Legal Protection: WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) Presumably the major player in the field of international intellectual property protection and administrator of various multilateral treaties dealing with the legal and administrative aspects of intellectual property is the WIPO. Information on WIPO administered agreements in the field of industrial property (Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property (1883), Madrid Agreement Concerning the International Registration of Marks (1891) etc.) can be found on: http://www.wipo.org/eng/general/index3.htm Information on treaties concerning copyright and neighboring rights (Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (1886) etc.) is published on: http://www.wipo.org/eng/general/index5.htm The most recent multilateral agreement on copyright is the 1996 WIPO Copyright Treaty. Among other things it provides that computer programs are protected as literary works and also introduces the protection of databases, which "... by reason of the selection or arrangement of their content constitute intellectual creations." Furthermore the 1996 WIPO Copyright Treaty contains provisions concerning technological measures, rights management information and establishes a new "right of communication to the public". It is available on: http://www.wipo.org/eng/diplconf/distrib/treaty01.htm

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Recent "Digital Copyright" Legislation: U.S. DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) The debates in the House and Senate preceding the signing into law of the DMCA by U.S. President Clinton in October 1998 indicated that the principal object of the Act is to promote the U.S. economy by establishing an efficient Internet marketplace in copyrighted works. The DMCA implements the two 1996 WIPO treaties (WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty and WIPO Copyright Treaty) and addresses a variety of issues that arose with the increased availability of content in digital form. The Act 1) creates a series of "safe harbor" defenses (which are subject to a variety of conditions that must be met) for certain common activities of ISPs (Internet Service Provider), 2) bars the circumvention of technological protection measures that protect copyrighted works, 3) prohibits the distribution or provision of false copyright management information with the intent to induce or conceal infringement, 4) establishes an exemption for making a copy of a computer program for purposes of maintenance or repair, and 5) contains provisions concerning the "webcasting" of sound recordings on the Internet and the making of (digital) copies of copyrighted works by nonprofit libraries and archives. A full-text version of the DMCA is available from: The Library of Congress: Thomas (Legislative Information on the Internet): http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/cpquery/z?cp105:hr796: Moreover the U.S. Copyright Office provides a memorandum, which briefly summarizes each of the five titles of the DMCA (pdf format): http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/legislation/dmca.pdf The DMCA has been criticized for not clarifying the range of legal principles on the liability of ISPs and creating exceptions to only some of the provisions; therefore giving copyright owners even more rights. Among the variety of comments on the DMCA are: Lutzker, Arnold P.: Primer on the Digital Millennium: What the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and the Copyright Term Extension Act Mean for the Library Community. http://www.arl.org/info/frn/copy/primer.html Lutzker & Lutzker law firm and the Association of Research Libraries: The Digital Millennium Copyright Act: Highlights of New Copyright Provision Establishing Limitation of Liability for Online Service Providers. http://www.arl.org/info/frn/copy/osp.html

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to encipher/encode to put a word or text into ciphers/codes

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Agostino Ramelli's reading wheel, 1588 Agostino Ramelli designed a "reading wheel" which allowed browsing through a large number of documents without moving from one spot. Presenting a large number of books, a small library, laid open on lecterns on a kind of ferry-wheel, allowing us to skip chapters and to browse through pages by turning the wheel to bring lectern after lectern before our eyes, thus linking ideas and texts together, Ramelli's reading wheel reminds of today's browsing software used to navigate the World Wide Web.

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