Establish Compulsory Licences for all Copyright and Patents

Text of the Policy

 * We will establish a system of automatic licences for copyright and patents. Innovators will be able to pay a flat fee for the right to use works of intellectual property held by another. This is similar to the provisions made for ‘cover songs’ in the music industry.
 * As the intellectual property holders will not be able to reject an automatic licence request we will set the royalties received from sales of products using their intellectual property at a level above the market rate as a means of compensation.
 * License fees for intellectual property whose owner is not known (known as ‘orphaned works’ in copyright) will be paid to the government. The government will hold onto the payment until the intellectual property holder is identified.

Rationales

 * Compulsory licencing would prevent abuse of the patent system such as patent hoarding (e.g. oil company buying up patent to a technology that could make oil obsolete to keep it out of the market - see Chevron Patent Encumberance of NimH Battery and Toyota's First Gen Rav4 EV Discontinued), life saving products monopoly, overzealous patent owners making the iteration of an invention inaccessible (e.g. Steam Engine patent slowing further innovation and improvement until the patent expired), patent owner creating artificial scarcity, etc.

Snippet of Discussions

 * Suggestion raised about mentioning it's required only for commercial use. But it was pointed out that our other policies is making non-commercial infringement legal so it becomes redundant and unecessary to specifically mention that.
 * Differing fees based on technology or sector is possible. Uniform fee needed to prevent company selectively making it prohibitively expensive for small business or individuals from using it.

Possible Misinformations
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Related News or Articles

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 * Toyota RAV4 EV's Chevron Patent Encumberance
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 * Compulsory patent licensing and local drug manufacturing capacity in Africa

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