WIPO Diary SCCR39 (Day 4) – Are we still talking TV?

The second day of discussions on the broadcasting treaty were mainly conducted behind closed doors with the plenary chamber finally filling at 17:40 for a presentation of conclusions.

The behind closed doors approach left observers heading to the coffee area around the meeting room where informals are held to get snippets of information both on the broadcasting treaty and the way forward on exceptions and limitations for libraries, museums, archives and educational uses. 

Today’s side event was organised by Knowledge Education International (KEI) on the broadcasting treaty under the title The broadcasters right and the new streaming services: who benefits from the new rights. The discussions helped clarify the boundaries of the possible Broadcasting Treaty and saw former SCCR Chair, Jukka Liedes use his expertise to ensure the discussions were framed correctly. 

With the day drawing to a close the delegates came back into the chamber for Daren Tang to quickly present the progress on the Chair’s text for the Broadcasting Treaty noting that it was decided not to shift the text to a Committee text to maintain the flexibility they had so far to discuss solutions in informals, informal informals (really), and using the friends of chair process (a sort of a safe place where delegates from Japan, Korea, China, US, EU, Kenya, Argentina, and the Vice Chairs from Hungary and Senegal discuss options). Deferred transmissions remain a point of contention, so more work is still needed.

With that, the way forward on exceptions and limitations was confirmed as the opening item for the last day. The suspense!