Trans-Pacific Partnership Proposes Copyright Suppression of Price Competition

posted on 21/02/2012 18:21 #copyrights #acta

http://infojustice.org/archives/8305 →

Dissatisfied with the exclusive right to set the price at which copies of their works are first sold, copyright holders have been trying, for over 150 years, to bolster the resale prices at which copies of their works are re-sold, in order to protect them from the normal pressures of free market price competition. Since they no longer own the copies, they have tried extending the reach of their exclusive right to “distribute” copies to encompass copies they no longer own. For just as long, the courts and Congress have rebuffed those efforts. Today, however, the United States Trade Representative is negotiating with foreign countries to obligate Congress and the courts to give them that power, even as their latest in a series of efforts to extend the existing distribution right is pending before the Supreme Court.

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