WSIS Tunis

When most of the world's press (I was particularly struck by the front page of yesterday's Independent) seems to be interested in in your work you think you must be on to something. Perhaps inevitably, media coverage of the World Summit on the Information Society has so far focussed primarily on Internet Governance or indeed "who should own the internet".
With some sort of deal having been done on future multilateral cooperation - remains to be seen how it will work in practice - WSIS Tunis is now underway.

There is encouraging rhetoric about bridging the digital divide and having human rights at the heart of initiatives, as well as specific action plans. The present forms of the Tunis Agenda and Tunis Commitment are laudable documents (most particularly the Action Line with its suggestions for institutional collaborations). Again, the next two days will be interesting.

From our perspective, other than some focus on IP in parallel events, and to open source projects in key documents, there is a marked lack of reference to IP - particularly in comparison with its presence in the WSIS Geneva Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action. While this could be seen as a focus on what is to be achieved, rather than legal nicety, ignoring the legal obstacles which could be posed by IP might simply shore up problems.

However, fingers crossed.