The World Health Organization (WHO) has released a framework paper on how intellectual property rights can help or hinder public health. The focus is much more on how patents affect the development and distribution of medicines than on how copyrights affect the publication and sharing of knowledge. However, WHO is soliciting public opinion on the issues (for about four weeks) and might welcome a copyright thread to supplement the patent thread. One of the questions for comment is whether the WHO Commission on Intellectual Property Rights, Innovation and Public Health (CIPIH) is omitting any important issues.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 7/27/2004 11:25:00 AM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
