The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is a treaty that the US government worked on in secret with other countries to bring the US’ draconian copyright laws to other countries. It will:
- lock us into obsolete copyright and patent laws;
- criminalize harmless remixes by ordinary users if they achieve ‘a commercial scale’ (art 2.14.1) which many amateur videos do on sites like Youtube;
- criminalize legitimate websites by making them responsible for user behavior (‘aiding and abetting’ art 2.14.4).
- permanently bypass the democratic process by empowering the ‘ACTA Committee’ to ‘propose amendments to [ACTA]‘ without your approval. (art 6.4)
The ACTA was developed virtually in secret with access provided to the entertainment industry, but not citizens.
The United States (without Senate approval), Australia, Canada, Japan, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore, and South Korea all signed the ACTA on October 1st, 2011.
Thankfully, a number of European nations who were part of the negotiations have not signed it, and some, including Germany, are backing away from it.
Tomorrow, Saturday, February 11th, citizens all over Europe will demonstrate their opposition to this treaty.
Fight for the Future has a form you can use to tell European Parliamentarians that you oppose this treaty. Additionally, over two million people have filled out AVAAZ’s form urging European Parliamentarians to reject the ACTA. It takes only a minute to do both!
While you are at it, please sign up for our email list at the form on the right. Thanks!
The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) is a treaty that the US government worked on in secret with other countries to bring the US’ draconian copyright laws to other countries. It will:
The ACTA was developed virtually in secret with access provided to the entertainment industry, but not citizens.
The United States (without Senate approval), Australia, Canada, Japan, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore, and South Korea all signed the ACTA on October 1st, 2011.
Thankfully, a number of European nations who were part of the negotiations have not signed it, and some, including Germany, are backing away from it.
Tomorrow, Saturday, February 11th, citizens all over Europe will demonstrate their opposition to this treaty.
Fight for the Future has a form you can use to tell European Parliamentarians that you oppose this treaty. Additionally, over two million people have filled out AVAAZ’s form urging European Parliamentarians to reject the ACTA. It takes only a minute to do both!
While you are at it, please sign up for our email list at the form on the right. Thanks!