Centre for Internet and Society

International Workshop on the Impact of the TRIPS Agreement on key sectors and its continuing relevance in the context of Regional and Bilateral Trading Agreements

praskrishna — 2015-10-28T02:57:33Z

On the occasion of 20 years of TRIPS Agreement, Centre for WTO Studies and Indian Institute of Foreign Trade is holding a workshop at Naland, Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, New Delhi on October 26 and 27, 2015. Pranesh Prakash is a speaker in the concluding session.

26^th October 2015 (Monday)
1000-1030 hrs	Registration
1030-1100 hrs 1030-1035hrs 1035-1045 hrs 1045-1055 hrs 1055-1100 hrs	Inaugural Session Welcome Remarks by Prof. Abhijit Das, Professor & Head, Centre for WTO Studies, Indian Institute of Foreign Trade Remarks by Dr. V. Bhaskar, Former Special Chief Secretary Government of Andhra Pradesh and Joint Secretary Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, Government of India Inaugural Address by Shri Rajeev Kher, Former Commerce Secretary* Vote of Thanks by Ms Chandni Raina, Professor, Centre for WTO Studies, Indian Institute of Foreign Trade
1100-1130 hrs Tea
1130-1330 hrs	Session 1 Implementation of the TRIPS Agreement by developing countries and the growth of the Regional and Bilateral Trading Agreement The TRIPS Agreement placed on the developing countries onerous commitments with respect to protection of IPRs leading to a complete overhaul of their legislations. In the process more than half of the LDCs implemented their obligations under TRIPS even before the timelines set for them for compliance. Many developing countries have moved beyond TRIPS in their legal regimes. At the same time, further tightening of the regime as part of the FTA commitments is also a concern. The session discusses the manner in which countries met their commitments under TRIPS and the pulls and pressure that led to the TRIPS plus positions adopted by many. The plethora of FTAs and BITs has set additional commitments. The lessons learnt from recent arbitration proceeding and the positions adopted by countries such as South Africa, Indonesia, Thailand and India need to be examined. In the context of increasing pressure to harmonize enforcement standards, the reasonableness of this given the differing domestic priorities and developmental goals also needs to be studied. Questions for discussion: What were the pulls and pressures faced by the developing countries as they sought to comply with the TRIPS Agreement? Have the developing countries largely accepted TRIPS Plus commitments in their IPR regimes including on crucial issues such as public health and enforcement? What are the areas in which the FTA and RTAs are further enhancing protection? Are the developed countries seeking commitments that are even beyond the protection provided in their own jurisdiction? What are the various mechanisms of influence exercised by the developed countries? Chair: Shri Jayant Dasgupta, Former Permanent Representative of India to the WTO Speakers: Prof. Peter Drahos, Australian National University Prof Carlos Correa, University of Buenos Aries Prof Frederick Abbott, Florida State University Shri R. Saha, Senior Advisor, Confederation of Indian Industry Shri KM Gopa Kumar, Third World Network
1330-1430 hrs	Lunch
1430-1630 hrs	Session 2 IP and Economic Development The reasonableness of high level IPR protection is often explained in the context of the beneficent impact it has on economic growth and development. The session will examine the strength, if any, of this correlation. Is the level of IP protection alone responsible for higher growth? What are the preconditions if any and empirical evidence on the level of development when this correlation really sets in? An important factor in development is the ability of countries to access technology and knowhow. What has been the experience of the developing countries in getting new technology? The session will discuss cross country studies with a view to gain clarity on this issue. Questions for discussion: Most developed countries have benefitted from fairly lax IPR regime, but the argument being given now for a high level of IPR protection is the beneficent impact it is likely to have on economic growth. Are the developed countries seeking to ‘kick away the ladder’ with which they climbed up to the top? Or is there a basis for the argument extended by them? What is the empirical evidence of the correlation of enhanced IPR protection on economic growth and development of a country? How important is IPR as a factor in economic growth? What is the evidence on the extent of technology transfer from the developed to the developing countries in the past two decade? Chair: Shri Sudhansh Pant, Joint Secretary, Department of Pharmaceuticals, Government of India Speakers: Prof. Peter Drahos, Australian National University Prof Sunil Mani, Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram Prof Sunil Kanwar, Delhi School of Economics, Delhi University Mr Bobby Bedi, Film Producer and Director, Chairman, FICCI committee on Film and Industry
1630-1700 hrs	Tea

27^th October 2015 (Tuesday)
0945-1300 hrs	Session 3 TRIPS and Public Health Pharmaceutical and biotech sectors had the maximum divergence in IP protection regimes across countries prior to the TRIPS Agreement. The TRIPS Agreement was therefore a watershed for these sectors. However the flexibilities and subsequently the Doha declaration on TRIPS and Public Health have allowed countries to model the laws taking into account their developmental and societal objectives. Questions for discussion: Pharmaceuticals and the biotech sectors were possibly the most impacted by the TRIPS Agreement. However, the flexibilities allowed countries to take into account their public health concerns while formulating the Patent regimes. How did the Agreement impact access to medicines? Does this remain an unfinished agenda for the developed countries? What would be the areas where further action could be seen? Chair: Justice (retd.) Prabha Sridevan, Former Chairperson of the Intellectual Property Appellate Board Speakers: Mr D.G Shah, Secretary General, Indian Pharmaceutical Alliance Mr. Bhaskar Bhattacharya, Partner, Corporate Law Group Ms Leena Menghaney, ‎Access Campaign India Co-ordinator at Médecins Sans Frontières Prof Frederick Abbott, Florida State University Mr Anand Grover, Senior Advocate, Supreme Court of India* Prof Sudip Chaudhuri, Indian Institute of Management, Kolkata
1300-1400 hrs	Lunch
1400-1530 hrs	Concluding Session Shape of things to come The twenty years since the TRIPS Agreement came into existence, saw widespread changes in the legislative framework of most developing countries. While they grappled with fulfilling the obligations of the Agreement, the developed world has looked towards further strengthening these norms. The FTA/RTA’s with their tighter IPR chapters are but an outcome of this exercise. *Questions for discussion:* With FTAs/RTAs a norm, where are we headed? Will TRIPS lose its relevance? Or will the TRIPS be renegotiated? What are the new issues that will figure prominently in any prospective negotiations? What are the likely implications? Chair: Dr. V. Bhaskar, Former Special Chief Secretary Government of Andhra Pradesh and Joint Secretary Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, Government of India Speakers: Prof Frederick Abbott, Florida State University Mr Pranesh Prakash, Policy Director, Centre for Internet Society Ms. R V Anuradha, Partner, Clarus Law Associates Ms Sanya Reid Smith, Legal Adviser, Third World Network
1530-1600	Tea

*- tbc

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/international-workshop-on-the-impact-of-the-trips-agreement-on-key-sectors-and-its-continuing-relevance-in-the-context-of-regional-and-bilateral-trading-agreements

International treaty to make books accessible to the blind

praskrishna — 2012-12-21T11:36:11Z

It would make it legal to send accessible books across borders.

The article by Ramya Kannan was published in the Hindu on December 20, 2012. Rahul Cherian is quoted.

In a move that is likely to take more books closer to some 285 million people in the world, the Extraordinary General Assembly of the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) has referred the Treaty for Visually Impaired Persons to a diplomatic conference in June of 2013.

The treaty would allow specialist organisations to make accessible copies of books in all signatory countries; make it legal to send accessible books across national borders and make more books available for the blind.

There are an estimated 285 million blind and partially-sighted people in the world, of which the largest percentage lives in India. Like everyone else, blind people need books for education, pleasure and inclusion in society, but unlike others, these books are not accessible to them.

Books have to be converted into ‘accessible formats’ — audio, Braille, or large print — for the visually impaired. However, the fact is that about only 1 to 7 per cent of all books published are available in these formats.

“In many countries, the copyright laws prevent making accessible copies of the books, or importing them from nations where it is available,” said Rahul Cherian Jacob, who heads the Inclusive Planet Centre for Disability Law and Policy. He helped in drafting the Treaty and is the legal adviser to the World Blind Union on the Treaty.

Some developed nations have huge budgets that would allow them to make books in accessible formats. For instance, the U.S. had about $400 million a year to spend on making such books, while countries like India have very little funds available for the purpose, he said. Even if these books were available in the U.S., they were not accessible in India, because of import restrictions.

Sam Taraporevala, Director of the Xavier’s Resource Centre for the Visually Challenged and vice president and chairman policy formulation, Daisy Forum of India, said this could not have come at a better time for India. It was in last June that the amendment to the Copyright Act was passed, making a special exception to make accessible books.

G.R. Raghavender, Registrar, Copyrights, told The Hindu, “While the WIPO treaty looks at the blind and print-disabled, in June, Parliament introduced wider exceptions for physically disabled. Authorised entities will be allowed to produce accessible versions of books on a not-for-profit-basis without seeking for special permissions.”

However, even with this, owing to import restrictions, books already available in accessible formats in other countries could not be brought into India. They would have to be reprinted, Mr. Jacob noted.

"This is the real benefit of the treaty if it kicks in," Dr. Taraporevala said. Books could be sent across nations without restrictions, and this would mean a significant increase in the number of books available.

"However, what we do need to move towards a scenario where publishers will attempt to move towards equal opportunity publishing. The ideal scenario will be to make available every book that is published in accessible formats. Hopefully if all goes well, there will be something on the ground by the end of next year," he said.

The Cabinet should give the nod for India signing and ratifying the international treaty for it to come into force. However, given the overwhelming positive reception to the recent amendment to the Copyright Act, getting approval would not be an issue, rights activists said.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/the-hindu-ramya-kannan-december-20-2012-international-treaty-to-make-books-accessible-to-the-blind

International Mother Language Day

praskrishna — 2016-02-27T06:17:37Z

On 21 February 2016, Eenadu published a special story on the occasion of International Mother language day in Hyderabad edition. The special story covered Wikipedians effort to develop Encyclopedic content online and also about multi-lingual (English-Telugu) Wikipedians meetup organized in December 2015.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/eenadu-february-21-2016-international-mother-language-day

International Copyright Law

praskrishna — 2016-05-15T15:32:23Z

Anubha Sinha will be attending the 2016 IViR Summer Course on International Copyright Law as a beneficiary of the OSF Civil Society Scholarship in Amsterdam from July 4 to 8, 2016. The event is being organized by the University of Amsterdam.

For more info click here.

Monday July 4
8:45-9:15	Welcome
9:15-9:30	Opening Session by Bernt Hugenholtz
9:30-12:30	‘International Framework’ by Bernt Hugenholtz	This session sets out the framework of international copyright protection, and describes the main norms of the Berne Convention, the TRIPS Agreement, the WIPO Copyright Treaty and various bilateral instruments.
14:00-17:00	‘TRIPS and Other Trade Agreements' by Daniel Gervais	This session focuses on the Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property, administered by the WTO, and other more recent trade agreements. It takes a look at the negotiation process leading to their adoption, at the decisions from the WTO Dispute Resolution Panel and the impact on developing nations.
18:00-21:00	Boat tour on Amsterdam canals and welcome dinner

Tuesday July 5
9:30-12:30	'Copyright and Competition Law' by Thomas Vinje	In principle, the objectives of copyright law and competition law are complementary in that they are both meant to promote creativity and innovation. In some cases, however, the exercise of exclusive rights runs afoul of competition rules. This session describes how these two fields of law interact.
14:00-17:00	‘Recent Case Law of the Court of Justice of the EU' by Stef van Gompel	This session examines the recent case law of the Court of Justice of the European Union, which has been very active in issuing preliminary rulings interpreting various provisions of the Directive on Copyright in the Information Society and others. This leads to further harmonization of copyright within the EU but it also holds its share of ambiguities.

Wednesday July 6
9:30-12:30	'Collective Administration of Rights' by Daniel Gervais	Sometimes required by law and other times necessary due to practical reasons, rights owners must exercise their rights through collecting societies. This session outlines the general workings of a collective administration of rights system, and considers its future in a digital environment.
Afternoon	(free)
Evening	(free)

Thursday July 7
9:30-12:30	‘The EU Copyright Reform Package’ by Martin Senftleben	Following its Digital Single Market Strategy, the European Commission is in the process of rolling out plans to modernise the EU copyright framework. This session discusses these plans and examines their implications.
14:00-17:00	'Limitations & Exceptions for Libraries and Archives' by Lucie Guibault	Archives and libraries increasingly wish to engage in digitization projects, e-lending and other relevant activities. This session explores in what way the WIPO agenda and relevant EU Directives provide room for such activities.

Friday July 8
9:30-12:30	'Database Protection' by Bernt Hugenholtz	In Europe, makers of databases enjoy an exclusive right on their databases pursuant to the European Directive on the legal protection of databases. This session examines the scope and content of the sui generis right on databases, and discusses the case law from the European Court of Justice and the national courts.
14:00-17:00	'Digital Copyright Controversies' by Fred von Lohmann	This session discusses the changes brought by the digital networked environment with respect to copyright infringement liability. It describes in greater detail the liability regimes that apply to Internet intermediaries, the challenges posed by user generated content online, as well as emerging solutions to these controversies.
17:00-19:00	Closing reception

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/international-copyright-law

International Conference on Innovation for Shared Prosperity

praskrishna — 2016-08-25T02:40:59Z

Rohini Lakshane attended a conference on IP Rights, Competition and Standard Setting in the IT industry on August 20 and 21, 2016. The conference was organized by O.P. Jindal Global University and Jindal Initiative on Research in IP & Competition.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/international-conference-on-innovation-for-shared-prosperity

International Conference on Evolving Regime in Intellectual Property Protection

praskrishna — 2015-11-29T08:11:52Z

Jawaharlal Nehru University organized a conference from 2 to 4 November 2015 at its campus in New Delhi. Pranesh Prakash was a speaker in the session "IP Enforcement".

Agenda

Time	Session	Theme	Speaker
Day 1: 2nd November, 2015
8:30-10:00	Registration
10:00-11:00	Inaugural session		Praveen Jha
			MR Murthy
			Sakthivel Selvaraj
			K.M. Gopakumar
11:00-11:15	Tea
11:15-13:00	Plenary 1	Twenty Years of TRIPS Implementation	Chair: D G Shah
			OPPI
			Amit Sengupta
			Biswajit Dhar
13:00-14:00	Lunch
14:00-15:45	Parallel session 1a	TRIPS flexibilities	Chair: Mira Shiva
			Leena Menghaney
			Aditi Kahtri
			Shivani
			Prabhat Kuamr Saha
			Priyanka Kumari
			Krutika Gaur
			Chandan Wadhwa
	Parallel session 1b	Multinational Enterprises and Access to Medicines	Chair: Bruno Woeren
			Reji Joseph
			Suraksha Gupta
			Swadhin Mondal
			Dr. Jafar K
			Dr KD Raju
			Apurva Agarwal
			Aman Shukla
	Parallel session 1C	Lightening presentations 1	Chairs: Muraleedhran VR & Arun Nair
			T.M.Vasuprada
			Aakriti Jain
			Uttam Bhattacharya
			Soumya Sinha
			Azamat Ali
			Nidhi Saxena
			Aishwarya Khanna
			Mayank Kapila
			Krishna Kumar Verma
			Nidhi Nair
			Ravindra Chingale
			Smita Sahu
15:45-16:00	Tea
16:00-17:30	Plenary 2	TRIPS Plus	Chair: Chandani Raina
			Kajal Bhardwaj
			Nirmalya Syam
			D.G. Shah
			Alka Mehta
			Pranesh Prakash

Day 2: 3rd November, 2015
10:00-11:30	Plenary 3	IP and Access to Medicines	Chair: Manisha Shridhar
			Sakthivel Selvaraj
			Amit Sengupta
			Leena Menghaney

11:30-11:45	Tea
11:45-13:15	Parallel session 2a	Patent Pools and Voluntary Licensing	Chair: Ravi Duggal
			Shailey Gupta
			Kajal Bhardwaj
			Abhishek Tripathi
			Garima Singh
			Achyut Shankar Shukla
			Renuka PP
	Parallel session 2b	IP and Access to knowledge	Chair: T.C. James
			Zakir Thomas
			Saradindu Bhaduri
			Jayanta Ghosh
			Dr Kavitha Chalakkal
			Harilal Madhavan
			Amiya Kumar Pati
	Parallel Session 2c	Lightening presentations 2	Chair: Preeti Kumar and Dinesh Abrol
			Amritha Gunasekaran
			Aishwarya Dhancholia
			Deepesh Raj
			Aqa Raza
			Nikhil Kashyap
			Swapan Manna
			Veer Mayank
			Ganesh Mishra
			Harsh Kankane
			Rakhee Gupta
			Ashit Kumar Srivastava
			Yashwant Kumar Yash
			C.Prashanthi
13:25-14:15	Lunch			Presenter 3
14:15-16:00	Parallel session 3a	TRIPS and Agriculture	Chair: R.C. Aggarwal
			Shalini Bhutani
			Kumar Ankit
			Krishna Ravi Srinivas
			Dr.S.Elumalai
			Amit Singh
			Nidhi singh
			Anna David Thottappilly
			Rohit Moonka
	Parallel session 3b	IP enforcement	Chair: Madhukar Sinha
			Yogesh Pai
			Prashant Sugthan
			Pranesh Prakash
			Amjad Ali
			Abhilosh Chaturvedi
			Shirin Syed
			Indrani Barpujari
	Parallel session 3c	Lightening presentations 3	Chair: K.M. Gopakumar and Kajal Bhardwaj
			Nalini Kaushik
			Gouri Saxena
			Deepali Vashist
			Satatya Anand
			Kunjal Arora
			Aditya Mishra
			Aditya Amar
			Shivam Kumar
			Nidhi Singh
			Shova Devi
			Rashmi Kumari /Subir Kumar
16:00-16:15	Tea
16:15-17:30	Plenary 4	India's IP Policy	Chair: Rajeev Kher
			Carlos Correa
			Manisha Shridhar
			Dinesh Abrol
			Anand Grover
Day 3: 4th November, 2015
9:00-10:15		Lightening presentations 4	Chair: V.G. Hegre and Keerti Pradhan
			Alok Ranjan
			Jupi Gogoi
			Ruchika Sharma
			Divya Monga
			Atul Sharma
			Charu Srivastava
			Ravi Parupalli
			Prabhakar Maurya
10:15-11:30	Plenary 5	TRIPS and Sustainable Development Goals	Chair: Biswajit Dhar
			T.C. James
			K.M. Gopakumar
			Ranja Sengupta
11:30-11:45	Tea
11:24-12:30	Plenary 6	The way forward…	Chair: Muchkund Dubey
			B.S. Chimni (tbc)
			Jayant Dasgupta
			Carlos M. Correa
12:30-13:00	Closing Remarks and Vote of Thanks
13:00 onwards	Lunch

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/international-conference-on-evolving-regime-in-intellectual-property-protection

International Conference on Contours of Media Governance: Teaching, Disciplinarity, Methodology

praskrishna — 2013-03-05T09:28:27Z

The Centre for Culture, Media & Governance, Jamia Millia Islamia organises an international conference on contours of media governance at Jamia Milla Islamia in New Delhi from February 25 to 27, 2013. The event is supported by Ford Foundation and ICSSR.

Sunil Abraham is participating in the event as a speaker and will present the Pervasive Technologies project.

Click to download the agenda.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/international-conference-on-contours-of-media

Intellectuals stresses on need for revival of Bhagabat Tungi in Odisha villages as knowledge hub

praskrishna — 2014-05-06T07:03:49Z

Odia Intellectuals stresses on need for revival of Bhagabat Tungi in Odisha villages as knowledge hub. This was expressed by the intellectuals at a seminar organized by ‘The Intellects’ at Tyagaraj Nagar Jaggnath Mandir, New Delhi.

The article was published in Odishadiary on April 22, 2014. Subhashish Panigrahi is quoted.

It should be noted that The Intellects a Delhi based organization of Odia intellectuals and Shree Jagannath Mandir & Odisha Art And Cultural Center have come together to organize a seminar on the subject “Relevance Of Bhagabat Tungi In The Evolution Of Odia Language From Budha Era To Digital Age”.

The conference was about the discussion over creative platform for future development of Odia language and literature. Delegates were drawn from diverse areas to provide more interdisciplinary insight in to issues and challenges that are in from of Odia language to march ahead in the new age of computer.

The seminar was attended by Rajya Sabha MP Baisnab Parida, Dr. Subash Pani, Dr. Bhagaban Prakash, researcher Subrat Prusti, writer and lawyer Biraja Mohapatra, journalist and Odiakart.com founder Sahasranshu Mahapatra, Subhashish Panigrahi- Programme Officer at the Centre for Internet and Society and The Intellects chairman Shri Devendra Rout.

The program was attended by who is who of Delhi Odias like OdiaRadio Founder, Sitanshu Mohapatra, Journalist Asit Ranjan Mishra, OdishaDiary (www.orissadiary.com) founder Prachee Naik, The Intellects members Smrutidhara Rout, Anasuya Sahoo, Aditya Mohanty, Nirmal Dhal, Sangram Dhar, Sanjaya Parida, Pankajamala Sarangi, Premanda Swain, lawyer Sanjeeb Kumar Mohanty, Tarun Samantray, Dr. Anita Panda, Prof. Saudamini Barik, Jayaram Samal, Indubhushan Lenka, Kamdev Biswal of Tyagraj Nagar Jaggnath Temple and others.

This program was attended by nearly 600 Odias living across the national capital region. The Intellects also organsing 7-days BHAGABAT SANDHYA will also be organized at the premises of Shree Jagannath Mandir, Tyagraj Nagar, New Delhi from 21st April to 27 April 2014 in an effort to spread the noble principles of the SHREEMAD BHAGABAT.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/odisha-diary-april-22-2014-intellectuals-stresses-on-need-for-revival-of-bhagabat-tungi-in-odisha-villages-as-knowledge-hub

Intellectual Property Rights — Open Access for Researchers

nehaa — 2015-03-24T01:22:20Z

In the year 2013, Nehaa Chaudhari had worked on a module on Intellectual Property Rights for United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)'s Open Access Curriculum (Curriculum for Researchers) as part of a project for the Commonwealth Educational Media Centre for Asia. UNESCO published the module this year. Nehaa Chaudhari and Varun Baliga were among the Module preparation team. Nehaa Chaudhari was the writer for Units 1, 2 and 3: Understanding Intellectual Property Rights, Copyright and Alternative to a Strict Copyright Regime.

This publication is available in Open Access under the Attribution - ShareAlike 3.0 IGO (CC-BY-SA 3.0 IGO) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/igo/). By using the content of this publication, the users accept to be bound by the terms of use of the UNESCO Open Access Repository (http://www.unesco.org/open-access/terms-use-ccbysa-en).

Module Introduction

Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) are set of rights associated with creations of the human mind. An output of the human mind may be attributed with intellectual property rights. These are like any other property, and the law allows the owner to use the same to economically profit from the intellectual work. Broadly IPR covers laws related to copyrights, patents and trademarks. While laws for these are different in different countries, they follow the international legal instruments. The establishment of the Wold Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has established the significance of IPR for the economic growth of nations in the knowledge economy.

This module has three units, and while the Unit 1 covers the basics of IPR, Unit 2 expands in detail the components of copyright and explains the origins and conventions associated with it. Unit 3 discusses the emergence of liberal licensing of copyrighted work to share human creation in the commons. In the last unit, we discuss the Creative Commons approach to licensing of creative works within the structures of the copyright regime that permits the authors to exercise their rights to share in the way they intend to. Creative Commons provides six different types of licenses, of which the Creative Commons Attribution license is the most widely used in research journals part of the Open Access framework.

At the end of this module, you are expected to be able to:

Understand intellectual property rights and related issues
Explain copyright, authors’ rights, licensing and retention of rights; and
Use the Creative Commons licensing system

Acknowledgements

Nehaa would like to thank Varun Baliga and Anirudh Sridhar for their research and writing support in Unit 1, and Samantha Cassar for Unit 2.

Click to download the PDF containing the Modules. Also read UNESCO’s Open Access (OA) Curriculum is now online

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/unesco-nehaa-chaudhari-march-19-2015-communication-and-information-resources-news-and-in-focus-articles-unesco-open-access-curriculum-is-now-online

Intellectual Property Rights & TRIPS: An Overview

Job Michael Mathew — 2016-01-31T05:54:02Z

The Uruguay Round of multilateral trade negotiations of the General Agreement on Trade and Tariff began in 1986 with a Ministerial Deceleration in Punta del Este.

One of the 13 subjects for negotiation in Part I of the declaration dealing with trade in goods was the mandate on Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). The essence of the mandate was to develop an effective and adequate standard of protection of intellectual property rights and a multilateral framework of principles, rules and disciplines dealing with international trade in counterfeit goods. The agreement laid the architecture for a uniform global treatment of IPR by providing for minimum standards of IP protection, national enforcement mechanisms and dispute settlement mechanisms.

GATT and IPR

Article IX: 6 was the only provision in the GATT that specifically dealt with the protection and promotion of IP. The Article dealt with distinctive regional or geographical names and did not lay down any standards of protection but rather called on States to corporate with each other on its protection. The first attempt at addressing questions of IPR within the GATT framework was made by the United States in 1978 towards the end of the Tokyo Round of multilateral trade negotiations. The focus at this point of time was to develop a plurilateral agreement on trade in counterfeit goods. No progress was made on this front due to lack of support from any country/bloc apart from the EC.The matter was raised again in the 1982 Ministerial meeting and the Ministerial Declaration included an instruction to the GATT council to look into the question of counterfeit goods and the appropriateness and modalities of joint action within the GATT framework to counter the same. The expert group constituted pursuant to the Ministerial Declaration called for enhanced international action to tackle the problem of trade in counterfeit goods but stopped short of agreeing that GATT was the right forum for this. The preparations for the Uruguay Round in 1986 arrested any further progress by the expert group, even as active efforts were made to include IP in the Round.

IPR in the Uruguay Round

The United States was the major force behind the inclusion of IP in the Uruguay Round. Ineffective protection of US IP abroad was thought to be undermining the competitiveness of the US industry by both the US Government and industry. The objective was to evolve substantial standards of protection of IP in other countries along with effective enforcement mechanisms. This objective had earlier found expression in the US Trade and Tariff Act of 1984 which states explicitly that adequate foreign IP protection is a major US objective in trade negotiations.

In the initial stages of the Uruguay Round it was only US and Japan that were at the forefront for the inclusion of IPR’s in the mandate of negotiations. As a consequence of this, the first two years of the TRIPS Negotiating Group was an effort towards clarifying its negotiating mandate. The United States wanted the mandate to extend to substantive standards of protection of IP and internal enforcement; other developed countries were measured in their response. In particular, EC had an ambivalent stand at the beginning due to the added complication of distribution of competences between member states as EC institutions now had exclusive competence in GATT related matters. However as negotiations proceeded industrialized countries including Australia, Canada, Switzerland, New Zealand and the Nordic countries joined the pro IP bandwagon recognizing their shared interests in the deal. Even as industrialized countries were on one page in relation to the need for substantial IP protection to be part of multilateral trade rules there were still differences among them on the scope of protection of certain IPRs and with respect to special measures for developing countries such as transition periods , ‘pipeline protection’ and compulsory licensing. The underlying consensus on the need for IP protection within the GATT framework among these countries ensured that differences as noted above did not end up derailing the agreement.

Developing countries on the other hand were apprehensive about the inclusion of IPR within the GATT framework. The reasons for such a stand include, the belief that the mandate of GATT should not extend beyond ‘goods’, that such an inclusion will intrude into the domestic policy space of these countries and adversely affect their sovereignty in pursuing socio-economic policies according to their own needs and finally that there was nothing to be gained from undertaking obligations when 99% of the global patents and other forms of IP are owned by industrialized countries. However in the midterm review meeting held at Montreal in 1988 it started to appear that some of these developing countries shifted their stand in favour of inclusion of IPR in the GATT framework. This change in stand was not due to any new found clarity on the need for stricter and stronger IP protection at a global level. The future of multilateral trading system and the market access it secured came to be linked with the success of the Uruguay Round and a successful completion of TRIPS agreement was increasingly seen as a prerequisite for such an outcome. This belief was buttressed by the fact that the WTO agreement created new trade rights and did not incorporate pre-existing rights of the GATT with the result that any Government not joining it would lose the rights they enjoyed prior to the agreement. There was growing acceptance that refusing to deal with IP within the GATT will lead to a situation where developing countries will have to address it through bilateral agreements where the balance of power is further skewed in favour of developed countries. Further the potential benefits the agreement could bring in, in the fields of agriculture and textile was becoming clearer. Most importantly developing countries believed that using their collective bargaining power they could build into the agreement adequate flexibilities which will achieve a better balance of the interests of the developed and developing world.

Inherent Flexibilities in TRIPS

Although the mandate of TRIPS was to evolve a uniform global IP system with minimum standards of protection and effective enforcement mechanisms it does include a number of flexibilities that facilitate development and protection of public interest. In 1990 even as negotiations were in full swing to iron out differences between developed and developing countries , a draft TRIPS agreement was tabled by industrialized countries the focus of which was minimum protection , enforcement mechanisms and dispute settlement measures. In response to this draft, developing countries proposed their own draft legal text which aimed to maintain some flexibility in the agreement to allow countries to implement economic and social development objectives. The idea that was being emphasized was that intellectual property is not an end in itself and its objective should be the overall benefit of society as opposed to mere private benefit. These concerns of the developing countries found expression in Article 7 and 8 of the TRIPS of the agreement.

Article 7 and 8 of the agreement explicitly provide the important objectives and principals that need to be considered in the interpretation of the Agreement. Article 7 sets out the objective of the agreement to be promotion of technological innovation, transfer and dissemination of technology, production and use of technological knowledge while giving due attention to social and economic welfare. Article 8 gives countries the freedom to amend their laws to protect public health, nutrition and to promote public interest. Further, the preamble of the agreement recognizes underlying public policy objectives of countries in the protection of intellectual property rights which include developmental and technological objectives. A combined reading of Article 7, 8 and the Preamble of the agreement ‘in good faith in accordance with the ordinary meaning given to the terms of the treaty’ reveals that the agreement shows due deference to the domestic policy considerations of member countries. Thus even though TRIPS had its genesis in the strategic interests of the developed world , by the time the agreement was agreed and entered into , the developing world by virtue of its collective bargaining power had managed to incorporate certain flexibilities to make the agreement a more balanced framework for the protection and promotion of intellectual property.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/intellectual-property-rights-trips-an-overview

Intellectual Property in Mobile Application Development in India

sinha — 2015-08-31T14:33:06Z

A steady rise in smart phone penetration in India has led to a corresponding growth of the mobile application development industry. Mobile application development like all technological implementations is subject to intellectual property issues. However, very little is understood about the effect of existing patent and copyright law on this niche industry. I aim to develop an understanding of the mobile applications industry, and how it is governed by current Indian patent and copyright regime. I will also use this research to inform the optimal ways in which policymakers may ensure the continual emergence of the mobile applications industry. This blog post lays down a document delineating the research methodology and research questions within the Intellectual Property in Mobile Application Development in India chapter under the Pervasive Technologies Project. The document is a work in progress.

Introduction to the “Intellectual Property in Mobile Application Development” chapter

Software companies in India were traditionally operating on the software as a service (SAAS model). Service contracts signed within this industry ensured that all IPR developed during a project was owned by the client. With the advent of the smart-phone, many software developers left SAAS enterprises in pursuit of developing their own mobile application products (“mobile apps”). Several developers began to aggressively acquire or create patent portfolios around their products.¹ However, it has been observed that mobile apps continue to be increasingly produced in imitation of other products or services or by more discrete means of copying source code or content without the right to do so.

The overall objective of this chapter is to develop a holistic picture of the mobile apps development ecosystem in India in order to portray the decisions developers are making within their practice as a function of how India's intellectual property regime operates within this ecosystem. I will also examine whether existing regimes of intellectual property interact inhibit or accelerate the growth of the mobile applications development ecosystem in India, especially in conjunction with market and cultural forces arising as a result.

Research Questions and Methodology

1. What are the decisions developers are making within their practice in terms of location of their enterprise and clients, scale of audience, funding, business models and mobile apps marketplace (app stores) ?

1.1. Who is the primary actor in the mobile applications development cycle in India?

Method: Analysis of the quantitative research conducted by Samantha Cassar across 267 mobile applications developers.²

Create a new survey instrument and supplement with relevant external expert interviews obtained from Samantha Cassar's qualitative research.

The interviews shall be conducted with respondents based out of Mumbai, Pune and Hyderabad
The exercise targets 10 developers in each city

The analysis of the interviews and results of Samantha's web survey shall be verified by an expert well-versed with the analysis of qualitative and quantitative data

1.2 Is the mobile apps marketplace organically developing into a Bazaar model, or a Cathedral model?

Method: Literature review

1.3. What are the contractual terms between the enterprise and the employee? What is the typical nature of agreements in the mobile apps development industry between enterprise-employee and enterprise- client?

Method: Analysis of the quantitative research conducted by Samantha Cassar and supplement with relevent external expert interviews obtained from her qualitative research.

What is the nature of innovation emerging from the mobile app industry? What is the awareness of the mobile applications developer and its enterprise of rules concerning code, content and design? How does re-use and sharing of code, content and design occur in the mobile application developer ecosystem ? What is the perceived impact of the Indian IPR regime on the aforementioned aspects? Finally, do the emerging trends in re-use and sharing of code run afoul of Indian IP law?

Method: Analysis of Indian Patent and Copyright regime to assess the legality of prevailing practices in the ecosystem.

Analysis of the quantitative research conducted by Samantha Cassar and supplement it with relevant external expert interviews obtained from Samantha's qualitative research.

3. The apps marketplace is extremely important since they are the gatekeepers enabling access to apps. What is the nature of the apps marketplace? What are the limitations associated with it ? How do the existing regulatory models intersect with this relatively new marketplace? What is the enforcement carried out by these app stores in terms of IP?

Method: Literature review and analysis of the new survey instrument.

   4. How does Indian Copyright law and patent law apply to the mobile applications development ecosystem, in respect of the various business models operating in the industry?

       Method: Literature review

4.1. The patent regime is grounded on a laboratory model of innovation. What does the niche mobile applications development industry (working on a micro-creativity model of innovation) require differently from the patent regime to foster growth?

Method: Literature review

4.2. Similarly, copyright law has a distinct design for digital objects. Examine the design and its suitability to regulate a mobile application.

Method: Literature review to trace the development of copyright law. Copyright was designed to regulate a physical book publishing industry. By extending its application to myriad objects, the design has gone through significant changes. Also, conduct expert interviews in the field to understand the practice and gather qualitative data.

1 See Lava aims for 100 mobile apps, available at http://spicyip.com/2013/01/guest-post-lava-aims-for-100-mobile-app.html

2 Out of 267 respondents, 93 responded in full and 164 responded partially

3See Question 1.2 of this document

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/intellectual-property-in-mobile-application-development-in-india-1

Integrating Urdu with Modern Technology the Need of Hour

praskrishna — 2014-04-01T11:15:54Z

A report of the Urdu Wikipedia Workshop at Maulana Azad National Urdu University by the Department of Translation Studies on March 6, 2014. Syed Muzamiluddin is quoted.

Advancing technology necessitates integrating language with the concurrent developments. These thoughts were expressed by Syed Muzammiluddin, Programme Officer, Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore during the Urdu Wikipedia workshop organised at Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad.

Continuing his lecture, Muzammil said Wikipedia is a freely accessible online repository of knowledge available in multiple languages across the world. He emphasised that while other language Wikipedia communities have geared up the momentum and contributed immensely, Urdu still needs its fair share of contributors.

Prof. Zafaruddin, head, Dept. of Translation Studies emphasised that the department desires to see all the students contributing to the Urdu Wikipedia and hence this event has been organised.

Dr Vishnu Vardhan from the Centre for Internet and Society addressed the gathering through the video conference and stressed the significance of Urdu language and the need for proactive contribution on Urdu Wikipedia.

In the later session, the students got the first hand exposure of the Wikipedia editing basics. Since all the participants had opened their accounts prior to the event, they all actively edited articles on the Urdu Wikipedia.

The event coordinator Dr Faheemuddin said that student look forward to this event as the beginning of their long term association with Urdu Wikipedia. The function ended with a vote of thanks by Dr Faheemuddin. Those present at the function included Dr Khalid Mubashir uz Zafar, Dr Mahmood Kazmi, Dr Junaid Zakir, Dr Kahkashan Lateef and Translator Shekh Sadi Arshad.

Read the original published in Urdu language below:

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/daily-taskeen-march-6-2014-integrating-urdu-with-modern-technology-the-need-of-the-hour

Institutional Partnership with Tribal Research & Training Institute

subodh — 2018-05-07T16:29:02Z

CIS-A2K has been building partnerships with major state government departments in Maharashtra to promote free & open knowledge resources. One such effort resulted into official Govt.Resolution of Tribal Research & Training Institute under State Tribal Development department on Expert's Study Group Formation for developing Open Knowledge Platforms.

Community Advocate for Marathi Language is representing CIS-A2K in this group. The mandate of the group is given in GR. We will be facilitating primarily No.1 & 2, which says - Developing new and utilising existing Open & free platforms like Wikimedia Projects to build knowledge resources on Community Forest Management, Development of training modules in Unicode & make it accessible by common man, Digitisation of reference books, training booklets, govt docs, archives,images etc and making it accessible.

Plan

The Tribal Research & Training Institute(TRTI), Pune was established on 1st May, 1962.The Institute undertakes research studies on various aspects of tribals. It has Tribal Cultural Museum located in its premises. All facets of life of tribals of Maharashtra are displayed in the Museum.The Institute has got a rich Library which serves as reference library on tribals. This is a very good opportunity to explore various aspects of open knowledge with research organisation like TRTI.

After extensive discussions, the project proposal on Van Bodh (a free & open knowledge repository on Biodiversity, Forest Management for Tribal communities) is prepared. The implementing agency is Vrikshamitra under leadership of Prof. Madhav Gadgil. Three other organisations - Mumbai University's Economics department, Vigyan Ashram, Dataspect, Datameet are other partners in this project. The content generation on free & open source platforms & Wikimedia Projects would be facilitated by A2K.

Impact

Many tribal communities have started managing their Community forests vested under Forest Rights Act 2006. All the information pertaining to this field is not easily available in local language. The online content is also not available. Under this project, the knowledge resource would be created in collaboration with grass-root communities in tribal areas. The youth will be trained in unicode, open source applications and content generation in Wikimedia projects. The knowledge resource thus created would be accessed by people in 2500 villages active in community forest management.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/institutional-partnership-with-tribal-research-training-institute

Institute for Internet & Society 2014, Pune

samantha — 2014-04-07T11:31:23Z

Last month, activists, journalists, researchers, and members of civil society came together at the 2014 Institute for Internet & Society in Pune, which was hosted by CIS and funded by the Ford Foundation. The Institute was a week long, in which participants heard from speakers from various backgrounds on issues arising out of the intersection of internet and society, such as intellectual property, freedom of expression, and accessibility, to name a few. Below is an official reporting summarizing sessions that took place.

Day One

February 11, 2014

Time	Detail
9.30 a.m. – 9.40 a.m.	Introduction: Sunil Abraham, Executive Director Centre for Internet and Society
10.00 a.m. – 10.15 a.m.	Introduction of Participants
10.15 a.m. – 12.00 p.m.	Internet Governance and Privacy: Sunil Abraham
12.00 p.m. – 12.30 p.m.	Tea-break
12.30 p.m. – 1.00 p.m.	Keynote: Bishakha Datta, Filmmaker and Activist, and Board Member, Wikimedia Foundation
1.00 p.m. – 2.00 p.m.	Lunch
1.30 p.m. – 3.00 p.m.	Participant Presentations
3.00 p.m. – 3.15 p.m.	Tea Break
3.15 p.m. – 4.45 p.m.	Histories, Bodies and Debates around the Internet: Nishant Shah, Director-Research, CIS

This year’s Internet Institute, hosted by the Centre for Internet & Society (CIS), kicked off in Pune to put a start to a week of learnings and discussions surrounding internet usage and its implications on individuals of society. Twenty two attendees from all over India attended this year, from backgrounds of activism, journalism, research and advocacy work.

Attendees were welcomed by Dr. Ravina Aggarwal, Program Officer for Media Rights & Access at the Ford Foundation, the event’s sponsor, who started off the day by introducing the Foundation’s initiatives in pursuit of bridging the digital divide by addressing issues of internet connectivity.

Internet Governance & Privacy, Sunil Abraham
The Institute’s first session was led by Sunil Abraham, Executive Director of CIS, and engaged with issues of internet governance and privacy with reference to four stories: 1) a dispute between tweeters from the US and those in South Africa over the use of hashtag #thingsdarkiesays, which is said not to be as racially derogatory as it is in the US; 2) Facebook’s contested policies on photos featuring users breastfeeding, 3) a lawsuit between Tata and Greenpeace over the organization’s use of Tata’s logo in a video game created for public criticism of their environmentally-degrading practices, and lastly, 4) the case of Savita Bhabhi, an Indian pornographic cartoon character which had been banned by India’s High Court and which had served as a landmark case in expanding the statutory laws for what is considered to be pornographic.

Each of these stories has one major thing in common: due to their nature of taking place over the internet, they are not confined to one geographic location and in turn, are addressed at the international level. The way by which an issue as such is to be addressed cuts across State policies and internet intermediary bodies to create quite a messy case in trying to determine who is at fault. Such complexity illustrates how challenging internet governance can be within today’s society that is no longer restricted to national or geographic boundaries.

Sunil also goes on in explaining the relationship between privacy, transparency, and power, summing it up in a simple formula; privacy protection should have a reverse relationship to power—the more the power, the less the privacy one should be entitled to. On the contrary, a direct correlation goes for power and transparency—the more the power, the more transparent a body should be. Instead of thinking about these concepts as a dichotomy, Sunil suggests to see them as absolute rights in themselves—instrumental in policies and necessary to address power imbalances.

The Web We Want, Bishakha Datta
The Institute’s kickoff was also joined by Indian filmmaker and activist, Bishakha Datta, who had delivered the keynote address. Bishakha bridged together notions of freedom of speech, surveillance, and accessibility, while introducing campaigns that work to create an open and universally accessible web, such as the Web We Want and Sexuality and Disability. Bishakha stresses how the internet as a space has altered how we experience societal constructs, which can be easily exhibited in how individuals experience Facebook in the occurrence of a death, for example. Bishakha initiated discussion among participants by posing questions such as, “what is our expectation of privacy in this brave new world?” and “what is the society we want?” to encompass the need to think of privacy in a new way with the coming of the endless possibilities the internet brings with it.

Histories, Bodies and Debates around the Internet, Nishant Shah
CIS Research Director, Nishant Shah, led a session examining internet as a technology more broadly, and our understandings of it in relation to the human body. Nishant proposes the idea that history is a form of technology, as well as time, itself, for which our understanding only comes into being with the aid of technologies of measurement. Although we are inclined to separate technology from the self, Nishant challenges this notion while suggesting that technology is very integral to being human, and defines a “cyborg” as someone who is very intimate with technology. In this way, we are all cyborgs. While making reference to several literary pieces, including Haraway’s Cyborg: Human, Animus, Technology; Kevin Warwick’s Living Cyborg; and Watt’s small world theory, Nishant challenges participants’ previous notions of how one is to understand technology in relation to oneself, as well as the networks we find ourselves implicated within.

Also brought forth by Nishant, was the fact that the internet as a technology has become integral to our identities, making us accessible (rather than us solely making the technology accessible) through online forms of documentation. This digital phenomenon in which we tend to document what we know and experience as a means of legitimizing it can be summed in the modern version of an old fable: “If a tree falls in a lonely forest, and nobody tweets it, has it fallen?”

Nishant refers to several case studies in which the use of online technologies has created a sense of an extension of the self and one’s personal space; which can then be subject to violation as one can be in the physical form, and to the same emotional and psychological effect—as illustrated within the 1993 occurrence referred to as “A Rape in Cyberspace.”

Attendee Participation
Participants remained engaged and enthusiastic for the duration of the day, bringing forth their personal expertise and experiences. Several participants presented their own research initiatives, which looked at issues women face as journalists and as portrayed by the media; amateur pornography without the consent of the woman; study findings on the understandings of symptoms of internet addiction; as well as studies looking at how students engage with college confession pages on Facebook.

Day Two

February 12, 2014

Time	Detail
9.30 a.m. – 11.00 a.m.	Wireless Technology: Ravikiran Annaswamy, CEO and Co-founder at Teritree Technologies
11.00 a.m. – 11.15 a.m.	Tea-break
11.15 a.m. – 12.45 p.m.	Wired Technology: Ravikiran Annaswamy
12.45 p.m. – 1.30 p.m.	Lunch
1.30 p.m. – 3.00 p.m.	Network, Threats and Securing Yourself: Kingsley John, Independent Consultant
3.00 p.m. – 3.15 p.m.	Tea Break
3.15 p.m. – 4.45 p.m.	Practical Lab: Kingsley John
4.45 p.m. – 5.00 p.m.	Wrap-up: Sunil Abraham

Day Two of the Institute entailed a more technical orientation to “internet & society” across sessions. Participants listened to speakers introduce concepts related to wired and wireless internet connectivity devices and their networks, along with the network of internet users and how one may secure him or herself while “online.”

Wireless & Wired Technology, Ravikiran Annaswamy
Senior industry practitioner, Ravikiran Annaswamy had aimed to enable the Institute’s participants to “understand the depth and omnipresent of telecom networks” that we find ourselves implicated within. Ravikiran went through the basics of these networks—including fixed line-, mobile-, IP-, and Next Generation IP-networks—as well as the technical structuring of wired and wireless broadband. Many participants found this session to be particularly enriching as their projects aimed to provide increased access to internet connectivity to marginalized areas in India, and had been without the know-how to go about it.

Network, Threats and Securing Yourself, Kinglsey John
An instructional session on how to protect oneself was given by Kingsley John, beginning with a lesson on IP Addresses—what they are and the different generations of such, and how IP addresses fit into a broader internet network. Following, Kingsley demonstrated and explained email encryption through the use of software, Kleopatra, and how it may be used to generate keys to encrypt emails through Thunderbird mail client.

Evening Discussion

A handful of participants voluntarily partook in an evening discussion, looking at the role of big players in the global internet network, such as Google and Facebook, how they collect and utilize users’ data, and what sorts of measures can be taken to minimize the collecting of such. Due to the widely varying backgrounds of interest among participants, those coming from this technical orientation towards the internet were able to inform their peers on relevant information and types of software that may be found useful related to minimizing one’s online presence.

Day Three

February 13, 2014

Time	Detail
9.30 a.m. – 11.00 a.m.	Free Software: Prof. G. Nagarjuna, Chairperson, Free Software Foundation
11.00 a.m. – 11.15 a.m.	Tea-break
11.15 a.m. – 12.45 p.m.	Open Data: Nisha Thompson, Independent Consultant
12.45 p.m. – 1.30 p.m.	Lunch
1.30 p.m. – 3.00 p.m.	Freedom of Expression: Bhairav Acharya, Advocate and Adviser, Centre for Internet and Society
3.00 p.m. – 3.15 p.m.	Tea-break
3.15 p.m. – 4.45 p.m.	Copyright: Nehaa Chaudhari, Program Officer, Centre for Internet and Society

The third day of the Internet Institute incorporated themes presented by speakers ranging from free software, to freedom of expression, to copyright.

Free Software, Prof. G. Nagarjuna
Chairman on the Board of Directors for the Free Software Foundation of India, Professor G. Nagarjuna shared with the Institute’s participants his personal expertise on software freedom. Nagarjuna mapped for us the network of concepts related to software freedom, beginning with the origins of the copyleft movement, and also touching upon the art of hacking, the open source movement, and what role software freedom plays in an interconnected world.

Nagarjuna looks at the free software movement as a political movement in the digital space highlighting the user’s freedoms associated to the use, distribution, and modification of software for the greater good for all. This is said to distinguish this movement from that of Open Source—a technical and more practical development-oriented movement. The free software movement is not set out to compromise the fundamental issues for the sake of being practical and in that sense, ubiquitous. Instead, its objective is “not to make everybody use the software, but to have them understand why they are using the software,” so that they may become “authentic citizens that can also resonate why they’re doing what they’re doing. We want them to understand the ethical and political aspects of doing so,” Nagarjuna says.

Open Data, Nisha Thompson
Participants learned from Nisha Thompson on Open Data; what it is, its benefits, and how it is involved in central government initiatives and policy, as well as civil society groups—generally for uses such as serving as evidence for decision making and accountability. Nisha explored challenges concerning the use of open data, such as those pertaining to privacy, legitimacy, copyright, and interoperability. The group looked at the India Water Portal as a case study, which makes accessible more than 300 water-related datasets already available in the public space for use from anything from sanitation and agriculture to climate change.

Freedom of Expression, Bhairav Acharya
Bhairav Acharya, a constitutional lawyer, traced the development of the freedom of speech and expression in India. Beginning with a conceptual understanding of censorship and the practice of censorship by the state, society, and the individual herself, Bhairav examines the limits traditionally placed by a nation-state on the right to free speech.

In India, modern free speech and censorship law was first formulated by the colonial British government, which broadly imported the common law to India. However, the colonial state also yielded to the religious and communitarian sensitivities of its subjects, resulting in a continuing close link between communalism and free speech in India today. After Independence, the post-colonial Indian state carried forward Raj censorship, but tweaked it to serve to a nation-building and developmental agenda. Nation-building and nationalism are centrifugal forces that attempt to construct a homogenous 'mainstream'; voices from the margins of this mainstream (the geographical, ethnic, and religious peripheries) and of the marginalised within the mainstream (the poor and disadvantaged), are censored.

Within this narrative, Bhairav located and explained the evolution of the law relating to press censorship, defamation, obscenity, and contempt of court. Free speech law applies equally online. Broadly, censorship on the internet must survive the same constitutional scrutiny that is applied to offline censorship; but, as technology develops, the law must innovate.

Copyright, Nehaa Chaudhari
CIS Programme Officer, Nehaa Chaudhari examined the concept of Copyright as an intellectual property right in discussing its fundamentals, purpose and origins, and Copyright’s intersection with the internet. Nehaa also explained the different exceptions to Copyright, along with its alternatives, such as opposing intellectual property protection regimes, including the Creative Commons and Copyleft. Within this session, Nehaa also introduced several cases in which Copyright came into play with the use of the internet, including Hunter Moore’s “Is Anyone Up?” website, which had showcased pornographic pictures obtained by submission bringing rise to the phenomenon of “revenge porn.” Instances as such blur the lines of what is commonly referred to as intellectual property, and what specific requirements enables one to own the rights to such.

Day Four

February 14, 2014

Time	Detail
9.30 a.m. – 11.00 a.m.	E-Accessibility and Inclusion: Prashant Naik, Union Bank
11.00 a.m. – 11.15 a.m.	Tea-break
11.15 a.m. – 12.45 p.m.	Patents: Nehaa Chaudhari
12.45 p.m. – 1.30 p.m.	Lunch
1.30 p.m. – 2.00 p.m.	Fieldwork Assignment

Day Four of the Internet Institute introduced concepts of eAccessibilty and Inclusion on the internet for persons with disabilities, along with patents as an intellectual property right. Participants were also assigned a fieldwork exercise as a hands-on activity in which they were to employ what they’ve learned to initiate conversation with individuals in public spaces and collect primary data while doing so.

eAccessibility and Inclusion, Prashant Naik

Prashant Naik started off the day with his session on E-Accessibility and Inclusion. Prashant illustrated the importance of accessibility and what is meant by the term. Participants learned of assistive technologies for different disability types and how to create more accessible word and PDF documents, as well as web pages for users. Prashant demonstrated to participants what it is like to use a computer as a visually impaired individual, which provided for an enriching experience.

Patents, Nehaa Chaudhari
Nehaa Chaudhari led a second session at the Internet Institute on intellectual property rights—this one looking at patents particularly and their role within statutory law. Nehaa traced the historical origins of patents before examining the fundamentals of them, and addresses the questions, “Why have patents? And is the present system working for everyone?” Nehaa also introduced notions of the Commons along with the Anticommons, and perspectives within the debate around software patents, as well as different means by which the law can address the exploitation of patents or “patent thickets”—such as through patent pools or compulsory licensing.

Fieldwork Assignment, Groupwork
Participants were split into groups and required to carry out a mini fieldwork assignment in approaching individuals in varying public spaces in Pune in attempts to collect primary data. Questions asked to individuals were to be devised by the group, so long as they pertained to themes examined within the Internet Institute. Areas visited by groups included the Pune Central Mall, MG Road, and FC Road.

Day Five

February 15, 2014

Time	Detail
9.30 a.m. – 11.00 a.m.	E-Governance: Manu Srivastav, Vice President, eGovernments Foundation
11.00 a.m. – 11.15 a.m.	Tea-break
11.15 a.m. – 12.45 p.m.	Market Concerns: Payal Malik, Economic Adviser, Competition Commission of India
12.45 p.m. – 1.30 p.m.	Lunch
1.30 p.m. – 3.00 p.m.	Digital Natives: Nishant Shah
3.00 p.m. – 3.15 p.m.	Tea-break
3.15 p.m. – 4.45 p.m.	Fieldwork Presentations

Day Five of the Internet Institute brought with it sessions related to themes of e-governance, market concerns of telecommunications, and so called “Digital Natives.”

eGovernance, Manu Srivastava
Vice President of the eGovernments Foundation, Manu Srivastava led a session on eGovernance—the utilization of the internet as a means of delivering government services communicating with citizens, businesses, and members of government. Manu examined the complexities of the eGovernance and barriers to implementation of eGovernance initiatives. Within discussion, participants examined the nuanced relationship between the government and citizens with the incorporation of other governing bodies in an eGovernance system, as well as new spaces for corruption to take place.

Market Concerns, Payal Malik
Payal Malik, Advisor of the Economics Division of the Competition Commission of India shared her knowledge on market concerns of the telecommunications industry, and exclaimed the importance of competition issues in such an industry as a tool to create greater good for a greater number of people. She demonstrated this importance by stating that affordability as a product of increased access can only be possible once there is enough investment, which generally only happens in a competitive market. In this way, we must set the conditions to make competition possible, as a tool to achieve certain objectives. Payal also demonstrated the economic benefits of telecommunications by stating that for every 10% increase in broadband penetration, increase in GDP of 1.3%. She also examined the broadband ecosystem in India and touched upon future possibilities of increased broadband penetration, such as for formers and the education sector.

Digital Natives, Nishant Shah
Nishant Shah shed some light on one of the areas that the Centre for Internet & Society looks at within their research scope, this being the “Digital Native.” As referred to by Nishant, the Digital Native is not to categorize a specific type of internet user, but can be said for simply any person who is performing a digital action, while doing away with this false dichotomy of age, location, and geography.

Nishant examines varying case studies in which “the digital is empowering natives to not merely be benefactors of change, but agents of change,” from the Blank Noise Project’s “I NEVER Ask for it…” campaign in efforts to rethink sexual violence, to Matt Harding’s foolish dancing with groups of individuals from all over the world.

As occurrences in the digital realm, however, these often political expressions may be rewritten by the network when picked up as a growing phenomenon, in order to make it accessible to online consumers by the masses. In doing so, the expression is removed from its political context and is presented in the form of nothing more than a fad. For this reason, Nishant stresses the need to become aware of the potential of the internet in becoming an “echo-chamber”—in which forms of expression are amplified and mimicked, resulting in a restructuring of the dynamics surrounding the subject—whether it be videos of boys lipsyncing to Backstreet Boys in their dorm room going viral, or a strong and malicious movement to punish the Chinese girl who had taken a video of her heinously and wickedly killing a kitten after locating her using the Human Flesh Search Engine.

Fieldwork Presentations, Groupwork

To end off the day, participant groups presented findings collated from the prior evening’s fieldwork exercise, in which they were to ask strangers in various public places of Pune questions pertaining to themes looked at from within this year’s Institute. Participants were divided into four groups and visited Pune’s FC Road, Mahatma Gandhi Road, and Central Mall.

Groups found that the majority of those interviews primarily accessed the phone via the mobile. There was also a common weariness of using the internet and concern for one’s privacy while doing so, especially with uploading photos to Facebook and online financial transactions. People were also generally concerned about using cyber cafes for fear of one’s accounts being hacked. Generally people suspected that so long as conversations are “private” (i.e. in one’s Facebook inbox), so too are they secure. Just as well, those interviewed shared a sense of security with the use of a password.

Day Six

February 16, 2014

Time	Detail
9.30 a.m. – 11.00 a.m.	Wikipedia: Dr. Abhijeet Safai
11.00 a.m. – 11.15 a.m.	Tea-break
11.15 a.m. – 12.45 p.m.	Open Access: Muthu Madhan (TBC)
12.45 p.m. – 1.30 p.m.	Lunch
1.30 p.m. – 3.00 p.m.	Case Studies Groupwork
3.00 p.m. – 3.15 p.m.	Tea-break
3.15 p.m. – 4.45 p.m.	Case Studies Presentations

As the Institute came closer to its end, participants got the opportunity to hear from speakers on topics pertaining the Wikipedia editing in addition to Open Access to scholarly literature. Participants also worked together in groups to examine specific case studies referenced in previous sessions, and then presented their conclusions.

Wikipedia, Dr. Abhijeet Safai
The Institute was joined by Medical Officer of Clinical Research at Pune’s Symbiosis Centre of Health Care, Dr. Abhijeet Safai, who led a session on Wikipedia. Having edited over 3700 Wikipedia articles, Dr. Abhijeet was able to bring forth his expertise and familiarity in editing Wikipedia to participants so that they would be able to do the same. Introduced within this session were Wikipedia’s different fundamental pillars and codes of conducts to be complied with by all contributors, along with different features and components of Wikipedia articles that one should be aware of when contributing, such as how to cite sources and discuss the contents of an article with other contributors.

Open Access, Muthu Madhan
Muthu Madhan joined the Internet Institute while speaking on Open Access (OA) to scholarly literature. Within his session, Muthu examined the historical context within which the scholarly journal had arisen and how the idea of Open Access began within this space. The presence of Open Access in India and other developing nations was also examined in this session, and the concept of Open Data, introduced.

Case Studies, Groupworks

Participants were split up into groups and assigned particular case studies looked at briefly in previous sessions. Case studies included #thingsdarkiessay, a once trending Twitter hashtag in South Africa which had offended many Americans for its use of “darkie” as a derogatory term; the literary novel, The Hindus, which offers an alternative narrative of Hindu history had been banned in India for obscenity; a case in which several users’ avatars had been controlled by another in a virtual community and forced to perform sexual acts, referred to as A Rape Happened in Cyber Space; and lastly, a pornographic submission website, Is Anyone Up?, for which content was largely derived from “revenge porn.” Each group then presented on the various perspectives surrounding the issue at hand.

The Cyborg, Nishant Shah
Nishant Shah led an off-agenda session in the evening looking more closely at the notion of the human cyborg. Nishant deconstructs humanity’s relationship to technology, in suggesting that we “think of the human as produced with the technologies… not who produces technology.” Nishant explores the Digital Native as an attained identity for those who, because of technology, restructure and reinvent his or her environment—offline as well as online. Among other ideas shared, Nishant refers to works by Haraway on the human cyborg in illustrating our dependency on technology and our need to care for these technologies we depend on.

Day Seven

February 17, 2014

Time	Detail
9.30 a.m. – 11.00 a.m.	Internet Activism: Laura Stein, Associate Professor, University of Texas and Fulbright Fellow
11.00 a.m. – 11.15 a.m.	Tea-break
11.15 a.m. – 12.45 p.m.	Domestic and International Bodies: Chinmayi Arun, Research Director
12.45 p.m. – 1.30 p.m.	Lunch
1.30 p.m. – 3.00 p.m.	Participant Presentations
3.00 p.m. – 3.15 p.m.	Tea-break
3.15 p.m. – 4.45 p.m.	Hot Question Challenge

The last day of the week-long Internet Institute examined concepts of Internet Activism and Domestic and International Bodies. Some participants led presentations on topics of personal familiarity, before a final wrap-up exercise, calling upon individuals to share any new formulations resulting from the Institute.

Internet Activism, Laura Stein

Associate Professor from the University of Texas, Laura Stein, spoke on activism on the internet. Laura examined some grassroots organizations and movements taking place on the online and the benefits that the internet brings in facilitating their impact, such as its associated low costs, accessibility and possibility for anonymity. Despite the positive effects catalyzed by the internet, Laura stresses that the “laying field is still unequal, and movements are not simply transformed by technology.” Some of the websites exemplifying online activism that were examined within this session includes the It Gets Better Project, which aims to give hope to LGBT youth facing harassment, and the national election watch by the Association for Democratic Reforms. Additionally, Laura spoke on public communication policy, comparing that of the US and India, and how this area of policy may influence media content and practice.

Domestic and International Bodies, Chinmayi Arun
As the Internet Institute’s final speaker, Research Director for Communication Governance at National Law University , Chinmayi Arun, explores the network of factors that affect one’s behavior on the internet—these including: social norms, the law, the markets, and architecture. In referring to Lawrence Lessig’s pathetic dot theory, Chinmayi illustrates how individual’s—the pathetic dots in question—are functions of the interactions of these factors, and in this sense, regulated, and stresses the essential need to understand the system, in order to effectively change the dynamics within it. It is worth noting that not all pathetic dots are equal, and Google’s dot, for example, will be drastically bigger than a single user’s, having more leveraging power within the network of internet bodies. Also demonstrated, is the fact that we must acknowledge the need for regulation by the law to some extent, otherwise, the internet would be a black box where anything goes, putting one’s security at risk of violation.

Hot Question Challenge
The very last exercise of the Institute entailed participants asking each other questions on demand, relating back to different themes looked at within the last week. Participants had the chance, here, to bridge together concepts across sessions, as well as formulate their own opinions, while posing questions to others that they, themselves, were still curious about.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/telecom/blog/institute-for-internet-society-2014-pune

Infrastructural Needs of Indian Language Wikisource Projects

Puthiya Purayil Sneha — 2022-10-21T13:21:20Z

This is a short study on identifying the infrastructural gaps on Indian language Wikisource projects, and potential strategies to address the same. The study was undertaken by Jayantha Nath, Puthiya Purayil Sneha and Satdeep Gill, with writing and editorial oversight by Puthiya Purayil Sneha and an external review by Divyank Katira. This is part of a series of short-term studies undertaken by the CIS-A2K team in 2021-22.

Read this report on Wikimedia Meta-Wiki here.

Introduction

This research project is an effort to understand some of the infrastructural needs of Wikisource platforms in India. With a focus on technological capacity, resources and training, this short pilot study collected baseline data from Indian language Wikisource communities to identify key knowledge gaps and areas of improvement. The final report here offers an overview of the current challenges in this space, and some learnings and recommendations on potential strategies to address these gaps, including through collaborative intervention and training.

Context

Wikisource projects have been an important part of the open knowledge movement in India, as it is a hub of out of copyright and freely licensed texts in a number of languages from across the world. With a focus on creating a ‘growing free content online library of source texts, as well as translations of source texts in any language', it functions as an important open knowledge repository that supports content development on various sister projects such as Wikipedia, Wikiquote etc. Wikisource projects in Indian languages have seen tremendous growth, especially over the last decade with increased efforts in content donation under free licences, digitization initiatives and availability of source texts. There have also been several advancements in Indic language computing and availability of digital infrastructure, such as more Indian language fonts, many with Unicode support, and increased flexibility in working with texts due to Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technologies. There has also been a general growth in awareness about the need for sourcing and making available more content in Indian languages, and better access to platforms like Wikisource has aided these efforts to a great extent.

However, several Indian language communities also continue to grapple with persistent challenges in this space, across diverse Wikimedia projects. Similarly, with Wikisource, there have been concerns about a lack of active participation and efforts towards bringing more content on the platform, including translations, and encouraging the use of source texts across projects among others. While a majority of the contributors are comfortable with transcribing texts, more technical tasks such as importing new books, creating Index pages and transcluding books are left to a very small number of contributors. These point to a lack of not just awareness and resources, but also a need for capacity-building efforts to address the skill gaps, improvements in digital infrastructures to resolve basic issues with platforms, and diversification of the scope of work undertaken. For instance, the most recent Community Wishlist Survey 2022 highlights some basic fixes that need attention− such as bugs with the search and replace function to improve search and mass uploads −to more advanced work such as expanding existing functionality in indexing, integrating structured data and translation tools and functionalities across Indian languages, to name a few.

A research needs assessment survey conducted by CIS-A2K last year also highlighted the need for better technological support for Wikimedia projects, and capacity-building in important areas of work in the Indian language communities. While this is not specific to Wikisource alone, observations by community members and active Wikisource contributors over the last few years illustrate that many of these concerns and knowledge gaps are prevalent in this community as well. This study was therefore an attempt to identify these challenges, by collecting baseline data on key areas of work in Indian language Wikisource projects, beginning with a focus on selected language communities, and areas of interest. The attempt was also to enable contributors to achieve a more detailed understanding of the requirements of communities, in the contexts of certain languages, and aid in developing potential strategies to address them.

Research objectives

The study had two areas of focus:

What are the key challenges with working on Indian language Wikisource projects currently? These may include anything from obstacles in Wikisource workflow, policies and open licences, to challenges such as quality of content and lack of community engagement?
What are gap areas and spaces for improvement in the infrastructure of these platforms, especially related to technological capacity, resources and training?

Research methods

The study adopted a mixed methods approach, comprising a survey and interviews with community members. The survey focussed on key areas of ongoing work, and potential challenges for Wikisource projects in India - including technological support, skill-building, policies on content donation and curation, and open access and licensing. The survey was opened to all Wikisource communities and publicised on relevant mailing lists and community platforms. Simultaneously, a detailed interview questionnaire was also prepared, along with the selection criteria for interviews with community members. The project team worked with one short-term research assistant over a 2–3-month period for the data collection through interviews and surveys. The research assistant also provided translation support as needed and worked closely in coordinating with community members.

The criteria considered for selection of the language communities for the study were language family and size, amount of content on Wikisource (according to bytes/number of proofread pages), recent activity and a good track record/sustained progress and challenges with the same over the last several years. External factors, such as visibility and prevalence of the languages on other online platforms, technical and cultural resources and complexities of working with certain languages etc. were also considered during the selection process. Keeping these in mind, the languages selected for this study were as follows:

Tamil Wikisource (One of the largest Wikisource communities in India, which has considerable content, is active and has seen steady growth over the last few years)
Assamese Wikisource (A growing Wikisource community, which has also seen a lot of activity in recent years)
Malayalam Wikisource (A large and active Wikisource community, which in recent years has some decline in engagement, despite good resources and activity on other Wiki platforms)

Using a purposive sampling technique, the team identified community members for interviews across these three languages and reached out over the course of six months in order to conduct semi-structured interviews. The criteria for selection of interviewees included a mix of senior/experienced and new contributors, those working across several projects and languages, those with expertise in specific/advanced technical areas of Wikisource, licensing and content donation efforts, and keeping in mind gender parity within the sample. There were however several challenges with this exercise, including basic barriers such as bad internet and phone connectivity, digital fatigue and unavailability of people due to the second wave of the pandemic, and limited time on Wikimedia projects. As a result, this method was unsuccessful, as it managed to gather very limited data for the study. The timeline of the survey was also extended as a result, and it received a total of 21 responses. The survey data offers several insights into some of these key areas of work and challenges, and the following is a report based on an analysis of this limited data set and observations on the same. Given the limited sample size and final dataset, it would be important to note that we may need several steps before the observations/findings may be considered to be representative at any scale.

Observations and Learnings

As mentioned earlier, the dataset comprised of 21 respondents on the survey, many of them contributors across diverse Wikimedia projects including English and Indian language Wikipedia projects, Wikisource, Wikibooks, Wikidata, Wikiquote, Wiktionary, Wikivoyage, Wikimedia Commons, software such as Media Wiki, and initiatives like Wikimedia in Education. The respondents ranged across nine languages (in alphabetical order) – Assamese, Bengali, English, Hindi, Kannada, Marathi, Malayalam, Punjabi, Telugu and Tamil. Several of them are also part of user groups working in some of these languages. The experience of the contributors’ ranges from 6 months to 12 years. Almost all the respondents note that contributions towards proofreading, and bringing more content on the Wikisource projects (including work on related processes by the Volunteer Response Team, previously known as Open Source Ticket Request System, and OCR) have been key milestones in their work, either as individuals or communities. Some respondents have also pointed out some new work such as audio books, and working on technological aspects, especially with gadgets and best practices shared by other global communities. The data offers some key insights into the kinds of challenges currently faced by Indian language Wikisource contributors, and what could be potential areas of improvement. As noted in Fig.1, an overwhelming percentage of the respondents noted that ‘capacity-building and training’ (81%) is an area that needs the most improvement, followed closely by ‘community engagement’ (66%) and ‘technological infrastructure’ (57%). These are key areas that show repetitive patterns across the data set, in terms of recurring challenges as well. As noted by respondents, training in Wikisource workflows, procedure and guidance, learning to use advanced templates/techniques, recruiting new volunteers etc. have been key challenges. Community engagement has seen a dip, especially over last year with the pandemic and related decline in activity on projects, as well as events and therefore opportunities to meet. There is a need for more contributors and strategies to encourage work and retain them on the projects. Scanning and post-production processing of scans emerged as a significant challenge, given lack of resources and infrastructure, and related issues such as poor quality of scanned work and no uniformity in the book selection criteria. There are also some areas of technical support such as broken tools on Wikisource projects, missing symbols in some language tool bars, and an abundance of formatting tags which could present barriers for new contributors. The following are some of the responses and observations in specific areas mentioned above:

As mentioned earlier, the dataset comprised of 21 respondents on the survey, many of them contributors across diverse Wikimedia projects including English and Indian language Wikipedia projects, Wikisource, Wikibooks, Wikidata, Wikiquote, Wiktionary, Wikivoyage, Wikimedia Commons, software such as Media Wiki, and initiatives like Wikimedia in Education. The respondents ranged across nine languages (in alphabetical order) – Assamese, Bengali, English, Hindi, Kannada, Marathi, Malayalam, Punjabi, Telugu and Tamil. Several of them are also part of user groups working in some of these languages. The experience of the contributors’ ranges from 6 months to 12 years.

Almost all the respondents note that contributions towards proofreading, and bringing more content on the Wikisource projects (including work on related processes by the Volunteer Response Team, previously known as Open Source Ticket Request System, and OCR) have been key milestones in their work, either as individuals or communities. Some respondents have also pointed out some new work such as audio books, and working on technological aspects, especially with gadgets and best practices shared by other global communities. The data offers some key insights into the kinds of challenges currently faced by Indian language Wikisource contributors, and what could be potential areas of improvement.

As noted in Fig.1, an overwhelming percentage of the respondents noted that ‘capacity-building and training’ (81%) is an area that needs the most improvement, followed closely by ‘community engagement’ (66%) and ‘technological infrastructure’ (57%). These are key areas that show repetitive patterns across the data set, in terms of recurring challenges as well. As noted by respondents, training in Wikisource workflows, procedure and guidance, learning to use advanced templates/techniques, recruiting new volunteers etc. have been key challenges. Community engagement has seen a dip, especially over last year with the pandemic and related decline in activity on projects, as well as events and therefore opportunities to meet. There is a need for more contributors and strategies to encourage work and retain them on the projects. Scanning and post-production processing of scans emerged as a significant challenge, given lack of resources and infrastructure, and related issues such as poor quality of scanned work and no uniformity in the book selection criteria. There are also some areas of technical support such as broken tools on Wikisource projects, missing symbols in some language tool bars, and an abundance of formatting tags which could present barriers for new contributors.

The following are some of the responses and observations in specific areas mentioned above:

Capacity-building and training

As most contributors would be well aware, capacity-building and technological infrastructure are two closely connected aspects of Wikimedia projects. The responses under this thematic reflect the same, in terms of a need for better training in optimising the use of available and advanced technical skills for Wikisource projects. This includes training on specific skills and processes such as scanning, text conversion, formatting, sourcing, transclusion, creating gadgets, writing bots. There is a need for better writing and spelling skills to improve the quality of content generated. The survey also suggested potential ways to address these skill gaps, all of which were seen as relevant by a majority of respondents (66.7%). [See Fig 2]

Community Engagement

Community engagement ranked second in terms of the challenges noted by respondents on the survey. The survey also looked at engagement in comparison with Wikipedia projects, as it has been observed that the latter see more active participation. This was confirmed by some of the responses as well. Some of the main reasons for lack of participation as noted by respondents is that Wikisource is a specialised project, that needs a specific skill-set and demands time and effort, hence may not appeal to all contributors. Also, it has lesser content and visibility compared to some of the Wikipedias or other projects which may be more easily updated. Thus, there is a need for actively recruiting new volunteers, and capacity-building to enable more contributions, as well as targeted outreach efforts in spaces related to literature and books to enhance discoverability. Some respondents also mentioned that a lack of awareness, coordination and interaction among contributors could be potential reasons. Finally, there are also external factors such as balancing volunteer work with other commitments such as family and financial problems, many contributors being students who move on to full-time careers, effects of the pandemic and paucity of time and interaction, and loss of interest over time in the projects.

Again, efforts to address community engagement need some strategic measures, including but not limited to community interaction, incentives and better visibility for work in, as noted in Fig.3.

Technological infrastructure

Technological infrastructure, which is one of the key areas of focus for this study, has also been a persistent challenge for Indian language communities, also given the resource-heavy work any form of computing with Indic languages entails. While some respondents did not notice any specific issues in their communities, there were some patterns or gaps that were reflected across communities. There is a need for basic hardware like scanners and good computers, or rather centralised facilities for scanning and good internet connectivity in order to cover more collections and regional areas. In addition to this, there is also a need for technical improvements such as easy-to-use widgets, gadgets and better tags to enhance formatting work as part of the transcription of texts, incorporating certain signs and symbols within toolbars, spell-checker, full list of syntaxes while proofreading, and stages for fixing mistakes and adding formatting tags. An important observation was that some language communities access and edit Wikisource on mobile phones, so there is a need for a mobile application that can provide a seamless editing experience, and connect more people with the projects. As mentioned earlier, there are also several technical fixes such as a number of pending bugs in projects. A related requirement therefore is for MediaWiki developers with good language skills to work on translation of interfaces. A few respondents also mentioned additional challenges such as improvement of new books, Graphical User Interface (GUI) and page layout, and the functionality to view Wikisource in other formats as well.

Some specific areas of improvement were also assessed on the survey, drawing upon a review of the community wishlists for the last few years. These included Optical Character Recognition (OCR), translation, visual editor, transclusion, user interface, search function and export of books. While all these functionalities did not receive responses from the entire set, many found these to be key challenges. OCR received the most responses (19), with 31.6% assessing this at 1 (needs minimal updates, functional with space for innovation). Translation received 18 responses, with 38.9% marking this at 4 (major challenges, requires focused work). Similarly, transclusion also received 18 responses with about 27.8% voting at 5 (significant challenges, requires long-term effort and resources). Visual editor, search function and export of books all received 17 responses each, with a majority in all three assessing these as 5. Of these search function had more people assessing the functionality at 5 (41.2%), followed closely by visual editor and export of books (35.3% each). User interface received 16 responses, with 31.3 % of respondents assessing it at 5 as well.

Open Access and Content Creation

In addition to the above, content curation and related aspects of open access and relicensing are also spaces with prevalent knowledge gaps in terms of protocols and best practices, which poses a challenge for content generation on Wikisource projects. Lack of awareness about Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) and relicensing in fact has been a significant impediment in content donation efforts, across projects. In this survey, a large number of respondents (42.6%) also said they were either unaware of these issues with Wikisource or about IPR itself, or mentioned that it was not applicable in this context. Among the challenges/issues mentioned, the need for simple, easily accessible advocacy material in print about open access was prominent, in order to encourage content creators/authors to share work on open licences. It was also noted that this process may be difficult for people who are not well-versed in the technical/legal aspects of the project, especially in terms of tracking down individual creators for consent to re-license and share their work. Respondents also noted that this work needs support from institutions to help set up collaborations, such as with educational organisations, publishing houses and authors, as also an understanding of official documentation and wider promotion etc. which may encourage more people to share content on open licences.

All of these aspects are further reflected in terms of strategies to address these issues as well, as observed in Fig. 4.

A similar disparity exists with content curation best practices as well, with a majority of respondents noting that their respective communities do not have clearly defined protocols for content curation. While such benchmarking is naturally difficult given several socio-cultural and linguistic subjectivities of each project, this also means that what makes it to Wikisource in a particular language can be defined by many factors, which also informs the quality, types and formats of content produced. Potential methods to address this include developing guidelines for content creation, and forms of review by experts as well as community members, all of which ranked high in the survey responses. ( See Fig 5)

As we did not receive enough responses on the interview questionnaires, there was not much additional qualitative data that could be gathered. There are however resonances with the survey responses, namely in terms of technical/hardware challenges such as poor quality of scanning, and the need for an app which is user-friendly and will further facilitate mobile editing, especially in areas with limited digital infrastructure and access. Some observations include the importance of the OTRS process in adding new content, and the need for better online and offline training, especially for new volunteers, in technical skills. Similarly, collaborations with educational institutions and local print media could be useful in creating more awareness, and therefore tapping into more content and resources in terms of new volunteers. Additionally, there are also some interesting observations on individual communities working on connecting work across projects, for example Wikisource and Wikiquote.

Conclusions and Recommendations

While the scope of the study had to be reduced significantly given several methodological challenges and external factors as mentioned earlier, the analysis of data does offer some significant learnings on the current challenges prevalent across Indian language Wikisource projects. Needless to say, many of these are also fairly contextual and nuanced, depending on how well-resourced certain languages are, given factors such as basic internet connectivity and digital literacy. The following is a short summary of key recommendations from this exercise.

Technological Infrastructure: Across the board, gaps in development of technological infrastructure have been prominent, ranging from basic fixes to advanced tools and user-friendly apps that may help mitigate some of the issues related to access. It is also notable that early challenges such as OCR and translation do not present as significant obstacles here (but continue to remain areas of ongoing work); features such as the visual editor, search and export functionalities emerged as continual challenges. The need for a user-friendly mobile app is also an important observation here. Some of this work is also quite resource-intensive in terms of funding; it would be prudent to look at collaborations with related organisations and local fundraising efforts that may help facilitate the same.

Capacity-Building: Similarly, capacity-building efforts need to be strengthened within communities, given the nature of work which is specialised and often quite technical( for example the process of transclusion). In addition to bringing in new volunteers, and equipping them with the requisite skill-sets to contribute effectively, there is a need for contributors with advanced skill-sets who may be able to address more technical challenges. Efforts here could include reaching out to the wider free and open source communities for external expertise, and working on a collaborative model of workshopping around strategic issues, and developing relevant skill-sets. Community-engagement: As noted by many respondents, bringing in new volunteers and their retention on projects has been a continual challenge, also due to the factors mentioned above. Improvements in technical infrastructure and capacity-building would help address some of these challenges as well. In addition to this, as noted by respondents, developing proactive collaborations with diverse institutions and individuals (educational/media/creative practice) would help widen networks, hence creating better awareness and visibility for work, such as through social media content and may also foster better engagement.

Content Curation and Open Access: As is widely understood, discourse around open access and relicensing is layered, and the protocols often vary widely depending on linguistic factors and cultural context. Instead of developing benchmarks, it may be prudent therefore to develop accessible content on existing, global relicensing protocols, in translation across languages. These may be further used by communities to understand and engage better with efforts in content donation. Guidelines for content curation will again need to be similarly developed and modified, keeping in mind how policies also evolve and change. An important consideration here in addition to quality, is also that of ethics of access and use, especially by communities themselves.

This short study was an effort to map some of the prevalent infrastructural challenges that underlie work on Indian language Wikisource projects. The observations from this report may offer useful insights in thinking through and developing strategies to address these gaps, through collaborative efforts in training and building resources for projects.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/research-infrastructural-needs-of-indian-language-wikisource-projects