According to reports originating about the major US lobby ground known as the International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA), open source software may very well be seen in the near future as being akin to piracy and other black-market dealings. The group, an umbrella corporation housing a number of different sub-groups, has recently reportedly requested that the US Trade Representative make an addition to the US’ infamous “special 301 watchlist” to include countries such as India, Brazil and even Indonesia be included on it.
What is the 301 watchlist, exactly, and what does it have to deal with these countries?
Originating a few years ago the Special 301 Watchlist was developed by the US Trade Department in order to classify certain countries that are more prone to intellectual property (IP) rights violations than others. This has been done in the past against a number of different countries with the primary intent to put pressure upon them for trade purposes and legal protection, forcing many areas such as Hong Kong to actively seek out and eliminate pirated goods in local areas.
So what does this have to do with India, Brazil and Indonesia?
Contrary to what you may believe that these three countries are major run for pirated goods, the IIPA’s main concern isn’t so grandiose. In fact, they’re petitioning for these countries to be added to the 301 watchlist simply because they do one thing: encourage local residents to utilize and develop open source software. Just to reiterate the terms here, we’re talking about encourage and not force individuals and businesses to use free open source products – much like the British government said they, too, would boost their own usage of such software to reduce costs and overall spending.
The IIPA, on the other hand, feels that such encouragements weaken the overall market viability of other paid software and simply won’t sit by and allow free open source products to dominate some potential markets. This is, of course, ignoring the fact that many major organizations such as WordPress were built upon Open Source information and IP rights in the open source community are many times much more strict and moderated than those in the other conventional paid markets.
Whether or not this motion successfully travels through the US Trade Representative and gets the three countries added to the watchlist is something of great interest as of late as it could set high precedence for the future of open source around the world. Only time will tell, and those interested in the open source community would be well advised to keep abreast of any of the latest developments related to this case that may transpire over the coming weeks or months.