Title:
'Net Neutrality,' Gene Patents Face Legal Setbacks
in US
Description: This is
a VOA Special English Economics Report.
See text below
Text:
Two American rulings could
change how information is controlled online and in
our bodies.
In April, a federal appeals court
in Washington ruled that current laws limit
government power over Internet traffic.
The court rejected an order against America's
biggest cable company.
In two thousand seven, officials ordered Comcast to
stop interfering with file-sharing programs used by
its Internet customers. Comcast said big files
slowed its network.
All three judges agreed that the Federal
Communications Commission had no legal basis to tell
Comcast what to do. The F.C.C. supervises
communications by radio, television, wire, satellite
and cable.
But its power over Internet and wireless
communications has
long been questioned.
Now, without changes in the rules, network providers
could slow or block services of competitors.
The decision came just weeks
after the F.C.C. announced its National Broadband
Plan to provide faster, lower-cost connections
for almost all Americans.
The F.C.C. says the court
"in no way disagreed with the importance of
preserving a free
and open Internet." The agency could seek new powers
to regulate Internet service and enforce net
neutrality. That is the idea that all content on the
Web should be treated equally.
In a different case, a recent ruling in New York
renewed debate about
who can "own" genetic information.
Myriad Genetics received patents for methods to
identify women with genes that create a high risk of
breast cancer. Patents involving the two genes made
Myriad the only company able to offer the costly
tests.
But federal Judge Robert Sweet cancelled seven of
twenty-three patents related to the genes.
He said they violate the law against patents for
products of nature.
Yet companies and universities often claim human
genes as intellectual property. An estimated twenty
percent of human genes have been patented in the
United States.
Judge Sweet said the patent office thinks DNA should
be treated like any other chemical compound.
The idea is that removal from
the body and purification makes
it into something different
that can be patented.
He said many consider this a "lawyer's trick" to
avoid the ban
on the direct patenting of DNA,
but the result is the same.
Cancer activists and researchers fought the patents.
Myriad is appealing the ruling.
And that's the VOA Special
English Economics Report.
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personally reviewed this video and found it appropriate for
the news section of English Global Group. This
is a Voice of America video which covers an interesting
topic in Special English. I would appreciate some feedback from both
students and teachers about this video. You can comment in
the window below using any of a number of different services
including Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, and Hotmail.
