Ms. Laurence Bich-Carrière, litigation lawyer at Lavery, is the author of an article entitled “Homère, Gutenberg, Helen Keller et Stevie Wonder: Commentaire sur le traité de l'OMPI pour l'accès des aveugles à l'imprimé,” recently published in the Asper Review of International Business and Trade Law.
On June 27, 2013, after many years of negotiation, the World Intellectual Property Organization adopted the Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access To Published Works by Visually Impaired Persons and Persons with Print Disabilities. In this commentary, Ms. Bich-Carrière explores the negotiation background and the evolution of the proposed instrument before turning to an analysis of how the international copyright community sought to modulate the rules regarding reproduction of copyright-protected works and their cross-border distribution to increase access to accessible format works. Impact on Canadian copyright law is also discussed.
To read the article, (in French) click here.
To read the Treaty and related official documents, click here.