Globalization And The Impacts Of E Commerce

One of the most vital processes of the last several decades has been the emergence and development of the process of globalisation. According to the definition given by Andrew Heywood “globalization is the emergence of a complex web of interconnectedness that means our lives are increasingly shaped by the events that occur, and the decisions that are made, at a greater distance from us. The central feature of globalization is therefor the geographical distance is of a declining relevance and the territorial boundaries, such as those between nation states are becoming less significant” [1] .

One of the significant characteristic of globalisation is the “Time- space compression”. Through the advances in technology, it is easier to communicate and travel internationally and also that the speed at which these things are accomplished has greatly increased [2] . This aspect of globalisation has a wider impact on the global commerce were the advances in technology have led to an integration and interconnectedness of the global economy. The pace at which transactions can take place has led to an increased global focus on the integration of economies and has led to the increased involvement of private business actors in the realm of international finance and international markets. Modern technologies have moreover facilitated a scale and speed of communication that is unprecedented [3] . The UNDP human development report [4] explains that “the fusion of computing and communications especially through the internet has broken the bounds of cost, time and distance launching an era of global information networking”.

The Internet, digital technologies and the evolution of E-commerce (Electronic Commerce) raised new challenges for the Intellectual property right holders in the digital world. Materials protected by copyright and related rights constitute much of the valuable subject matter of ecommerce. This situation has a wide-ranging impact on the right of copyright holders’ because they permit new ways of creating, using, and duplicating works of authorship. In the digital world copies can be made cheaply and distributed widely by individuals. The copyright laws that were set to compact with the problems in the physical world had to deal with the issues in the digital world. To achieve the same the copyright laws has to undergo drastic changes. In this context this paper attempts to analyse the evolution of Ecommerce in the background of globalisation and its implications on the Copyright laws. The paper will also focus on the various measures adopted by the national governments to prevent the infringement of copyright in the digital world. The paper excludes the disputes related to domain names, Patents and Trademarks.

EVOLUTION OF E COMMERCE

In the 1990s the information technology led to a new revolution through the commercialization of internet. The limitations of networked systems like the cost structure and that related to geographical limits became irrelevant. Old traditions about the cost structure and geographic limits of networked systems turn out to be irrelevant and it became easy to form a worldwide system quickly and inexpensively. Business people seized this opportunity and responded by creating entirely new types of businesses and fundamentally altering existing businesses. The once limited strategic use of information technology became widespread. Thus new terms were created to label this revolution: electronic commerce (more commonly called ecommerce) and electronic business (eBusiness) [5] .

In the present scenario we can see the business world is transitioning from a physical reality based on atoms to a digital one of bits [6] .The term commerce is viewed by some as transactions conducted between business partners. Therefore, the term eCommerce seems to be fairly narrow to some people. Thus the term eBusiness refers to a broader definition of eCommerce, not just buying and selling but also servicing customers and collaborating with business partners, and conducting electronic transactions within an organization.

Business-to-business eCommerce is the largest gold rush international commerce has seen for decades. It may be the largest ever Bridging the profound gap between the way traditional businesses are run and the way virtual communities will be built. [7] 

The rapid growth of the Internet and associated technologies have created a new business environment and opened up numerous new possibilities for conducting and managing businesses. Terms such as digital economy, eBusiness, and eCommerce are being used to characterize these developments. [8] Businesses have become internet worked eBusiness enterprises. The Internet and Internet-like networks inside the enterprise (intranets), between an enterprise and its trading partners (extranets), and other types of networks are now the primary information technology infrastructure of many organizations. The Internet is a network of networks. The internet worked eBusiness enterprise enables managers, business professionals, teams, and workgroups to electronically exchange data and information anywhere in the world with other end users, customers, suppliers, and business partners. Companies and workgroups can thus collaborate more creatively, manage their business operations and resources more effectively, and compete successfully in today’s fast-changing global economy [9] .

PRINCIPLES of E COMMERCE

Organization of Economic Corporation and Development (OECD) deals with five broad themes for a better understanding of eCommerce. [10] 

1. Ecommerce transforms the marketplace: ecommerce is changing the way business is conducted. Traditional intermediary functions will be replaced, new products and markets will be developed, and new and far closer relationships will be created between business and consumers. It will change the organization of work: new channels of knowledge diffusion and human interactivity in the workplace will be opened with more flexibility and adaptability will be needed, and workers’ functions and skills will be redefined.

2. Ecommerce has a catalytic effect: Ecommerce will serve to accelerate and diffuse more widely changes that are already under way in the economy, such as the reform of regulations, the establishment of electronic links between businesses (EDI), the globalization of economic activity, and the demand for higher-skilled workers. Likewise, many sectorial trends already underway, such as e-banking, direct booking of travel, and one-to-one marketing, are accelerated by ecommerce.

3. ECommerce over the Internet vastly increases interactivity in the economy: These linkages now extend down to small businesses and households and reach out to the world at large. Access will shift away from personal computers to cheap and easy-to-use TVs and telephones to devices yet to be invented. People will increasingly have the ability to communicate and transact business anywhere, anytime. This will have a profound impact, not the least of which will be the erosion of economic and geographic boundaries.

4. Openness is an underlying technical and philosophical tenet of the expansion of ecommerce: The widespread adoption of the Internet as a platform for business is due to its non-proprietary standards and open nature as well as to the huge industry that has evolved to support it. The economic power that stems from joining a large network will help to ensure that new standards remain open. More importantly, openness has emerged as a strategy, with many of the most successful eCommerce ventures granting business partner and consumers unparallel access to their inner workings, abases, and personnel. This has led to a shift in the role of consumers, who are increasingly implicated as partners in product design and creation. An expectation of openness is building on the part of consumers/citizens, which will cause transformations, for better (e.g. increased transparency, competition) or for worse (e.g. potential invasion of privacy) in the economy and society.

5. Ecommerce alters the relative importance of time: Many of the routines that help define the look and feel of the economy and society are a function of time: mass production is the fastest way of producing at the lowest cost; one’s community tends to be geographically determined because time is a determinant of proximity. Ecommerce is reducing the importance of time by speeding up production cycles, allowing firms to operate in close coordination and enabling consumers to conduct transactions around the clock. As the role of time changes, so will the structure of business and social activities, causing potentially large impacts.

In a nutshell the benefits of Ecommerce are, they offer personalization, high quality customer service and improved supply-chain management. This features of ecommerce has led to a wide scope of Intellectual Property transactions, especially the copyright works in the digital world and thus raise the challenges of protection of the same in the digital world.

IMPACT of ECOMMERCE on COPYRIGHT

Copyright is a legal term describing rights given to creators for their literary and artistic works. The kinds of works covered by copyright include literary works such as novels, poems, plays, reference works, newspapers, and computer programs; databases; films, musical compositions, and choreography; artistic works such as paintings, drawings, photographs and sculpture; architecture; and advertisements, maps, and technical drawings [11] . Copyright motivates the creative activity of authors and thereby provides the public with the products of those creators. By granting authors exclusive rights, the public receives the benefit of literature and music and other creative works that might not otherwise be created or disseminated. Effective copyright protection promotes a new Cyber-marketplace of ideas, expression, and products [12] .

The internet has paved the way for new ways of creating, using and duplicating copyrighted works. Internet and other digital technologies raise new issues for copyright law because they permit new ways of creating, using, and duplicating works of authorship. Copies are made cheap and the distributions of the same are done at a greater pace in the digital world. This creates the major challenge in the present scenario for copyright holders.

In this context it is worth to discuss the implications of globalisation of information and its impact on intellectual property laws. The growth of digital information in the background of globalisation has a wider impact on the domestic and international intellectual property regimes. This has led to the standardization of Intellectual Property laws and demand for greater protection. The literature of recent years advocates that these effects on Intellectual Property have positive impact on the intellectual property producing nations and transnational corporations. Another argument put forth in this context is that the sovereignty of the state is compromised to strong and powerful private entities .It is possible that the prevalence of such writings in the literature is a response to the movement toward harmonization and stronger intellectual property protections and an attempt to ensure that some of the less heard voices are expressed. [13] Globalization of intellectual property laws is leading to an erosion of state sovereignty or, at least, “profound transformations” in our notions of sovereignty [14] 

The Internet poses a threat to copyright laws, especially in the areas of illegal music copying and distribution. The Internet is made up of millions of sites with millions of users potentially viewing those sites daily. It is very easy for users to download information from other peoples’ sites and in many cases this activity is not easily monitored. A user with a personal web page may also upload files to the server where the page is located and then allow other users to copy that file, regardless of the fact that it may be copyrighted. [15] 

The international character of E commerce raises questions about the nature of traditional legal systems in general, and intellectual property law in particular. They are based on notions of sovereignty and territoriality. The Internet, in contrast, like the movement of weather within the global climate, largely ignores distinctions based on territorial borders. Instead, infrastructure, code and language have thus far had a greater bearing on the reach of its currents [16] . For example, the most fundamental issue raised for the fields of copyright is the determination of the scope of protection in the digital environment involving how rights are defined, and what exceptions and limitations are permitted. Other important issues include how rights are enforced and administered in this environment; who in the chain of dissemination of infringing material can be held legally responsible for the infringement; and questions of jurisdiction and applicable law.

The Internet is multi-jurisdictional. Users can access the Internet from almost any place on earth. The unique feature of digitized information is that they travel through various countries and jurisdictions before reaching its final destination. The major legal issue arise in this context is the problem of jurisdiction to adjudicate a dispute at a particular location. Secondly there arises the question of law that can be made available to the disputes and finally the recognition and enforcement of judgements in courts in foreign jurisdictions. The economic pressures and the growing international significance of copyright have led to new laws. These new laws are overwhelmingly in furtherance of expanding protection, easier protection, and longer protection. [17] 

There is no standard international copyright law, but an international system exists were a set of norms based on national laws. There exist two different traditions with regard to copyrighted works such as common law and the civil law. Public benefit is the principal focus of copyright systems for which the countries the countries that followed common law tradition. In the civil law tradition copyright works are treated as an author’s natural human rights, or part of one’s right of personality. Thus, under this system, the protection of an author’s moral rights is as essential as the corresponding protection of his/her economic rights.

The concept of copyright itself witnessed a drastic change along with the development of technology. In the age of printing press copyright was a restriction on the publishers and authors rather than on the readers. Now in the present context the age of the printing press is coming to an end and the age of the computer networks has taken the way. The computer networks and the transactions in the digital world are now taking us back to a scenario that existed at the age of printing press were anybody who can read can also make a copy of his own.

This has directed to a different situation were the there is a drastic change in the working of the copyright laws; Copyright law is now no longer an industrial regulation rather it is a draconian restriction on the general public. Earlier the copyright laws were used to restrict the publishers and to protect the authors now in the present scenario copyright laws are used to restrict the public for the sake of publishers.

In the present scenario the publishers are vigilant in protecting their copyright and they wish to increase copyright powers to the maximum extent point where they have complete control over the information. The publishers in fact started compelling the national governments for more copyright powers. These situations led to creation of stringent laws were more powers were given to the publishers and freedoms of the public are being taken away to a large extent.

The Passing of Digital Millennium Copyright Act by the US can be cited in this context. Similar laws were passed in Australia and European countries as well.

In order to prevent the infringement of copyright in the digital world various methods have been adopted. Firstly harsh punishments are inflicted on copyright violators. The word pirate was earlier used to refer the publishers who failed to pay the authors, but in the present scenario it is used to refer the public who escapes from the control of the publisher. In the globalised era of information it is observed that the publishers are compelling the governments to amend the copyright laws to give themselves more power. The publishers are purchasing the laws to empower themselves. Secondly the publishers are also trying to extend the duration of copyright.

So the publishers are purchasing laws to give themselves more power. In addition, they’re also extending the duration of the copyright. This can be assumed from the speech delivered by Richard Stallman were he points out

“The U.S. Constitution says that copyright must last for a limited time, but the publishers want copyright to last forever. However, getting a constitutional amendment would be rather difficult, so they found an easier way that achieves the same result. Every 20 years they retroactively extend copyright by 20 years. So the result is, at any given time, copyright nominally lasts for a certain period and any given copyright will nominally expire someday. But that expiration will never be reached because every copyright will be extended by 20 years every 20 years; thus no work will ever go into the public domain again. This has been called “perpetual copyright on the instalment plan.” [18] 

The law which was passed in US in the year 1998 that extended the copyright protection for twenty more years was called the “Mickey Mouse Copyright Extension Act”. One of the main champions of this law was Disney. The copyright of Disney was about to fall in the public domain by the year 2003 and to extend the duration of their copyright they compelled the US government to amend the copyright law. Similar instances can be pointed out from various national copyright legislations across the world.

CONCLUSION

In the current environment it is seen that globalisation is carried out by a number of policies that are done in the name of economic efficiency or free trade treaties. These treaties are drafted in such a way to empower the Business corporates over laws and policies. They’re not really about free trade. These treaties transfer power to business corporates and the national governments find themselves in a situation were they can’t protect the interest of their own citizens. In the present scenario it is the foreign companies having more power than citizens of the country.

The copyright treaties that were designed in the in the 90’s begin to impose copyright throughout the world in more powerful and restrictive way. The distinctive features of these treaties were they are controlled by corporate giants. It is an accepted reality that strong Copyright protection hinders the development of a country. When the US was a developing country, The US failed to recognize foreign copyrights because they were well aware of the fact that it can be an obstacle in their development, but in the present scenario the developing countries are compelled to amend their copyright laws for empowering the publishers of developed nations and to protect their copyright in the digital world. The US threatens the developing nations to go against their own interest. In the present scenario it is seen that the existing legal regime for protecting the copyright in the era of digitisation doesn’t serve the interest of the public.

Developing countries like India are also vigilant in protecting the copyright especially in the felid of software’s. In the recent years, the Indian court shows growing concern and willingness to enforce intellectual property rights. In the 21st century, intellectual property plays an ever more important role on the international stage. The evolution of ecommerce in the context of globalisation had a widespread impact on the Intellectual Property copyrights. There are further digital copyright issues yet to be successfully addressed in the world of ecommerce.