups and individuals. They both recommend that information on the delivery mechanism for support services including things like venture capital funding should be made expedient and that identified public institutions should offer end to end support for creation, protection and commercialization of IP. The September 2012 Strategy also recommends that procedural mechanisms adopted for giving financial support for patent filing should be made smoother and that the assistance provided should be improved. The Draft Policy does not include any specific recommendations with regard to start ups or individuals apart from involving them in the publicity/awareness campaigns. In this measure the Draft Policy seems to fall short.

Strengthening IP Protection/ Creating New IP Regimes

The September 2012 IPR strategy generally called for improvement in institutions that grant IPRs and in institutions that are responsible for its enforcement and expansion of rights to include new IPRs.

The July 2014 IPR Strategy had a significant advance to this and recommended periodic review and streamlining procedures and process and guidelines for search, grant examination, maintenance and registration of IPRs in consultation with relevant stakeholders and benchmarked with best practices. It also recommended that full benefit be taken of global protection systems of WIPO, Patent Cooperation Treaty, Madrid System for International Registration of Marks etc. and that consequent upon amendment in 2012 of the Copyright Act, 1957, consideration be given to acceding to the Marrakesh Treaty for the blind, that avenues for international cooperation in IPR be studied. And finally it recommended that with respect to traditional knowledge and grant of patents in other countries, the Nagoya protocol is a step in the right direction and while the Patents Act, 1970, Biological Diversity Act, 2002 and the Plant Variety Protection and Farmers Rights Act, 2001 address the issue, a sui generis system of protection to check misappropriation is required at the international level.

The Draft Policy generally recommends that there be a review of existing IP laws to update and improve them and remove any inconsistencies, a review of IP related rules and procedures etc. to ensure clarity, simplification, streamlining, transparency and time bound process in administration and enforcement of IP rights. The Draft Policy also recommends that the government actively engage in negotiating international treaties and agreements in consultation with stakeholders, examine accession to some multilateral treaties that are in the countries interest and become a signatory to those treaty that India has defacto implemented so that India can participate in their decision making process. The central problem here is of course that what is in the countries interest may be open to debate, the Draft Policy does not at any point for example indicate whether or not the Government would consider taking on TRIPS plus obligations, the Draft Policy does not clarify what the Governments general stance on such issues would be.

The Draft Policy further recommends that important areas of study and research for future policy development be identified, some examples provided are: a) Interplay between IP laws and other laws to remove ambiguities or inconsistencies, b) Interface between IP and competition law and policy, c) Protection of undisclosed information not extending to data exclusivity, d) Guidelines for authorities whose respective jurisdictions impact the administration or enforcement of IPRs such as patents and bio-diversity, e) Exceptions and limitations and f) Exhaustion of IP rights. A prominent concern here would be data exclusivity, while the policy uses vague language and only wants these issues to be studied, Data exclusivity among others are demands made by the EU and others in Free Trade Agreements that go beyond our obligation under TRIPS and could harm the public interest.

Establishing Cost Effective, Efficient and Service Oriented IP Administrative Infrastructure

The July 2014 IPR Strategy recommends that IPOs be restructured to aim for ISO 9002 model to increase efficiency, quality and cost effectiveness; that after a review of the need of human resources to enable IPOs to discharged workload efficiently the required amount of manpower be employed; that recruitment training and career development of officials has to be reviewed to recruit and retain best personnel in the IPO; that the possibility of providing advisory services and value added products be studied; and recommends that there should be cooperation with IPOs in other countries in the area of capacity building, human resource development and awareness.

The Draft Policy recommends that IPOs be restructured, upgraded and be granted greater responsibility and autonomy taking into account the rapid growth and diversity of IP users and services, it also recommends an increase in manpower according to findings after a review to ensure speedy liquidation of backlog, requirements of global protection systems and productivity parameters. And that the process of recruitment training, cadre structure and career development of officials be studied and reviewed to retain the best talent to enhance efficiency and productivity. The Draft Policy also recommends that the government collaborate with R&D institutions universities, funding agencies, chambers of industry and commerce in providing advisory services which will improve IP creation and management and utilization, promote cooperation with IP offices in other countries in areas of capacity building, HRD, training, access to databases, best practices in search and examinations, use of ICT and user oriented services, enhance international and bilateral cooperation and post IP attaches in select countries to follow IP developments and advice on IP related matters.

Office of CGPDTM

The September 2012 IPR Strategy recommended that Grant/registration procedure to be quickened through recruitment and increasing human resources, that the functioning of IPOs be improved by measures such as: complete digitization of IP records and uploading for public view to improve transparency, communication with applicant/agents to be improved to bring in transparency meticulousness, database to be made searchable so that researchers can conduct effective searches to identify state of the art technology, electronic filing of applications and subsequent examination through electronic mode to be mandatory, Increase in filing fee with specific discounts for identified sectors such as MSEs.

The 2012 IPR Strategy observed that the quality of examination of IP applications needs to be improved and suggested reassessment of procedures followed in IPO to reduce timelines toward statutory actions.

The July 2014 IPR Strategy recommended that the grant and registration procedure be quickened through recruitment and increasing human resources, and that there be regular meetings between the CGPDTM and the National Biodiversity Authority to resolve issues that arise from implementing guidelines about grant of patents on inventions using genetic resources and TK.

The Draft Policy recommended that the government establish close cooperation between IPOs and create a common web portal for ease of access to statutes regulations, guidelines, databases and for better coordination.

The Draft policy also recommended that the CGPDTM examine joining centralized access for search and examination (CASE) and WIPO digital access services (DAS), that the CGPDTM fix and adhere to timelines for grant of registration and disposal of opposition matters, create a service oriented culture, include appointing public relations officers who would make the IP office user friendly, that the CGPDTM conduct periodic audits of processes being adopted in IP administration for efficient grant and management of IP rights.

The Draft Policy also recommended that the CGPDTM implement quality standards at all stages of operations with the aim to obtain ISO certification and adopt best practices with respect to filing and docketing of documents, maintenance of records and digitizing the same including document workflow and tracking systems, and take steps to expedite digitization of the design office and enable online search and filing in the design office

The Draft Policy also recommended that the CGPDTM ensure that public records in IP office are easily available and accessible both online and offline and establish effective coordination between its office and NBA to enable harmonious implementation of guidelines relating to grant of patents on inventions using genetic resources and associated TK, that the CGPDTM remove disparities among different branches of the trademark registries and patent offices and adopt standardized procedures in examination/grant of applications including maintenance of rights, implement centralized priority field wise on a national basis and provide value added services in form of helpdesks, awareness and training materials, patent mapping, licensing and technology transfer support services, ease of remote access of the international patent search mechanisms and other IP related databases. And that the CGPDTM implement incentives for MSMEs to encourage filing by the said sector like waiver of official fee, support of examiners and pro-bono legal help for the first time filing.

Administrative Departments of Other IP Institutions

The September 2012 IPR Strategy and the July 2014 IPR Strategy both generally recommended that the administrative departments of other IP institutions also take up similar actions as the CGPDTM.

The Draft Policy however, goes into this with some detail. The Draft Policy recommends that with regard to the office of Registrar of Copyright, the Government take measures to expedite modernization of the office both in terms of office space and infrastructure and in terms of introducing e filing facility including e- applications, electronic processing and issuance of final extracts of registrations etc. It also recommends that all copyright records be digitized and that the government introduce an online search facility and provide necessary manpower and adequate training facilities to personnel in the copyright office. It further recommends that the government take urgent measures for the effective management and administration of copyright societies to ensure transparency and efficiency in the collection and disbursement of royalties in the best interests of rights holders and that the government provide user friendly services in the form of help desks, awareness raising and training materials.

The Draft Policy recommends that the registrar of Semiconductor Integrated Circuits Layout Design study the reasons for lack of interest in filings under the Semiconductor Integrated Circuits Layout Design Act, 2000 and suggest appropriate measures. The Draft Policy also recommends that the government formalize a consultation and coordination mechanism between the National Biodiversity Authority and the IPOs with a view to harmonious implementation of guidelines for grant of IP rights and access to biological resources and associated traditional knowledge and benefit sharing.

Institutional Capacity Building

The July 2014 IPR Strategy recommended that the RGNIIPM act as a think tank, carry out research on IP matters, formulate and deliver training courses and develop teaching curricular for academic institutions, develop linkages with other national and international institutions involved in similar fields and develop joint training programs and conduct joint research studies on IPRs including programs for plant variety protection and issues related to traditional knowledge and bio resources. And establish IP institutes with state governments for raising awareness and training and teaching.

It also recommended that the MHRD IPR chairs provide support to all ministries and departments in policy making law making and negotiations under bilateral or multilateral frameworks. The Strategy also recommended that institutes responsible for training customs, police, judiciary, forest research institutes have IP training as an essential part of the curriculum, that National level institutes associated with creation enforcement or commercialization should be encouraged to incorporate IP training and capacity building in their operations and finally that industry, business, IP professional bodies, inventers associations, venture capital funds etc. should be encouraged to develop IP training modules for their members as well.

The Draft Policy recommends all this and more and suggests that RGNIIPM Nagpur conduct training for IP administrators , managers in the industry, academicians, R&D institutions, IP professionals, inventors, civil society apart from training the trainers, developing training modules and links with other similar entities at the international level and set up state level institutions. Further it recommended that the MHRD IPR Chairs provide high quality teaching and research, develop teaching capacity and curricula and evaluate their work on performance based criteria.

The Draft Policy also recommends that the CGPDTM provide continuous training to the IPO staff and update them with developments in procedures, substantive laws and technologies along with the RGNIIPM.

The Draft policy also recommends that the government establish national level institutes of excellence to provide leadership in IP, conduct policy and empirical research, examine trends and developments in the field of IP at the national and international level, support the government in strategic development of IP systems and international negotiations, establish links with similar institutes and experts in other countries for exchange of ideas, information and best practices and suggest approaches and guidelines for inter-disciplinary human capital development. And that the government facilitate industry associations, inventors and creators associations and IP support institutions to raise awareness of IP issues for teaching, training and skill building.

Strengthening Institutional Set-up to Improve Enforcement of IPRs and Create Respect for IPRs

The September 2012 IPR Strategy and the July 2014 IPR Strategy both recommend that the government encourage small and niche businesses to protect their products through trademarks, the September 2012 Strategy also adds that these businesses should be encouraged to seek international protection to participate in global competition and contribute to international trade activities. The Draft Policy recommends increasing awareness of international mechanisms and treaties (e.g. PCT, Madrid and The Hague) to encourage creation and protection of IP in global markets.

The 2012 IPR Strategy and the July 2014 Strategy go into further detail, they recommend that the service sector be encouraged to adopt strategies for registration of trademarks to ensure competitiveness and to leverage the goodwill of strong indigenous brands that have acquired traction in international markets. They also recommend that SME clusters be encouraged to develop a comprehensive database of their products to ensure that a parent isn’t issued on unprotected innovations.

As far as GI is concerned, both the July 2014 and the September 2012 IPR Strategy recommend that central public bodies such as the development commissioner for handicrafts and handlooms etc. partner with the suitable state, district and Panchayat level entities to educate communities on the benefits of registering GIs, to put in place examination protocols to ensure GI owners comply with quality standards. They further recommend that these bodies develop a roadmap to build brands for better market presence for products registered as GIs and coordinate with relevant state authority on enforcement and provide periodical updates to enforcement taskforce on issues that need redressal.

The Draft Policy only recommends that the government encourage registration of GI through support institutions and assist GI producers to define and maintain acceptable quality standards and providing better marketability.

As far as designs are concerned, both the July 2014 IPR Strategy and the September 2012 IPR Strategy recommend that the government encourage a move from informal to formal practices of protecting designs by administrative intervention, while the Draft Policy recommends the encouraging of creation of design related IP rights by identifying, nurturing, and promoting aspects of innovation protectable under the design law and educating designers to utilize and benefit from their designs , involve the NIDs , NIFTs and other institutions in sensitization campaigns.

With regard to plant varieties, both the 2014 and 2012 IPR Strategies recommend awareness generation programmes to encourage filings of new extant and essentially derived varieties. While the 2012 IPR Strategy further stated that there was a need to evaluate whether restructuring institutions/merging all IP issues under one umbrella would improve efficiency and a need for centrally managed National IP Enforcement Taskforce that could :a) Maintain database on criminal enforcement measures instituted for trademark infringement and copyright piracy, civil cases filed to be collated also, b) Mandated to deliberate upon operational issues of enforcement with the concerned Central and State agencies, c) Conduct periodic industry wise infringement surveys d) Coordinate capacity building programmes for the central and state enforcing agencies.

The Draft Policy recommends that the protection of plant varieties and farmers rights authority should: a) Support increased registration of new, extant and essential derived varieties and streamline procedures, b) Facilitate development of seeds and their commercialization by farmers., c) Establish links with agriculture universities, research institutions, technology development and management centers and Krishi Vikas Kendras, d) Coordinate with other IPOs for training sharing expertise and adopting best practices, e) Augment awareness building, training and teaching programs and modernize office infrastructure and use of ICT.

With regard to Traditional Knowledge, the Draft Policy also recommends that the government create a sui generis system for protecting TK which will safeguard misappropriation of traditional knowledge as well as promote further research and development in products and services based on traditional knowledge.

Creation of New IP Rights to Address Gaps

The September 2012 IPR Strategy recommended protection of utility models, utility patents as they have Protection of utility model. Utility patents / models proposed as they have less stringent patentability criteria, faster examination/grant, shorter term of protection as a cost effective way to incentivize incremental innovation and encourage creation of IPRs, with sector specific exemptions to ensure TRIPS compliance. And included a proposal for a predictable recognizable trade secret regime to improve investor confidence and facilitate flow of information.

The Draft Policy also recommended that the government facilitate creation and protection of small inventions through a new law on utility models, enact laws to address national needs to fill gaps in protective regimes of IPRs such as utility models and trade secrets to keep up with advancements in science and technology to strengthen IP and innovation ecosystem from example IP created from public funded research, to protect and promote traditional knowledge. As pointed out in the CIS Submission to the IPR Think Tank, the creation of utility models should by no means be assumed to be completely uncontroversial, many countries that had this system have now given it up, further this could lead to granting of frivolous patents and thereby harming development.

Facilitating Commercialization of IPRs

Both the July 2014 and the September 2012 IPR Strategies have similar recommendations with respect to facilitating commercialization of IPRs; they both recommend policy interventions to create strong and transparent national strategies to encourage: licensing of rights to another entity for commercialization, cross licensing agreements, leveraging the intellectual assets for future R&D growth and improved services, sale merger acquisition of either IPR or entire business distinguished and appropriately valued by their intellectual capital, patent pooling, reinforcing stability of IP license contracts.

And they both recommend that National research laboratories and academia and public institutions to stimulate commercialization of research resultants: intervention in building strengthening institutional capacity of research led organisations to enable utilization of IP.

The 2012 IPR Strategy also recommends national level policy changes to encourage development of indigenous technologies, that government fund (grants/loans) demonstration projects of new technologies that require large investment, suitable tax breaks for indigenously developed and commercialized products till attainment of some maturity levels, that qualification requirements during tendering process to accord acceptance to indigenously developed products where heavy development investments have been incurred, strengthening the indigenous R&D ecosystem policy frameworks should provide for flexibility in outsourcing technical expertise in niche areas and type testing of prototypes. Further it visualizes the emergence of open innovation systems and the role of voluntary SSOs.

The Draft Policy does all this and more. It recommends that the government establish an IP Promotion and Development Council (IPPDC) as a nodal organization for promotion and commercialization of IPR, the IPPDC is supposed to, among other things, promote licensing and technology transfer of IP, devise suitable contractual and licensing guidelines to enable commercialization of IP, promoting patent pooling and cross licensing to create IP based products and services and also establishing links with similar organisations for exchange of information and ideas as also to develop promotional educational products and services for promotion and commercialization, to facilitate access to databases on Indian IP and global databases of creators/innovators, market analysts, funding agencies, IP intermediaries, to study and facilitate implementation of best practices for promotion and commercialization of IP within the country and outside. IPPDC to establish IP Promotion and Development Units (IPPDU) in various regions The IPPDC is also tasked with identifying opportunities for marketing Indian IPR based products and services to a global audience.

The government is also recommended to provide statutory incentives like tax benefits linked to IP creation for the entire value chain from IP creation to commercialization, to support financial aspects of IP commercialization by: a)Enabling valuation of IP rights by application of appropriate methodologies including for better accounting as intangible assets, b) Facilitating investments in IP driven industries and services through the proposed IP exchange for bringing investors/funding agencies and IP owners /users together, c) Providing financial support to less empowered groups of IP owners or creators like farmers weavers, artisans, craftsmen etc. through financial institutions like rural banks or cooperative banks offering IP friendly loans, d) Taking stock of all IP funding by the government and suggesting measures to consolidate the same to the extent possible generating scale in funding and avoiding duplication, enhancing the visibility of IP and innovation related funds so that utilization is increased, performance based evaluation for continued funding, c) Regulating IP created through publicly funded research by a suitable law.

The Draft policy also recommends that the government promote going to market activities by: a) Creating mechanisms to help MSMEs and research institutions to validate scale and pilot through market testing, b) Providing seed funding for market activities such as participating in trade fairs, industry standards bodies and other forums, c) Providing guidance and support to IPR owners about commercial opportunities of e commerce through internet and mobile platforms. And that the government study the role of IPRs in setting standards in various areas of technology, actively participate in standards setting processes at national, international and industry SSO levels and to encourage the development of global standards that are influenced by technologies and IP generated in India

Facilitating and Encouraging Commercialization of IP Assets

The July 2014 IPR Strategy had specific recommendations to make in this regard. It recommended that the government forge links between creators and inventors , universities, industry and financial institutions for commercialization, that the government establish an IP exchange to stimulate trading of IP and creating markets for IP assets, to facilitate MSMEs to identify protect and commercialize their IP, creations through facilitation centers by providing package of services, to encourage technologies acquired under the patent pool of the Technology Acquisition and Development Fund (TADF) and licensed as per provision in manufacturing policy.

The Draft IP policy recommends all of these, tasking the IPPDC with most of these tasks and also recommends that the government improve awareness of the value of copyright for creators, the importance of their economic and moral rights and the rationalization of payment mechanisms for them, and to support initiative taken by public sector research entities to commercialize their IPRs for commercialization and lastly to develop skills among scientists to access , interpret and analyze the techno-legal and business information contained in IP documents.

Enforcement and Adjudication

The Draft Policy makes very specific recommendations with regard to enforcement and adjudication, apart from suggestions that go toward creating awareness and sensitizing the public, students, industry and inventors about IP, the policy also recommends that the government establish a Multi-Agency Task Force for coordination between various agencies and providing direction and guidance on enforcement measures, creating a nationwide database of known IP offenders, coordination and sharing intelligence and best practices at the national and international levels, studying the extent of IP violations in various sectors, examining the implications of jurisdictional difficulties among enforcement authorities and introducing appropriate technology based solutions for curbing digital piracy.

The government is also tasked with working with state governments in establishing IP cells and including IP crimes under their special laws, increasing manpower and infrastructure of the enforcement agencies and building capacity to check proliferation of digital crimes, providing regular training for officials in enforcement agencies, encouraging application of tech-based solutions in enforcement of IP rights, initiating fact finding studies in collaboration with stakeholders concerned to assess the extent of counterfeiting and piracy and the reasons behind it as well as the measures to combat it and taking up the issue of Indian works and products being pirated and counterfeited abroad with countries concerned.

On improving IP dispute resolution, the Draft Policy recommends the designation of specialized patent bench in the High Courts of Bombay, Calcutta, Delhi and Madras, the designation of one IP court at the district level depending on the number of IP cases filed, working with judicial academies to conduct regular workshops for judges, promoting ADRs in the resolution of IP cases by strengthening mediation and conciliation centers and developing ADR capabilities, creating regional benches of the IPAB in all five regions where IPOs are located, increasing the powers of IPAB in its administration including autonomy in financial matters and selection of technical and judicial members and providing necessary infrastructure for its effective and efficient funding and also taking urgent steps to make the copyright board function effectively and efficiently and provide adequate infrastructure and manpower to it.

Work Plans

In addition to all of the above, the July 2014 IPR Strategy also recommends a work plan which includes commissioning a study on schemes and programs financed by the government including under the PP mode for innovation, signing and acceding to the Marrakesh Treaty, the NICE agreement on international classification of goods and services for the purpose of registration of trademarks, assessing the Hague Agreement regarding registration of industrial design vis a vis India’s Designs Act with a view to accede to the treaty, assessing the possibility of accepting facilitation centers run by universities/academic institutions/departments of science and technology as receiving offices for patent applications where there are no patent offices.

The Draft IP Policy also makes recommendations to integrate IP with other government Initiatives like Make in India and Digital India, and plans to integrate into these government initiatives the different schemes of the Department of Electronics, and IT for IP promotion and global protection. It further recommends the establishing of a high-level body in the government to co-ordinate, guide and oversee the implementation and development of IP in India in accordance with the National IP Policy. The body will be responsible for bringing cohesion and coordination among different ministries and departments with regard to how they deal with IP matters, laying down priorities for IP development and preparing plans of action for time bound implementation of national and sector specific IP policies, strategies and programs, monitoring the progress and implementation of the National IP policy linked with performance indicators, targeted results and deliverables, annual evaluation of the overall working of the policy and a major review of the policy ever three years.

Concluding Observations

The National IPR Strategies of 2012 and 2014 contain more or less similar recommendations, the key differences being that the 2014 IPR Strategy emphasizes the need to address IP issues in international fora and in establishing cost effective, efficient and service oriented IP administrative infrastructure. It does not, in contrast to the 2012 IPR Strategy, recommend the introduction of laws on utility models or protection of trade secrets, policy changes to encourage development of indigenous technologies, but it does more specifically address facilitating commercialization of IP.

The Draft Policy is an important advance over the National IPR Strategy of July 2014 and September 2012. It places makes important new recommendations with regards to publicity and awareness raising, creation of legal regime with regard to traditional knowledge, utility patents and trade secrets, enforcement and adjudication- including the setting up of new courts, creation of the IPPDC and of a new high-level government body to oversee the implementation of the policy. It does however miss out on the chance to help start-ups, MSMEs and individuals in contrast to recommendations of the previous IPR Strategies. And in context of its avowed aim to turn knowledge owned into knowledge shared does little to encourage open access and focuses heavily on IP creation assuming that increase in IP would promote innovation and thereby lead to national development.

Table - Comparison of National IPR Strategy September 2012, National IPR Strategy July 2014 And Draft National IP Policy, December 2014

Sectoral Innovation Council, National IPR Strategy, September 2012, Available at: http://dipp.nic.in/english/Discuss_paper/draftNational_IPR_Strategy_26Sep2012.pdf (Hereafter : National IPR Strategy, September 2012)

National IPR Strategy, July 2014, Available at: http://dipp.nic.in/English/Schemes/Intellectual_Property_Rights/national_IPR_Strategy_21July2014.pdf (Hereafter: National IPR Policy, July 2014)

IPR Think Tank, Draft National IP Policy, December 2014, Available at: http://dipp.nic.in/English/Schemes/Intellectual_Property_Rights/IPR_Policy_24December2014.pdf (Here after: Draft Policy)

National IPR Strategy, July 2014, p.5

Draft Policy, p.5

[5] National IPR Strategy, July 2014, p.5

Draft Policy, p.5

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.11 and Draft Policy, December 2014, pp.5

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.11

National IPR Strategy, July 2014, pp.5-6,

Draft Policy, p.6,

Draft Policy, p.8.

Draft Policy, p.11.

Draft Policy, p.13.

Draft Policy, p.17.

Draft Policy, p.20.

Draft Policy, p.23.

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 7, 11, 12, 19 20

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 21

Draft Policy, p.6-8

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.6-7 , 12-13 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.6-8

Draft Policy, p.5, 9-10, 15,18-19

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 7, 13-14 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.8-9.

Draft Policy, p.8,11,24

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.6, 14-15 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.9-10

Draft Policy, p.7-8, 10

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 7, 15 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.10

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 7, 15

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 15

National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.10-12

Draft Policy, p.12-13,

Draft Policy, p.13

Swaraj Paul Barooah, Data Exclusivity back on the table for India, SpicyIP, March 27, 2015, Available at: http://spicyip.com/2015/03/data-exclusivity-back-on-the-table-for-india.html

National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.11-12

Draft Policy, p.14

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 15-16

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 16

National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp. 12-14

Draft Policy, p. 15-16

Draft Policy,p. 16

Draft Policy, p.15

Draft Policy, p. 15-16

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.16 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.14

Draft Policy, p.16

Draft Policy, p.17

National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.14-15

National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.15

Draft Policy, p.24

Draft Policy, p.23

Draft Policy, p.24

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.18 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.15-16

Draft Policy, p.11

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.17-18 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.16-17

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.19 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.16

Draft Policy, p. 11

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.19-20 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp. 17-18

Draft Policy, p.11

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 20 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.18

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 18

Draft Policy, p.11

Draft Policy, p. 12

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 20-22

Draft Policy, p.12

See, CIS Comments to the First Draft of the National IP Policy, Available at: http://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/national-ipr-policy-series-cis-comments-to-the-first-draft-of-the-national-ip-policy

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp. 22 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp. 18-19

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.22 and National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.18

National IPR Strategy, September 2012, pp.23

Draft Policy, p. 18-19

Draft Policy, p.19

Draft Policy, p.10,19

Draft Policy, p.19-20

Draft Policy, p. 12-13

National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.19

Draft Policy, pp. 10, 18-19.

Draft Policy, pp. 20-22

Draft Policy, p. 22

Draft Policy, p.22-23

National IPR Strategy, July 2014 , pp.22

Draft Policy, pp. 25-26.

Draft Policy, p.26

Draft Policy, p.27-28

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/comparison-of-national-ipr-strategy-september-2012-national-ipr-strategy-july-2014-and-draft-national-ip-policy-december-2015

Comparative Transparency Review of Collective Management Organisations in India, United Kingdom and the United States

maggie — 2015-08-21T17:12:10Z

This Transparency Review seeks to compare the publicly available information on the websites of music collective management organizations (“CMOs”) operating within India, the United States, and the United Kingdom. A total of 10 CMOs were selected, which included a range of non-profit, government registered organizations to for-profit, private organizations, managing works on behalf of record labels, publishers, composers, lyricists, and music performers. This exercise intends to contribute to the growing body of research on the relationship between transparency and effectiveness of CMOs. It concludes with recommendations and learnings which may lead to more transparent and effective functioning of copyright societies in India, and management of music copyright overall.

The research paper was co-authored by Maggie Huang, Arpita Sengupta, Paavni Anand.

Taking into account the needs of users and members of CMOs, the following pieces of information was determined to be useful to report on the websites: : membership lists, governing directors, user types, tariff rates, royalty distribution schemes, and annual revenue reports. Collectively, the presence of these became rough parameters for transparency. The authors then reviewed each website to determine whether this information was made publicly available, and whether such disclosure was voluntary or mandated by law. As a proxy for effectiveness, percentage of revenue distributed as royalties was calculated for those who made their annual revenue report available.

Broadly, the review found that India's 2012 Copyright Amendment Act and 2013 Copyright Rules were by far the most stringent regarding registration, operations, rate setting, and reporting. Despite India's strict laws, it appears there is little compliance, particularly by PPL which failed to report the mandated tariff rates, royalty distribution policy, and its annual revenue report. ISRA had all the information sought on their website except for the crucial annual revenue report. IPRS however clearly made an effort to comply, with all information sought, provided.

Relative to India, CMOs in the United Kingdom were regulated less strictly, with U.K.'s 2014 Copyright Regulations allowing self regulation provided CMOs follow guidelines to comply with the operating code of conduct. All six indicators were available on websites of both UK PPL and PRS for Music, although the latter required user authorization to access membership/repertoire data.

In comparison, the U.S. seems to have the most lax reporting standards of the three, really only mandating basic reporting for CMOs administering statutory licenses. However, similar to India, rate-setting in the U.S. for certain digital broadcasts are subject to significant government control, in addition to anticompetetive measures which prevent partial withdrawal of rights from certain CMOs’ blanket licenses. Availability of information varied, with BMI and Sound Exchange complying with the more demanding parts of US legislation and disclosing all information sought, while ASCAP and HFA were missing tariff rates and user types respectively. SESAC was the least informative, with governing directors absent, and more crucially, their annual revenue report.

To determine relative efficiency, the authors calculated the percentage of royalties distributed per total revenue for those CMOs which published their revenue reports. All distributed royalties ranged between 80%-90%. Though not necessarily the most accurate measure, there appeared no significant correlation between the percentage of distributed royalties, and amount of information found; therefore a correlation between effectiveness and information transparency remain unknown.

However, throughout the exercise, the limitations of the research design became clear, leading to its own learnings for future research. Methodologically, the more attention should have been paid to spanning a wider spectrum of legal control, drawing clear lines of which types of CMOs to include in the study, being careful not to equate presence of information with usability or effectiveness, deeper assessment of the legal provisions, and the inclusion of membership exclusive data as part of the exercise.

Nevertheless, the comparative review process did produce several learnings that Indian CMOs could adopt for enhanced transparency and potentially improved effectiveness as well. These recommendations are as follows:

Publish the full repertoire of works the CMO is authorized to license, and its corresponding rights holder information in a searchable format;
Provide a platform for collectively identifying the rights-holder of orphan works (works which are registered whose royalties are collected, but ownership information is unknown);
Guide new users and potential members through a more user-friendly designed page with simplified, accessible introduction to music licensing;
Increase clarity surrounding royalty distribution policies;
Publish updated annual revenue reports; and
Clarify the dispute resolution processes.

This review concludes by suggesting future research through stronger methodological design, further exploring membership exclusive data, assessing effectiveness outcomes between multiple, competing licensing bodies versus a single, state-granted monopoly society, and the possibility of alternative compensation schemes for music financing and production.

MOTIVATIONS FOR RESEARCH: MUSIC COPYRIGHT MANAGEMENT IN THE MOBILE MUSIC AGE for the PERVASIVE TECHNOLOGIES PROJECT

Managing copyright in the digital age is one of the most contentious issues today amongst music industries globally. Innovation in digital technologies has opened up formerly restricted production and distribution channels, resulting in a proliferation of music like never before.

The mobile phone is one of these innovations, particularly since becoming the most preferred music listening device in India. [1] The overarching utility of the mobile phone has made it the object of study for the Centre for Internet and Society's Pervasive Technologies project[2], which seeks to identify intellectual property levers which can enhance access to affordable mobile devices' hardware, software, and content within India and China.

Access to music content[3] via the mobile phone is one of the chapter's primary focus, with a research objective of balancing access to music for internet and mobile consumers, while ensuring the protection of rights and remuneration for artists and creators.

The initial phases of this research found that new stakeholders such as device manufacturers, telecom operators, and streaming services were developing business models based on a free, ad-supported service with a paid premium tier, ultimately resulting in high royalty payouts and low profit margins. However, artists in India and worldwide are raising grievances due to decreasing royalty revenue, putting to question whether these business models are sustainable in the long term.

We had hoped to answer these questions within the Indian context, but the findings were ultimately inconclusive. This was primarily due to two reasons: 1) lack of data transparency at multiple levels of the music distribution chain, and 2) a copyright management system heavily in flux due to poor enforcement of the ambiguous 2012 Copyright Amendment Act. The copyright societies in India embodied both these issues in India, resulting in a need to study these institutions further as one of the main objects of research.

INTRODUCTION to COLLECTIVE MANAGEMENT ORGANIZATIONS and the NEED FOR TRANSPARENCY

Music copyright societies, commonly referred to as collecting agencies or collective management organizations ("CMOs") provides music rights holders (authors, owners, and performers of lyrics, compositions, and sound recordings) the ability to authorize the licensing of their copyrighted works to another body (the CMO) who can collect royalties from the numerous sources of usage on behalf of its members. If the law allows, these CMOs are also able to collectively negotiate for rates as well. Royalties derived from these licenses are often collected and distributed by CMOs as a source of income for the creators of musical works, after administrative costs are deducted.

CMOs and their rights-holder members represent a principle-agent relationship as agent-CMOs collects royalties from users on behalf of its principle rightsholder-members. However, if a conflict of interest arises, the inherent information asymmetry may give rise to abuse. In the case of CMOs, this standard principle-agent problem has manifested in forms ranging from inefficient administration overhead, to more dubious acts of corruption and collusion.

Economic theory tells us that the key to a free and fair market is "perfect information", or when stakeholders are equipped with the relevant information needed to make market decisions. Information enforces accountability, an idea that sparked the Right to Information movement in India. This is why transparency is especially critical in the music industry, characterized by complex revenue and consumption patterns, an intricate copyright law framework and stakeholders with varying levels of bargaining power.

Given many CMOs operate as state-granted monopolies which exclusively administer specific class of works, it is important that the collection and distribution of royalties occur in a transparent manner so members and regulators can scrutinize its functioning to ensure greatest effectiveness. For countries which allow competition between CMOs, transparency in operations and revenue data can provide users and members the ability to make an informed choice, and the opportunity for other competing players to enter the market.

Within India, transparency has been a recurring issue due to allegations of mismanagement and corruption[4] of the copyright societies. This was one of the motivations for the 2012 Copyright Amendment and subsequent2013 Copyright Rules which attempted to address, amongst other issues, regulations around transparency for registered copyright societies in India.

Thus, in light of new transparency and operations regulations for India, and inconclusive research findings due to sparse data, the authors sought to review the transparency of various CMO websites and their corresponding regulatory measures in the hopes of answering the following questions:

1. How does India's level of CMO transparency compare to other countries?

2. Is disclosure of information a result of regulatory pressures or voluntary?

3. What kind of learnings and recommendations can be made from the voluntary information disclosure and/or legal regulatory environments of other countries?

METHODOLOGY

Selecting countries for comparison

Since one of the broader goals of this review was to identify legal and/or industry led proposals for increased CMO effectiveness in India, the authors wanted to select case study country samples which were relevant and useful for the Indian context, while also considering differing legal and regulatory regimes.

The United States was chosen due to its competitive CMO structure where multiple CMOs administering the same class of musical works, and representing similar kinds of rights-holders can co-exist as private entities. Aside from statutory rate-setting of sound recording broadcasts, and anticompetitive consent decrees for ASCAP and BMI, the United States seem to have little to no regulation overall surrounding CMO operations and management.

The United Kingdom was selected due to its recent growing interests in the Indian music industry. This was demonstrated by the high volume of British attendants at recent Indian music industry conferences , several of which were directly sponsored by UK Trade & Investment as a music trade export mission.[5] In addition, U.K.'s CMO structure seemed to be more streamlined, with class of works separately managed under two main music CMOs.

Indian research participants of ongoing research also expressed interest in registering their musical works with CMOs in the U.S. and U.K. given increasing market demand, higher currency exchange, and increased reliability of royalty receipts. This was further indication of relevant country case studies for a comparison with India.

Identifying the Relevant CMOs

Due to challenges enforcing India's 2012 Copyright Amendment Act, and subsequent ambiguity of copyright societies' registration statuses, the selection criteria for CMOs consisted of those organizations which generally issued music licenses and collected royalty revenue on behalf of other rights-holder members.

In India, the following three CMOs were identified for this review: the Indian Performing Right Society ("IPRS") which collects on behalf of composers, lyricists, and publisher-members[6]; the Phonographic Performance Limited ("PPL") which exclusively controls public performance and broadcasting rights for its music label members[7]; and the Indian Singers Rights Association ("ISRA") which is currently the sole officially registered copyright society collecting on behalf of singers for their Performer's Rights. [8]

The status of IPRS and PPL as registered societies are ambiguous due to recent reports of registration withdrawal [9]; therefore compliance to Section 33 of the Copyright Act is uncertain. However, the authors chose to uphold the same standards in this review due to similarity in purpose and functioning.

In the U.S., the identified CMOs included the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers ("ASCAP"), Broadcast Music, Inc, ("BMI") and SESAC (originally the Society of European Stage Authors and Composers) which are all competing Performing Rights Organizations collecting on behalf of songwriters and music publishers for public performance rights. SoundExchange is responsible for managing digital sound recordings for copyright owners (mostly music labels) and performing artists; while Harry Fox Agency ("HFA") collects mechanical royalties on behalf of publishers and songwriters when their compositions are reproduced.

In the U.K., two CMOs were identified: PRS for Music which manages public performance rights on behalf of songwriters, composers, and music publishers; and Phonographic Performance Limited ("PPL-UK"), which manages the rights of performers and record producers. Unlike the United States and India, each society exclusively manages separate categories of works. Although technically a compulsory collective licensing scheme is mandated under Indian copyright law for musical works incorporated in cinematograph films or sound recordings, ambiguity in India remains due to the unregistered/deregistered yet still functioning licensing bodies.

Identifying the comparative parameters

To compare CMOs transparency, the authors sought to develop a feasible proxy to determine their website's degree of disclosure. This was done considering two main stakeholders who most often access CMO websites: rights-holders, and users. The rights holders are owners and/or authors of a copyright or related right (i.e. performer's right) who is a member, has sought membership, or is a potential member of the CMO. The user is any person or organization who seeks to use the copyrighted work and is hence made to pay a fee for such use. This fee is generally based on the licensing agreement, struck between the CMO and the user on behalf of their collective rights holders.

Thus, the following information was identified to be useful for comparative assessment: list of members, governing directors, usage types, tariff rates, royalty distribution policy, annual revenue report, and percentage of distributed royalties. The justifications, and comparative findings are outlined below.

FINDINGS

List of members

Publishing members lists is useful for potential users since it can collectively reduce search costs for ownership information, making the process of licensing and royalty collection more efficient overall. In addition, users approached for licensing payment can also verify that the CMO is indeed authorized to administer those works. This has been a recurring issue in recent history for CMOs in both the United States [10] and India[11], which have reported extortion-like licensing demands for songs which may not have been even owned by their member rights-holders. Some have been alleged to demand licenses for broad, undefined catalogs like entire genres of music.[12] Having members lists published can prevent these discrepancies.

In India, all identified CMOs published their membership lists in accordance with Rule 66, section 1(c) of the Copyright Rules, which mandates the disclosure of members lists explicitly on the website.

In the U.S., all CMOs have published their membership data either as full lists or in the form of a searchable repertoire database corresponding with the specific work. This presentation format was similar in the U.K. although PRS for Music restricted access to authorized users. Nevertheless, this disclosure went beyond U.K.'s Copyright Regulations which only require the number of rights holders represented, whether as members or non-member rights holders to be published in the annual report. To the authors' knowledge, the U.S. does not seem to have an equivalent law as such.

Several CMO websites in the U.S. and U.K. also feature a search for owners of orphan works - copyrighted songs within their catalog in which the due rights-holders are unable to be contacted, or simply unknown due to a multitude of reasons, including lack of data collection, transfer of rights, unknown inheritance from deceased rights holders, amongst others. Many of these CMOs hold undistributed royalties for these works, bringing to question whether rights-holder members truly give genuine authorization for their continued licensing.

India's CMOs could enhance their transparency by adopting the repertoire format of membership disclosure which corresponds with each copyrighted work. It could also provide a platform to collectively identify orphan works' due rights-holders.

Country	CMO	List of Members Available on Website?	Regulation?
India	IPRS	Yes	Copyright Rules, 2013, Rule 66 Code of Conduct for Copyright Societies. Section (1): Every society shall make available on its website... c) List of all members in the general body
	PPL	Yes
	ISRA	Yes
United States	ASCAP	Yes, members can be searched through a database[13]	N/A
	BMI	Yes, members can be searched through a database.[14]
	SESAC	Yes, member list available through repertoire search and as downloadable full list.[15]
	SoundExchange	Yes
	HFA	Yes, artists can be individually searched via HFA's 'Songfile' database[16] but not available as a whole
United Kingdom	PPL UK	Yes, repertoire search database including member/label search exists.[17]	The Copyright (Regulation of Relevant Licensing Bodies )Regulations , 2014 Reporting Requirements 6. The code of practice shall require the relevant licensing body to publish an annual report which includes: a) the number of right holders represented, whether as members or through representative arrangements including, where possible and if applicable, an estimate of the number of non-member right holders represented by any Extended Collective Licensing Scheme
	PRS for Music	A database exists but restricted to authorized users

Governing directors

For rights holder members, knowledge of the governing members directing the functioning of the CMO can help ensure decision making occurs in a representative, accountable manner. In 2011, it was found that IPRS and PPL of India were governed by the same Board of Directors [18], despite theoretically managing distinct sets of rights and representing different rights-holder members. Stopps (2013) in WIPO's 'How to Make a Living from Music' states that democratic governance is highly desirable if not essential, since the board structure should ideally reflect the rights they administer.[19]

In India, all CMOs comply with the 2013 Copyright Rules which mandates the publishing of Governing Council members on its website. All CMOs in the United States, with the exception of SESAC have published information on their governing or executive board. SESAC does highlight the appointment of the CEO within its 'news' section, but not in an easily accessible location.

In the UK, the governing directors are disclosed, though not explicitly mandated for disclosure on the website. Copyright Regulations does require the appointment procedure of the Directors and their remuneration be included in the Annual Report. India's 2014 Copyright Rules appears relatively stringent in comparison given the process is specified in detail rather than a self-regulated process.

Country	CMO	Governing Directors Available on Website?	Regulation?
India	IPRS	Yes	Copyright Rules, 2013, Rule 66 Code of Conduct for Copyright Societies. Section (1): Every society shall make available on its website… d) Names and address of chairman, other members of the Governing Council and other officers in the society Copyright Rules 59 Management of Copyright Society (1) Every copyright society shall have… a) General body…b) Governing Council with Chairman… c) a CEO… (3) The Chairman shall be elected by two third of the majority….
	PPL	Yes
	ISRA	Yes
United States	ASCAP	Yes	N/A
	BMI	Yes, management
	SESAC	Appointment of CEO announced under 'News' section.[20] No other members found
	SoundExchange	Yes
	HFA	Yes
United Kingdom	PPL UK	Yes	Copyright (Regulation of Relevant Licensing Bodies) Regulations, 2014 requires the procedure for appointment of Directors, and the list of remuneration of the Directors to be included in the Annual Report.
	PRS for Music	Yes

User Categories

The categorization of users simply allow potential licensees to understand when they would be legally required to purchase a music license given the scope and scale of their business/usage. User categories can range from restaurants, internet streaming, radio broadcasting, and live performance; to the physical reproduction of a musical composition or sound recording (for example through photocopying of sheet music or burning of CDs).

All CMOs identified had user categories displayed on the websites, with some presenting the distinctions through search options while others outlined usage types as a general list. Only India's Copyright Rules mandated the publishing of different categories of users as part of their tariff scheme.
U.S.'s HFA did not not distinguish licensing requirements by user type, but did communicate when a license would be needed through simple questions regarding usage.

Country	CMO	User categories Available on Website?	Regulation?
India	IPRS	Yes	According to Rule 56 of the Copyright Rules, 2013, it is mandatory for Indian CMOs to publish on their website the different categories of users in their Tariff Scheme
	PPL	Yes
	ISRA	Yes
United States	ASCAP	Yes	N/A
	BMI	Yes, Search bar for user types available
	SESAC	Yes
	SoundExchange	Yes
	HFA	Not specifically, but section on 'What kind of license do I need' delineates user types
United Kingdom	PPL UK	Yes	N/A
	PRS for Music	Yes

Tariff Rates

Tariff rates are the costs of licenses issued by the CMOs. The calculation of these rates are done in a myriad of ways, ranging from being fixed by statutory provisions, set collectively by CMOs, or negotiated privately in a willing buyer-willing seller market. Some rate-setting considerations have included anticipated number of listeners, physical size of establishment, time of music use, number of loudspeakers, etc. Due to similarities in mode and scale of usage, most fixed tariff rates such as blanket licenses offered by CMOs are distinguished by different categories of users, most fixed tariff rates are divided accordingly.

In a market like the U.S. where CMOs compete to sublicense similar kinds of rights, publishing tariff rates can enable comparison of licensing fees for the most cost effective choice.[21] It can also allow users to forecast licensing expenses and adjust their business models or anticipated usage accordingly. Lastly, transparent cost calculations as opposed to hidden negotiated rates can prevent price and user discrimination, since licensees can verify the accuracy of their license charge.

In India, IPRS and ISRA complies to Rule 56 (2) of the Copyright Rules 2014 which mandates the publication of rates distinguished by categories of users, mode of exploitation, user group, durations of use, and territory. In U.K., both CMOs comply with Section 5(c) of their Copyright Regulations 2014 which mandates the publication of 'tariff rates in a uniform format' on the website as part of the monitoring and reporting requirements. In the U.S., all CMOs with the exception of ASCAP publish their tariff rates.

Although the U.S. does not seem to mandate the explicit disclosure of rates, both U.S. and India set statutory rates for certain uses of sound recordings. In the U.S. for example, the rates for ephemeral sound recordings akin to non-interactive, radio-like services are set by the Copyright Royalty Board under S17 USC 112 and 114. Similarly, in India, a statutory rate is also fixed by the Copyright Board for radio broadcasting.

As an anticompetitive measure, music consent decrees in the U.S. also mandate that ASCAP and BMI provide licenses on equivalent, non exclusive terms. This means that while its members can still individually refrain from joining a CMO in its entirety, partial withdrawing of their works from blanket licenses are not allowed.[22]

Despite fairly affordable statutory rates for use in non-interactive services, interactive streaming which seeks to host popular content often still requires direct licensing agreements from major record label conglomerates. Due to the importance of acquiring that content, these labels are often able to negotiate exclusive deals with hidden terms. Evolving music consumption patterns and an inconsistent rate-setting landscape have raised grievances, particularly amongst songwriters. In the U.S., this has led to the Copyright Office's review and reconsideration of the music licensing landscape in recent months, while in India, the cost of content acquisition remain a source of debate by the services.

Country	CMO	Tariff Rates Available on Website?	Regulation?
India	IPRS	Yes, listed as per usage types	Section 33A of the Copyright Act, 1957 and Rule 56 of the Copyright Rules, 2013: ...must indicate separate for categories of users, media of exploitation, user group, durations of use and territory, etc.
	PPL	No
	ISRA	Yes
United States	ASCAP	No, must request	No regulation mandating the disclosure of tariff rates. Consent decrees for BMI/ASCAP as an anticompetitive measure mandates offering of licenses to services on equivalent, non exclusive terms. Statutory rates set by the Copyright Royalty Board under 17 U.S.C. 112 and 114.
	BMI	Yes
	SESAC	Yes
	SoundExchange	Yes
	HFA	Yes, rate charts published[23]
United Kingdom	PPL UK	Yes	The Copyright (Regulation of Relevant Licensing Bodies) Regulations 2014 Section 5 of its Specified Criteria mandates 'provide details of tariffs in a uniform format on its website.
	PRS for Music	Yes

Royalty distribution policy

The royalty distribution policy typically outlines the process and manner of royalty distribution, specifying how royalty is split between member-rights holders and the CMO. It usually notes the frequency of payments as well. Since one of the main reasons a rights-holder seeks membership within a CMO is to ensure their royalties are received on a consistent basis without themselves having to track down all users of their work, a transparent distribution policy is of utmost importance.

In India, IPRS and ISRA published the distribution policy on their website in compliance with Rule 58 of the Copyright Rules. Upon review of both, it was interesting to note the lack of detail in India's policies. Although it is specified in the Act, ISRA does not convey on its website clearly the distribution of percentages, nor the administrative cut it seeks to take. IPRS was very unclear about their frequency of payments, noting that "The distribution of Royalties shall be carried out promptly from time to time", despite the Copyright rules stipulating that the frequency be set at every quarter.

In the U.S., S . 370.5 (c )of the Code of Federal Regulations for statutorily set sound recordings do state that online-published Annual Reports must have information on how royalties are collected, distributed, and spent as administrative expenses. All CMOs seem to comply.

In the UK, Section 6 of the 2014 Copyright Regulations Specified Criteria mandates reporting of the distribution policy in its annual report. Both identified CMOs comply.

Country	CMO	Royalty Distribution Policy Available on Website?	Regulation?
India	IPRS	Yes, although quite vague, unclear frequency of payments[24]	Rule 58 of the Copyright Rules 2013 outline the terms of the Royalty Distribution Policy
	PPL	No
	ISRA	Yes, but vague, unclear re: distribution of percentages and administrative deduction.
United States	ASCAP	Yes, it outlines exactly how it is calculated	For designated collection and distribution companies for use of sound recordings under statutory licenses: S . 370.5 ( c ) of the Code of Federal Regulations , as part of the annual Report, Collectives must indicate how royalties are collected and distributed.
	BMI	Yes, in the Royalty Policy Manual
	SESAC	Yes
	SoundExchange	Yes
	HFA	Yes, rate charts[25] and commission rates revealed.
United Kingdom	PPL UK	Yes	The Copyright (Regulation of Relevant Licensing Bodies) Regulations 2014 Section 6 Reporting Requirements of its Specified Criteria mandates the publishing of the distribution policy in its annual report.
	PRS for Music	Yes

Annual revenue report

The annual revenue report provides an overview of total income, which is particularly important for a CMO acting as a non-profit organization. Rightsholders can assess what the rest of the revenue is being used for, and cross-verify whether the self-reported data is true. For market and policy researchers, the annual revenue report can also provide the breakdown of which licensing services or catalogs are being used. An externally audited revenue report also enhances trust in the organization and ensures reliable financial transparency. Thus, the publication of the annual revenue report forms one of the most important benchmarks of transparency.

In India, only IPRS has published their 2013-14 annual revenue report in compliance with Rule 66 of the Copyright Rules which mandates the publishing of an annual report and audited accounts on their website. None of the other CMOs seem to have done this.

In the United States,S . 370.5 (c ) of the Code of Federal Regulations mandates that CMOs collecting and distributing for statutorily licensed sound recordings must publish their annual revenue report. CMO SoundExchange complies, while HFA does so voluntarily. ASCAP and BMI also post their reports on occasion with a few years missing, but SESAC's report seems to be absent, possibly due to private incorporated company status.

In the UK, both CMOs comply with the 2014 Copyright Regulations under Rule 6 mandating the publication of an annual report.

Country	CMO	Annual Revenue Report Available on Website?	Regulation?
India	IPRS	Yes, for year '13-'14	Rule 66 of the Copyright Rules, 2013, CMOs mandate the publishing of an annual report and audited accounts on their website.
	PPL	No
	ISRA	No
United States	ASCAP	Yes, until 2013	For designated collection and distribution companies for use of sound recordings under statutory licenses: S . 370.5 ( c ) of the Code of Federal Regulations .
	BMI	Sporadically posted
	SESAC	No (possibly because privately held company?)
	SoundExchange	Yes
	HFA	Yes
United Kingdom	PPL UK	Yes, until 2013	In UK, the Copyright (Regulation of Relevant Licensing Bodies) Regulations, 2014 under Rule 6 requires that every CMO publish an annual report containing the annual financial statements, collections from the different licenses and the distribution of royalties.
	PRS for Music	Yes, until 2014

Percentage of Revenue as Distributed Royalties

Given the main function of CMOs are to secure royalties for rights-holders, the percentage of revenue as distributed royalties was calculated using numbers from the latest published annual revenue reports. Although there are differences in CMO mandates and subsequently their investment on litigation and advocacy for example, the proportion of revenue as distributed royalties was used as a simplified proxy of effectiveness for this review. [26]

For those CMOs who published their annual revenue reports, it was found that the percentage of revenue as distributed royalties seemed to range between 80-90%. Given the controversies surrounding collecting societies in India, it was admittedly surprising that IPRS' distributed royalty percentage averaged almost 1% higher than comparable societies in the UK. It is also interesting that the United States seem to have the most efficient CMOs, with two rounding to 90%.

Country	CMO	Data reported on Website	Percentage of Revenue as Distributed Royalties
India	IPRS	From 2013/14 annual revenue report: Net royalties payable: Rs 396743413 / License fees total revenue Rs 470934348:	0.84246013204 = 84.25%
	PPL	N/A	N/A
	ISRA	N/A	N/A
United States	ASCAP	Self reported 88cents/dollar goes back to artists. 2014 Revenue Report: Total receipts: 945 385 Total distribution to members: 850 984	850 984/945 385 = 0.90014544339 90.01%
	BMI	Self reported numbers from press release: "For the fiscal year ending June 30, 2012, BMI reported revenues of $898.7 million and royalty distributions to our affiliates totaling $749.8 million."	749.8 / 898.7 = 0.83431623456 83.43%
	SESAC	N/A
	SoundExchange	Self reported from pre-audit 2013 fiscal report[27]: Total Royalties Collected $656 Total gross distributions $590	590 / 656 = 0.8993902439 89.94%
	HFA	N/A but self reported 11.5% commission[28]	N/A
United Kingdom	PPL UK	Self reported from 2013 financial statement:[29] Total license fee income: £176.9 m Net distributable revenue: £148.4m	0.83889202939 83.89%
	PRS for Music	Self-reported from 2014 annual revenue report[30]: Our royalty revenues for the year were £664.3m, of which we distributed £565.6m to members.	565.6/664.3 = 0.85142255005 85.14%

LIMITATIONS & LEARNINGS

The major limitation of this review is rooted in its various methodological weaknesses, ranging from the sampling of countries, inclusion of ambiguous CMOs, possible bias towards Indian copyright law during the parameter design, limitations of distributed royalties percentage as an effectiveness proxy, lack of measurable factors when attempting to evaluate 'ease of website use', and somewhat shallow legal research. Nevertheless, these were part and parcel of the learnings which stemmed from this review.

Limitations in Country Selection Process

The selection of countries to be assessed was not very methodologically sound. After further literature review, it seems a more representative sample could have been selected. Dr. Fabrice Rochelandet in his 1996 conference paper ' Are Collecting Societies Efficient? An evaluation of collective administration of copyright in Europe' categorized legal supervision systems in the following spectrum: lack of control, control at request, setting up control, permanent control, and extreme control. [31]

Rochelandet (1996) identifies UK as having 'control at request' since decisions surrounding operations are generally left up to the CMO themselves, exemplified by the freedom to develop their own functioning and code of practices, which then must be approved. Control at request is also demonstrated by rights-holder members ability to procure certain documentation upon request, and call upon the tribunals for dispute resolution if desired.

Using this taxonomy, India would likely span across 'setting up control', 'control at request', and possibly 'permanent control'. Setting up control is fitting since the 2012 Copyright Amendment mandates the registration of any organization in the business of issuing and granting licenses for underlying musical works (composition and lyrics) as a 'copyright society'. Typically this requires extensive documentation on procedural and governance matters, most of which is predetermined in detail in the 2012 Copyright Act and 2014 Rules. Permanent control may also apply since the Central Government has powers to cancel the registration of any copyright society and legally cease its functioning. Additionally, quite substantial regulations determine rate setting process and even calculation, as well as distribution of royalties. Lastly, control at request may also be fitting since similar to the UK system, an internal dispute resolution is legally mandated. However, any dispute can also be brought to the quasi-judicial Copyright Board if unable to settle matters internally.

The United States appears as if it would deviate from former examples of more involved legal supervision since it would likely be characterized by 'lack of control'. Few requirements exist regarding specific operations of licensing bodies, with the exception of rate setting for ephemereal sound recordings and anticompetitive consent decrees, the U.S. does provide a contrasting comparative system.

Although these examples do span across part of the spectrum of legal control, a future case study country could include one which mandates complete control such as in the case of Italy with a single state granted monopolist or New Zealand in which a single clearance license is offered to reduce complexity and transaction costs for music users.[32]

Limitations of CMO Identification

Throughout the methodology design, one of the main challenges was deciding which CMOs to include in the review. Due to lack of in-depth knowledge of U.S. and U.K.'s music licensing space, the initial survey and selection included bodies irrelevant to music licensing specifically. Due to the ambiguity in India, all organizations who were involved in some form collective licensing were initially included, including private entities like Novex Communications, and the South Indian Music Companies Association, due to their seeming similarities in functioning. However, they were eventually excluded in the final review to include only those which have received registered society status, or are currently registered as such.

There was also a lack of distinction made between licensing bodies specifically managing underlying works like music composition and lyrics, sound recording (phonographic rights), and performance rights. Although interesting insights may have been able to be drawn between similarly managed members and rights, the disaggregated rights management in the U.S. made these categorizations and comparisons challenging.

Part of the confusion stemmed from the vast variety of CMO systems and characteristics. Ficsor (2003) distinguishes these differences from four varying viewpoints: the level of collectivization, rights' owners freedom of choice, scope of rights and rights-owners covered, and the freedom of CMOs to set rates and other licensing terms.[33] The level of collectivization range in terms of representation, authorization, and even distribution of royalties/returns. The freedom of rights owners' have range in the ability to choose joint management of rights, or even which CMO to manage their rights -- assuming the option is not restricted by their respective copyright laws. The scope of rights and rights owners covered by a CMO varies from exclusively managing its own members rights, occasionally managing other members rights, and occasionally managing all similar members rights with no ability to opt out. Lastly, the freedom of CMOs to set rates and licensing terms range from free negotiations with the possibility of an arbitration body, to legally fixed predetermined rates and conditions.

The tremendous variety of CMO characteristics and the lack of bright lines in defining control factors for this review's selection meant that major music publishers, music services who directly issue payment, and even content aggregators who collate and distribute works for a certain fee could have been included. However, the decision to include only those officially recognized and legally registered as CMOs enhanced the feasibility of this review.

Limitations of Parameter Selection

While reviewing the parameters for transparency, it soon became clear that there were several limitations to the information identified. These include heavy influence in its development from India's context and legal provisions, an assumed value in transparency for transparency's sake, lack of specificity when surveying 'ease of website use', overly simplified proxy for efficiency measurement, a relatively shallow review of the law, and lack of assessment of membership data.

While selecting the comparative parameters, the process of developing a feasible transparency proxy may have been tilted towards the context and legal developments of India. This appeared to be the case when the first round of data collection was inconsistent with further reviews due to what appeared to be differences in the terms being sought - terms used in the Indian Copyright Act - rather than the substance of the content. This is indicative of how India's laws heavily influenced the development of the parameters.

Exposure to mistrust and lack of data in the Indian context may have also led authors to a somewhat presumed ideal of transparency for transparency's sake, implying in a weak correlation between publicly available information, the more effective the website and possibly the CMO . However, Schroff (2014) noted that information overload could occur if a potential licensee is uncertain what they are looking for.[34] From an efficiency point of view, search costs may actually decrease if less information is provided upfront, but better presented in more accessible language and format to guide the user to the relevant information.

Following review of the websites for a list of members, it appears that a more fruitful parameter may have been the publication of actual works and affiliated creators, rather than only the rights-holder members themselves. A grievance occasionally raised is the lack of recognition of composers and producers within a song, since it is typically the singer (or in the case of Indian film music, the actor and the film) who the audience associates with the work. Thus, a full repertoire list could be a useful addition for Indian websites to consider.

The selection of governing directors as a marker of transparency may have also been influenced by India's recent concerns surrounding copyright societies' leadership. Although it is a useful indicator, private, for-profit CMOs which have exclusive membership does not necessarily have the same burdens of a compulsory collective licensing scheme in which representation is necessary. What may be more useful for members is ensuring a dispute resolution process is easily accessible so that any grievances can be taken up through proper channels.

Identifying a relatively simple proxy for effectiveness and efficiency was also challenging. Many CMOs in their annual reports highlighted figures such as 'administrative costs', 'operation costs', 'cost to income ratios', and other similar indicators to report expenses outside of royalty licensing, collection, and distribution. However, due to differences in calculations, a simplified proxy was developed to assess the effectiveness of their core purpose of royalty distribution. However, this calculation does not account for absolute sums, year on year growth, taxation, and other non-monetary benefits. In addition, the differing years, geographies, and class of works makes comparison not very methodologically sound.

The authors had initially included 'ease of website use' as part of the review. However, this parameter was not very clearly developed and defined, and thus reviewed subjectively by different research assistants with varying assessments. Nevertheless, closer attention was paid to web design and user interface to enable greater efficiency in searching for relevant information. Future assessments could measure the number of clicks or amount of time it takes to find a certain piece of oft-sought information.

The assessment of each country's relevant laws was based on whether reporting the information online was mandated by law. However, throughout the exercise it soon became clear that beyond reporting standards, more interesting distinctions such as the level of control and specificity to which the law sought to determine functioning and operations of the CMOs. Although this was briefly touched upon throughout the review, further research should be explored in this area.

Lastly, data the authors did not seek due to logistical limitations were membership-exclusive information. Recent complaints about royalties of streaming services have resulted in the publishing of
numerous HFA and SoundExchange royalty reports by their rights-owners. These reports outline the services and songs from which they have received their royalties, allowing for more informed debate and discussion of royalty payouts and business models of the various digital services. Ongoing research surrounding copyright management in India have found that detailed reports on how royalty was calculated, or from which works/services they were generated are often absent upon receipt of their royalty cheques.

CONCLUSIONS

Despite India's strict legal provisions and control regarding registration, operations, rate setting, and reporting, it appears there is little enforcement and even less compliance, particularly by Phonographic Performance Limited which failed to report tariff rates, royalty distribution policy, and its annual revenue report. The Indian Singers Rights Association published all parameters sought with the exception of their annual revenue report, leaving authors without data needed to calculate the percentage of distributed royalty. The Indian Performing Rights Association provided all information sought in this review, with an 84.25% of revenue as distributed royalties as calculated from its 2013/14 annual revenue report.

Relative to India, CMOs in United Kingdom were regulated less strictly, allowing self-developed codes of conduct providing adherence to certain broad guidelines on operations and reporting. It appears the government only imposes rules in the absence of adequate self-regulation. U.K.'s Phonographic Performance Limited displayed all six indicators sought, with 83.9% as distributed revenues from its 2013 financial statement. PRS for Music did not make its members list and repertoire open to the general public, but did publish all other parameters with 85.1% of distributed revenues as calculated from its 2014 annual revenue report.

To the authors' knowledge, the U.S. has the least operations regulation for CMOs with the exception of reporting laws for those issuing statutory licenses. Anticompetitive consent decrees also prevent partial withdrawal from blanket licenses to ensure non-discrimination towards select services. Despite relaxed regulation, BMI and SoundExchange reported all identified parameters, while ASCAP and HFA reported five, with SESAC only having four. ASCAP, Sound Exchange, and BMI were the only ones to have published their annual revenue report, with percentage of revenue royalty calculated to 90.0%, 89.9%, and 83.4% respectively.

It is important to reiterate however that information transparency demonstrated by CMOs website does not necessarily indicate effectiveness. Though not necessarily the most accurate indicator, there appeared no significant correlation between the percentage of distributed royalties, and amount of information found. All three countries have recently, or are currently undergoing regulatory reviews and reform to enhance copyright management. India's Copyright Amendment Act and Copyright Rules was a response to allegations of corruption and collusion of copyright societies. The legal status of certain CMOs and other private authorized agents not included here are ambiguous. Though they seem to function similarly to private CMOs in the US, whether they will be obliged to comply with copyright societies regulation is uncertain. The United States' Copyright Office has recently undergone a major study of the music licensing landscape. One of the major grievances highlighted was the disparity between negotiated sound recording rates and statutory rates of licenses for works of composers and publishers for the rapidly growing use of internet radio streaming. This disparity is furthered by the aforementioned Consent Decrees. In early 2014, the European Commission had also adopted the Collective Rights Management Directive with the main objectives of increasing transparency and efficiency of CMOs, and to facilitate cross-border licensing for music online. Thus, transparency and increased effectiveness of CMOs particularly in light of the digital age are being made a priority within legislation; and hopefully, in execution as well.

Recommendations

Through reviewing other CMO websites, a few learnings were found which could be adopted by Indian CMOs for enhanced transparency and effectiveness:

Publish a full repertoire of works the CMO is authorized to license with corresponding rights holder information. This recommendation stems from other CMO websites which present their administrable works in a searchable database, allowing users the ability to efficiently identify whether the work they seek to use are covered by the license.
Provide a platform for collectively identifying the due rights-holder of orphan works. This recommendation was a feature found in several other websites which lost contact with the rights holder through failure to update ownership information in the case of rights transfer, changes in contact details ,passing of the original author, unknown inheritance, and more.
Guide new users and potential members through a more user-friendly designed page with simplified, accessible introduction to music licensing. As exemplified by the layout of other websites, the webpage could be subdivided between information useful for prospective or current licensees, and prospective or current member rights-holders. Basic questions framed in accessible language can guide the website user to the correct information.
Increase clarity surrounding royalty distribution policies. During the review, IPRS and ISRA's royalty distribution scheme were noticeably vague. Although ISRA noted the most crucial elements, certain details like how "reliable statistical data" were to be procured and calculated in the case of missing log sheets was absent. IPRS was even more obscure, noting their frequency of royalty distribution would occur "promptly, from time to time."
Publish updated annual revenue reports. This document is probably one of the key indicators of how a CMO is doing financially, and it is important that these are made available so CMOs remain transparent and accountable to its rights-holder members and users.
Clarify dispute resolution processes. This is important particularly for those jurisdictions which do not allow much choice, if at all, between various institutions and rate-setting processes. Membership and representation would ideally provide and promote proper channels for raising and addressing grievances prior to seeking legal remedies.

Further Questions

Although a few insights were found through this review, the numerous limitations indicate a better designed exercise asking different, more nuanced questions may uncover some more fruitful conclusions. Future research could explore membership-exclusive data, and how reporting is presented across CMOs. From a legal standpoint, a more detailed analysis of regulations across different jurisdictions may shed light on different international standards of transparency and reporting. Additionally, given that the highest percentage of distributed royalties were from CMOs based in the U.S., the correlation leads to the question of whether more relaxed reporting requirements, or perhaps a competitive CMO structure can actually contribute to increased effectiveness? Lastly, given the increasingly complex licensing environment and continued creation of rights due to technological innovations, the feasibility of this system to monitor and finance music should be questioned as well. Further research on alternative compensation schemes considering tax-based, or patron-based financing will increasingly become more feasible and important systems to explore.

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Reddy, Prashant. "Did the Big Music Companies on IPRS & PPL Collude to Deny Lyricists and Composers Crores of Rupees in 'Ringtone Royalties? - An Investigation." Http://spicyipindia.blogspot.in/2011/02/did-big-music-companies-on-iprs-ppl.html. Spicy IP, February 14, 2011. http://spicyipindia.blogspot.in/2011/02/did-big-music-companies-on-iprs-ppl.html.
Reid, Harvey. "ASCAP & BMI - Protectors of Artists or Shadowy Thieves?" Wooedpecker.com, 1993. http://www.woodpecker.com/writing/essays/royalty-politics.html.
SESAC. "Repertory Seearch." SESAC, n.d. https://www.sesac.com/repertory/RepertorySearch.aspx?x=100&y=22.
---. "SESAC Announces the Appointment of John Josephson as Chairman and CEO of SESAC," July 31, 2014. http://www.sesac.com/News/News_Details.aspx?id=2109.
Smirke, Richard. "U.K. Music Industry Sets Trade Mission to India." Billboard, September 4, 2014. http://www.billboard.com/articles/business/6243633/ukti-aim-bpi-trade-mission-india-mumbai.
Sound Exchange. "Sound Exchange Draft Annual Report 2013." Annual Report. Sound Exchange, 2013. http://www.soundexchange.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/2013-Fiscal-Report-PRE-AUDIT.pdf.
Stopps, David. "How to Make a Living from Music." Creative Industries. WIPO, 2013. http://www.wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/en/copyright/939/wipo_pub_939.pdf.

[1] FICCI & KPMG. "The Stage Is Set: FICCI-KPMG Indian Media and Entertainment Industry Report 2014." https://www.kpmg.com/IN/en/Topics/FICCI-Frames/Documents/FICCI-Frames-2014-The-stage-is-set-Report-2014.pdf

[2] Centre for Internet and Society. "Research Proposal: Pervasive Technologies: Access to Knowledge in the Marketplace.," http://www.google.com/url?q=http%3A%2F%2Fcis-india.org%2Fa2k%2Fpervasive-technologies-research-proposal.pdf&sa=D&sntz=1&usg=AFQjCNF4hnAUXGIRMcUozZfs5QOFwvO55A.

[3] Huang, Maggie. "Copyright Management in the Age of Mobile Music," December 26, 2014. http://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/copyright-management-in-age-of-mobile-music.

[4] Reddy, Prashant. "The Background Score to the Copyright (Amendment) Act." NUJS Review 5, no. 4 (2012). http://nujslawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/01_prashant.pdf.

[5] Smirke, Richard. "U.K. Music Industry Sets Trade Mission to India." Billboard, Sept 4, 2014. http://www.billboard.com/articles/business/6243633/ukti-aim-bpi-trade-mission-india-mumbai.

[6] IPRS. "The Indian Performing Right Society Limited.," http://www.iprs.org/cms/.

[7] PPL. "About Us." Phonographic Performance LImited, n.d. http://www.pplindia.org/aboutus.aspx.

[8] ISRA. "About ISRA." ISRA Copyright, n.d. http://isracopyright.com/about_isra.php.

[9] Agarwal, Devika. "After IPRS, PPL next to Claim It Is Not a 'Copyright Society.'" SpicyIP, Mar 30 2015. http://spicyip.com/2015/03/after-iprs-ppl-next-to-claim-that-it-is-not-a-copyright-society.html.

[10] Reid, Harvey. "ASCAP & BMI - Protectors of Artists or Shadowy Thieves?" Wooedpecker.com, 1993. http://www.woodpecker.com/writing/essays/royalty-politics.html.

[11] Basheer, Shamnad. "Indian Copyright Collecting Societies and Foreign Royalties: Whither Transparency?," November 18, 2008. http://spicyip.com/2008/11/indian-copyright-collecting-societies.html.

[12] Philipes, Richard Hayes. "How One Independent Musician Defeated BMI." Woodpecker.com, 2003. http://www.woodpecker.com/writing/essays/phillips.html.

[13] ASCAP. "Ascap Clearance Express (ACE) Search." ASCAP We Create Music, https://www.ascap.com/Home/ace-title-search/index.aspx.

[14] BMI. "BMI Search." BMI http://www.bmi.com/search.

[15] SESAC. "Repertory Seearch." SESAC, https://www.sesac.com/repertory/RepertorySearch.aspx?x=100&y=22.

[16] Harry Fox. "Songfile Search." Songfile,

https://secure.harryfox.com/songfile/termsofuse/publictermsofuse.do.

[17] PPL. "PPL Member/Label Search," http://repsearch.ppluk.com/ars/faces/pages/licenseSearch.jspx?_afrWindowMode=0&_afrLoop=6609527708771000&_adf.ctrl-state=17ajb42h7o_4.

[18] Reddy, Prashant. "Did the Big Music Companies on IPRS & PPL Collude to Deny Lyricists and Composers Crores of Rupees in 'Ringtone Royalties? - An Investigation." http://spicyipindia.blogspot.in/2011/02/did-big-music-companies-on-iprs-ppl.html. Spicy IP, Feb 14 2011.

[19] Stopps, David. "How to Make a Living from Music." Creative Industries. WIPO, 2013. http://www.wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/en/copyright/939/wipo_pub_939.pdf.

[20] SESAC. "SESAC Announces the Appointment of John Josephson as Chairman and CEO of SESAC," July 31, 2014. http://www.sesac.com/News/News_Details.aspx?id=2109.

[21] Although it is important to note that each work can only be registered exclusively to one society, so the catalogs won't be identical.

[22] Future of Music Coalition. "ASCAP - BMI Consent Decrees." Future of Music Coalition, October 3, 2014. https://futureofmusic.org/article/fact-sheet/ascap-bmi-consent-decrees.

[23] HFA. "Rate Charts," 2014. https://www.harryfox.com/find_out/rate_charts.html.

[24] IPRS. "Distribution Scheme As Per 17-5-2013." Indian Performing Right Association, 2012. http://www.iprs.org/cms/IPRS/DistributionScheme.aspx.

[25] HFA. "Rate Charts," 2014. https://www.harryfox.com/find_out/rate_charts.html.

[26] However, it is important to note the major limitations of these numbers in making any sort of conclusions due to data acquired from different years, varying geographies, without accounting for differing mandates and non-royalty collection activities. More reflections on this in the Limitations and Learnings Section

[27] "Sound Exchange Draft Annual Report 2013." Annual Report. Sound Exchange, 2013. http://www.soundexchange.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/2013-Fiscal-Report-PRE-AUDIT.pdf.

[28] "HFA Commission Rates." HFA, https://www.harryfox.com/publishers/commission_rate.html.

[29] PPL UK. "Annual Review 2014." Annual Revenue Report, 2014. http://www.ppluk.com/Documents/Annual%20reviews/PPL_Annual_Report_2014.pdf.

[30] PRS for Music. "PRS for Music 2014 Review." Annual Review, 2014. https://www.prsformusic.com/SiteCollectionDocuments/About%20MCPS-PRS/financial-results/prs-for-music-financial-review-2014.pdf.

[31] Rochelandet, Fabrice. "Are Copyright Collecting Societies Efficient? An Evaluation of Collective Administration of Copyright in Europe." Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, 2002.

[32] Resnikoff, Paul. "New Zealand Invents the 'Single Music License' for ALL Performances…." Digital Music News, September 30, 2013. http://www.digitalmusicnews.com/permalink/2013/09/30/newzealand.

[33] Ficsor, Mihali. Collective Management of Copyright and Related Rights. Geneva: WIPO, 2002. http://www.wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/en/copyright/855/wipo_pub_855.pdf.

[34] Andrew. "Transparency and the Collective Management Organisations." CREATe, October 1, 2014. http://www.create.ac.uk/blog/2014/10/01/transparency-and-the-collective-management-organisations.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/comparative-transparency-review-of-collective-management-organisations-in-india-uk-usa

Community Toolkit for Greater Diversity

Admin — 2018-10-30T02:08:31Z

P.P. Sneha participated in a 3 day programme organized by Wikipedia community in Mandrem, Goa from October 5 - 7, 2018. The event was a peer training programmeto strengthen the work in the direction of building greater diversity and inclusion in the Wikimedia community.

Click to see the agenda of the event

More info of the programme can be accessed here

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/community-toolkit-for-greater-diversity

Community Prioritisation of Content Donation: Kannada Wikisource

hasan — 2015-12-15T07:42:09Z

CIS-A2K has initiated a community consultation in order to prioritise and streamline the work on Wikisource projects across FLA. Due to the commitment of volunteers from the respective FLA and the institutional partnerships that A2K has developed we have been able to bring a large corpus of content under free licence into our Wikisource projects. CIS-A2K promotes both content donation and content acquisition strategies in order to bring in free licence content.

The re-releasing of the content under CC-BY-SA is a difficult task no doubt, but the even more difficult task is to get the donated content digitised and made available on Wikisource. As this activity involves three intermediary steps of scanning the original document, uploading the same on commons.wikimedia.org and finally recreate the same page on Wikisource by typing.

It is common knowledge that Indian Language Wikimedia communities consist of very few volunteers and in many communities it is Wikipedia that is the chief attraction for volunteers. This compounds the problem towards work that has to be done on Wikisource. To overcome this problem CIS-A2K has initiated a community consultation and prioritisation effort. CIS-A2K consults community in form of posts on Village pump, mailing lists and other channels of communication and update them about the overall content donated towards Wikisource projects and requests for suggestions and feedback as to the plan to digitse and bringing the content on Wikisource.

For the month of November, 2015 CIS-A2K discussed the plan with the Kannada community Wikimedians and proposed a plan of aggregating all the content that has been donated towards Kannada Wikisource and copyright lapse content that has been identified by Wikimedians. A2K team is currently utilising its institutional partnership with Christ University in digitising the content of Sri. Niranjana a prominent Kannada author that was donated by Prof. Tejaswini Niranjana. As a result of this collaboration with the community A2K team shall be posting a comprehensive list of the content donated to Kannada Wikisource along with copyright lapse books that are available digitally on Digital Library of India and Osmania University Digital Library and other such platforms.

This consultation process with the Kannada Wikimedia community also seeded an idea of creating a 'Book Bank' for Kannada Wikimedians. The objective of the book bank is to provide authentic references, citation material and other primary sources of information for content generation. As a first step towards building of the proposed book bank, we have purchased encyclopaedic material on Stone Inscriptions found in Karnataka, Women writers of Karnataka, Literary history of Karnataka and Kannada Dictionaries. The material acquired under 'Book Bank' will serve as resources for community and will be provided to the community members upon request for the same.

Following lists provide information about the current status of projects undertaken on Kannada Wikipedia:

Projects which are active on Wikisource:

Vimochane - 50 pages to be typed out of 355
Abhaya - 63 to be typed of 326 pages
Doorada Nakshatra - 23 typed out of 175
Rangammana Vathara - 23 to be typed of 209 pages
Ekangini - 41 typed of 228 pages
Kalyanaswami - 100 typed of 251

These books are scanned and uploaded on Kannada Wikisource

Books to be uploaded on Wikisource:

Chirasmarane
Mrutyunjaya
Deekshe
Navodaya
Palike banda panchamruta
Swami Aparampara

Books available to be scanned:

Banashankari
Nandagokula

CIS-A2K has visited the following libraries in order to optimise the efforts put into Kannada Wikisource:

1) Central Library, Cubbon Park, Bangalore

2) Kannada Shaitya Parishat, Chamarajpet, Bangalore

3) B.M. Shri Pratishtana Library, Bangalore

4) Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Basavanagudi, Bangalore

The visits have resulted in identifying many books that were hitherto unavailable with A2K team. We are in process of getting these books and digitise them so that they can be uploaded on Kannada Wiisource. A2K team is hopeful that the increased levels of activity and consultation held with the community will help the overall progress of Kannada Wikisource project.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/community-prioritisation-content-donation-kannada-wikisource

Community led Konkani Wikipedia Outreach

nitika — 2014-06-10T08:44:22Z

Goa University students organised the first ever community led Konkani Wikipedia outreach on May 14, 2014. Fifteen first year M.A. students from Konkani Department participated in the six hour long workshop.

The primary focus of this workshop was to educate the MA first year students about contributing to Konkani Wikipedia which is currently in incubation.

The Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) took this up as an assignment to build capacity of interested community members to conduct effective outreach sessions in Konkani. By way of supporting and mentoring such workshops CIS wants to make sure that we do not reach a situation where Konkani Wikipedia community is entirely dependent on CIS-A2K for its growth. The community should be able to sustain even if CIS-A2K pulls out of its Konkani work.

The workshop was organised by, User: Darshan kandolkar , User: Konknni mogi 24, User: Supriya kankumbikar and User: John Noronha. The presenters were trained, mentored and supported by CIS-A2K to organise this workshop. This included:

Helping the trainers get physical space to organise this workshop at Goa Central State Library.

Training the presenters on how to best organise the workshop and divide it into different sections such as a) Introduction to Wikipedia b) Introduction to Basic Editing c) Hands on workshop on basic editing d) Advance Editing e) Hands on workshop on advance editing

Providing all the training documents such as presentation and presenters note.

Providing registration and feedback forms.

Helping in getting the IP released from '7 accounts creation per IP rule'.

Helping the trainers to design customised energisers, Wikipedia quiz and Wikipedia games to keep the participant's enthusiasm high.


Above: Participants take part in Wiki editing at the workshop.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/konkani-wikipedia-outreach

Community Discussion for Making Tulu Wikipedia Live

praskrishna — 2015-12-15T07:45:54Z

CIS-A2K Programme Officer Rahmanuddin Shaik visited Mangalore on October 28 and 29 and again on November 5 and 6, 2015. During his visit he interacted with Wikipedians for making the Tulu Wikipedia live.

There were discussions on translations of system messages that appear on Wikipedia interface, creating templates pages and adding images. Around 79 strings were translated on Translatewiki.net, the community project for MediaWiki localization, and about 500 strings were approved. This event was organised at Tulu Bhavana, Karnataka Tulu Sahitya Akademy. The director of the institution was part of the meeting who agreed for the following:

To relicense a lower resolution cover pages, and metadata of their 157 volumes of books under Creative Commons licenses. This will bring in those many articles on Tulu Wikipedia.
To give detailed information of winners of Tulu Sahitya Akademy award winners (this was being given away across 6 disciplines from 1993 onwards), which would add close to 100 biography articles on Tulu Wikipedia.

A possibility of CIS-A2K and Tulu Sahitya Akademy collaboration was also discussed briefly. Vishwanatha Badikana was there throughout these talks and he would be the contact person for further work.

Rahmanuddin was also invited to be a part of the World Konkani Literature festival where he spoke briefly about Konkani Wikipedia to the gathering.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/news/making-tulu-wikipedia-live