[Infoecon] Draft letter on copyright & the Australia-US "Free Trade" Agreement

[Lee Naish]

In message <20030506150959.A15738 at mundroo.cs.mu.OZ.AU> pde wrote:
>On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 12:59:28PM +1000, Alan Blair wrote:
>> 
>> I thought one of the main purposes of "mod chipping" was to modify
>> equipment so that it can play DVDs and computer games which are
>> available in the US but not currently available in Australia
>> at the same price. If there is a free trade agreement between
>> the US and Australia, surely this would no longer be necessary
>> (but maybe there are other purposes to the procedure?)

>To my knowledge, the only thing issue in the negotiations which could affect
>region coding is anti-circumvention rules, and these are going to make region
>coding stronger.

It looks like there is a good line of argument here.  Contrary to the
aims of a bilateral trade agreement, there is not a level playing field
wrt informations goods, due to region coding, etc.  Strengthening our
anti-circumvention rules would make the situation worse rather than
better, and Australia would definitely lose on this.

	lee