Internet Intermediaries and the Law Applicable to Intellectual Property Infringements

The coordination between territoriality restricted intellectual property rights and the potential global reach of Internet activities has been the focus of significant attention in recent years. The liability of Internet intermediaries offering potentially global services that may facilitate infringements of intellectual property rights by others in multiple countries poses a particular challenge in that regard. At a substantive law level, significant differences remain between jurisdictions regarding secondary liability for intellectual property rights infringements and safe harbor provisions for Internet intermediaries. The present article discusses the conflict of laws aspects of the liability of Internet intermediaries in light of the recent international efforts to adopt soft law provisions on intellectual property and private international law.

What’s Our Responsibility? How Individuals and Organizations Can Proactively Address Human Trafficking

Human trafficking is regarded by Interpol as the second largest and fastest growing criminal industry in the world. This letter is submitted in response to the topic of Human Trafficking addressed in Volume 2, Issue 1. In response to the ever-increasing attention to this problem, various programs focus on the rescue of survivors in anti-trafficking efforts - sometimes overshadowing efforts to prevent human trafficking and rehabilitate those harmed. A comprehensive, responsible approach requires a system of rescue and rehabilitation with a deliberate eye toward prevention. The basic human rights of survivors are at risk of being violated by “so-called rescue missions, despite the good intentions of would-be rescuers.” At the prevention level, a firm human rights approach is needed. When interventions shift their emphasis to prevention and tackle the innate contributors to inequality, then the roots of trafficking and slavery can be firmly extirpated. By taking a thoughtful and vested approach to tackling all areas of trafficking— including prevention, rescue, and rehabilitation—resources can be used more effectively, and communities are likely to have a more extensive impact in the fight against this hideous crime against humanity.

Rezension zu: Inge Govaere and Hanns Ulrich (eds.): Intellectual Property, Public Policy and International Trade

The contemporary intellectual property rights (IPR) system is not a simple, smoothly working block of rules but is complex and full of ambiguities, and as many argue, imperfections. Some deficits relate on the one hand to the inherent centrality of authorship, originality and mercantilism to the ‘Western’ IP model, which leaves numerous non-Western, collaborative or folkloric modes of production outside the scope of protection. On the other hand, some imperfections stem from the way IPR are granted, whereby creators acquire a temporary monopoly over their works and thus exclude the public from having access to them. In this sense, it is often uncertain whether the existent IPR model appropriately reflects the precarious balance between private and public interests, and whether the best incentives to promote creativity and innovation - the initially stated objectives of intellectual property protection - are offered. The matter becomes still more complicated when one considers that the IPR system is not domestically contained but is globalised and strongly affected by rules at the regional and international levels. The question of whether the balance between private interests and public values is sustained within the international legal framework, epitomised by the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) of the World Trade Organization (WTO), is precisely the topic of the book reviewed here. Review of Intellectual Property, Public Policy, and International Trade, edited by Inge Govaere and Hanns Ullrich, P.I.E. Peter Lang, 2007.

Human rights and international trade

Economic globalization and respect for human rights are both highly topical issues. In theory, more trade should increase economic welfare and protection of human rights should ensure individual dignity. Both fields of law protect certain freedoms: economic development should lead to higher human rights standards, and UN embargoes are used to secure compliance with human rights agreements. However the interaction between trade liberalisation and human rights protection is complex, and recently, tension has arisen between these two areas. Do WTO obligations covering intellectual property prevent governments from implementing their human rights obligations, including rights to food or health? Is it fair to accord the benefits of trade subject to a clean human rights record? This book first examines the theoretical framework of the interaction between the disciplines of international trade law and human rights. It builds upon the well-known debate between Professor Ernst-Ulrich Petersmann, who construes trade obligations as human rights, and Professor Philip Alston, who warns of a merger and acquisition of human rights by trade law. From this starting point, further chapters explore the differing legal matrices of the two fields and examine how cooperation between them might be improved, both in international law-making and institutions,in dispute settlement. The interaction between trade and human rights is then explored through seven case studies:freedom of expression and competition law; IP protection and health; agricultural trade and the right to food; trade restrictions on conflict WHO convention on tobacco control; and, finally, human rights conditionalities in preferential trade schemes.

Chronic volatile substance abuse among the adult Kickapoo traditional tribe of Texas: Disease and disability profiles, neuropsychosocial consequences, and social implications for treatment

The purpose of this study, based on secondary data from attendees at a substance abuse clinic for the Kickapoo Healing Grounds in Eagle Pass, Texas, is two fold: (1) to elucidate neuro-behavioral performance of volatile substance abusers in the Kickapoo tribe and (2) to determine factors associated with their treatment completion and rehabilitation as measured by their employment at follow-up. Volatile substance abuse (VSA) is associated with a host of neurological manifestations, and secondary prevention or clinical treatment and rehabilitation remains the mainstay of control efforts. Very little is known about VSA in general, and especially among Native American populations. It is anticipated that the results will help determine and assist other tribes and non-tribal substance abuse centers with treatment planning for volatile substance abusers among Native American populations. ^

Employment outcomes in liver transplant recipients: A policy analysis

Liver transplantation is a widely accepted treatment for end stage liver disease. Research has shown that people with end-stage liver disease experience improved survival and health-related quality of life after transplantation. However, the unemployment rate among liver transplant recipients remains high. The reasons for this were the subject of a study that was used as the primary dataset for this policy analysis. According to the primary data and background supporting data, many transplant recipients remain unemployed for fear of losing needed healthcare and disability benefits. When employment is considered as a health outcome, it is important in an era of evidence based medicine to ensure that healthcare interventions such as liver transplantation produce improved health outcomes. Therefore, the high unemployment rate among liver transplant recipients is a poor health outcome that should be addressed. In this policy analysis, it is proposed that policy might affect this outcome. The problem of unemployment after liver transplantation is structured and policies affecting the problem are evaluated according to the validated criteria - Effectiveness, Equity, Efficiency, and Feasibility. A policy solution is proposed, evaluated, and ultimately recommended to effectively address the problem, to make healthcare coverage more equitable for liver transplant recipients, and to provide a more cost-effective healthcare coverage model during this time of healthcare crisis.^

The XXI century guidance and its social responsibility

El presente trabajo tiene como finalidad considerar la orientación del siglo XXI en Venezuela como una disciplina con un alto compromiso social. Como programa, debe, hoy día, redefinirse con el objeto de impulsar propuestas conducentes a la inclusión de todas aquellas personas, que tradicionalmente han sido excluidas por su raza, etnia, género y/o discapacidad física y que como praxis social esté dirigida a la facilitación de los procesos de desarrollo humano en las dimensiones del Ser, Convivir, Servir, Conocer y Hacer, en el contexto personal, familiar y comunitario a lo largo del continuo del ciclo vital. L as competencias adquiridas a través de los procesos de orientación, son determinantes para proporcionar los medios a las ciudadanas y los ciudadanos para gestionar su propio desarrollo y el de su comunidad Se plantea la necesidad de un cambio de paradigma que deje atrás la clásica postura de un orientador que ayuda al orientado, desde el que conoce, el que tiene experiencia. Se sugiere más bien una relación de orientación intersubjetiva. Por otra parte, se habla de la necesidad de fortalecer el capital social de los espacios que contextualizan el proceso orientador. Se explican además, los alcances del Sistema Nacional de Orientación.

The XXI century guidance and its social responsibility

El presente trabajo tiene como finalidad considerar la orientación del siglo XXI en Venezuela como una disciplina con un alto compromiso social. Como programa, debe, hoy día, redefinirse con el objeto de impulsar propuestas conducentes a la inclusión de todas aquellas personas, que tradicionalmente han sido excluidas por su raza, etnia, género y/o discapacidad física y que como praxis social esté dirigida a la facilitación de los procesos de desarrollo humano en las dimensiones del Ser, Convivir, Servir, Conocer y Hacer, en el contexto personal, familiar y comunitario a lo largo del continuo del ciclo vital. L as competencias adquiridas a través de los procesos de orientación, son determinantes para proporcionar los medios a las ciudadanas y los ciudadanos para gestionar su propio desarrollo y el de su comunidad Se plantea la necesidad de un cambio de paradigma que deje atrás la clásica postura de un orientador que ayuda al orientado, desde el que conoce, el que tiene experiencia. Se sugiere más bien una relación de orientación intersubjetiva. Por otra parte, se habla de la necesidad de fortalecer el capital social de los espacios que contextualizan el proceso orientador. Se explican además, los alcances del Sistema Nacional de Orientación.

The XXI century guidance and its social responsibility

El presente trabajo tiene como finalidad considerar la orientación del siglo XXI en Venezuela como una disciplina con un alto compromiso social. Como programa, debe, hoy día, redefinirse con el objeto de impulsar propuestas conducentes a la inclusión de todas aquellas personas, que tradicionalmente han sido excluidas por su raza, etnia, género y/o discapacidad física y que como praxis social esté dirigida a la facilitación de los procesos de desarrollo humano en las dimensiones del Ser, Convivir, Servir, Conocer y Hacer, en el contexto personal, familiar y comunitario a lo largo del continuo del ciclo vital. L as competencias adquiridas a través de los procesos de orientación, son determinantes para proporcionar los medios a las ciudadanas y los ciudadanos para gestionar su propio desarrollo y el de su comunidad Se plantea la necesidad de un cambio de paradigma que deje atrás la clásica postura de un orientador que ayuda al orientado, desde el que conoce, el que tiene experiencia. Se sugiere más bien una relación de orientación intersubjetiva. Por otra parte, se habla de la necesidad de fortalecer el capital social de los espacios que contextualizan el proceso orientador. Se explican además, los alcances del Sistema Nacional de Orientación.

The Changing Nature of Employment and the Reform of Labor and Social Security Legislation in Post-Apartheid South Africa

This paper tries to understand the current status of South African labor market, which is changing in contradictory directions, i.e. a strengthening of the rights and protection of workers at the same time as the flexibilization of employment, in the context of the characteristics of labor and social security legislation in South Africa, as well as the nature of labor and social security reforms after democratization. We put emphasis on the corporatist nature of labor policy-making as the factor influencing the course of reforms; it is argued that the apparently contradictive changes can be explained consistently by the corporatist labor policy-making process which has been practiced notwithstanding the problem of representativeness.

Rights declaration in Linked Data

Linked Data is not always published with a license. Sometimes a wrong license type is used, like a license for software, or it is not expressed in a standard, machine readable manner. Yet, Linked Data resources may be subject to intellectual property and database laws, may contain personal data subject to privacy restrictions or may even contain important trade secrets. The proper declaration of which rights are held, waived or licensed is a must for the lawful use of Linked Data at its different granularity levels, from the simple RDF statement to a dataset or a mapping. After comparing the current practice with the actual needs, six research questions are posed.

Linked Data Rights 2.0: extension of ODRL for Licensing Linked Data

Linked Data assets (RDF triples, graphs, datasets, mappings...) can be object of protection by the intellectual property law, the database law or its access or publication be restricted by other legal reasons (personal data pro- tection, security reasons, etc.). Publishing a rights expression along with the digital asset, allows the rightsholder waiving some or all of the IP and database rights (leaving the work in the public domain), permitting some operations if certain conditions are satisfied (like giving attribution to the author) or simply reminding the audience that some rights are reserved.

Psychopathy, Moral Understanding and Criminal Responsibility

Peer reviewed

Identity Entrepreneurs

In my previous article Racial Capitalism, I examined the ways in which white individuals and predominantly white institutions derive value from non-white racial identity. This process flows from our intense social and legal preoccupation with diversity. And it results in the commodification of non-white racial identity, with negative implications for both individuals and society. This Article picks up where Racial Capitalism left off in three ways. As a foundation, it first expands the concept of racial capitalism to identity categories more generally, explaining that individual in-group members and predominantly in-group institutions — usually individuals or institutions that are white, male, straight, wealthy, and so on — can and do derive value from out-group identities. Second, the Article turns from the overarching system of identity capitalism to the myriad ways that individual out-group members actively participate in that system. In particular, I examine how out-group members leverage their out-group status to derive social and economic value for themselves. I call such out-group participants identity entrepreneurs. Identity entrepreneurship is neither inherently good nor inherently bad. Rather, it is a complicated phenomenon with both positive and negative consequences. Finally, the Article considers the appropriate response to identity entrepreneurship. We should design laws and policies to maximize both individual agency and access to information for out-group members. Such reforms would protect individual choice while making clear the consequences of identity entrepreneurship both for individual identity entrepreneurs and for the out-group as a whole. A range of legal doctrines interact with and influence identity entrepreneurship, including employment discrimination under Title VII, rights of privacy and publicity, and intellectual property. Modifying these doctrines to take account of identity entrepreneurship will further progress toward an egalitarian society in which in-group and out-group identities are valued equally.

Brief of Amici Curiae Scholars of the Constitutional Rights of Children in Support of Petitioners in Obergefell v. Hodges

Supreme Court precedent establishes that the government may not punish children for matters beyond their control. Same-sex marriage bans and non-recognition laws (“marriage bans”) do precisely this. The states argue that marriage is good for children, yet marriage bans categorically exclude an entire class of children – children of same-sex couples – from the legal, economic and social benefits of marriage. This amicus brief recounts a powerful body of equal protection jurisprudence that prohibits punishing children to reflect moral disapproval of parental conduct or to incentivize adult behavior. We then explain that marriage bans punish children of same-sex couples because they: 1) foreclose their central legal route to family formation; 2) categorically void their existing legal parent-child relationships incident to out-of-state marriages; 3) deny them economic rights and benefits; and 4) inflict psychological and stigmatic harm. States cannot justify marriage bans as good for children and then exclude children of same-sex couples based on moral disapproval of their same-sex parents’ relationships or to incentivize opposite-sex couples to “procreate” within the bounds of marriage. To do so, severs the connection between legal burdens and individual responsibility and creates a permanent class or caste distinction.