OMB To Pursue Registration Of Hard Disks
I received an update on my article about registering i-café’s hard disks with OMB by way of a response from Atty. Cyrus Paul Valenzuela, OIC-Executive Director of Optical Media Board (OMB) and I quote:
Hey guys,
First of all I do not think I can issue an Executive Order because only the president can do so it would more likely take the form of a memorandum circular. Other than that I have made it clear that I am still in the process of making an extensive study of the same, rest assured you will be consulted on the matter. To date I have already received an opinion from the United States Patent and Trade Office that hard drives are indeed magnetic mediums falling under the jurisdiction of the OMB. Your comments and suggestions on the matter really matters to me. If you have any problems regarding the current process of registration I want you to know I was not the one who implemented the same and should there be any complaints on the same then please let me know. Di ko kayo gugulatin on this matter.
Atty. Cyrus Paul Valenzuela
OIC-Executive Director
Optical Media Board
I wish to thank Atty. Valenzuela for finding time to respond to my humble blog. I already made the correction in my above-cited blog by way of a strike-through on term “executive order” and replaced it with “memorandum circular”. More than this, I wish that Atty. Valenzuela reply also to my questions at the bottom of my old blog as follows:
- How will the registration of hard disks be done?
- Will the memorandum circular require only the i-cafés to register their hard disks?
- How about other businesses and offices that also use computers with hard disks in them? Are they exempted to register their hard disks with OMB?
Likewise, I want to add to the above questions if there will be registration fee and how much? Lastly, can he please clarify how registering hard disks with OMB lessen the existing intellectual property violations in the country?
I do not have all the answers to your questions right now, as I have stated I am still studying the same and at the same time I have placed a halt to my research on the same, simply put why go through all the trouble when my boss doesn’t even have an idea what I am talking about. However I do plan to have the hard drives registered in lieu of the disc drives so that there will not be any duplicity in the fees that would be imposed.
Also the fact that hard drives fall under our jurisdiction would result in the headache of regulating each and every CPU in the country that is why I plan to come up with a guideline as to which businesses would be required to register, it could depend on the number of Hard drives being used by a particular business or specific businesses would be required to register. As I said your inputs would matter, I will not pretend that I know everything.
As to the fees, no admin fee redound to the benefit of the omb as the same automatically go straight to the national treasury, as such we try and keep it at the minimum as much as possible.
Lastly I do not think I owe it to anyone to explain as to how such registration would lower intellectual property infringement as the act of registering magnetic media falls under our jurisdiction and it will be a dereliction of duty on our part not to regulate the same. But for purposes of discussion do know that we do not have a specific law on direct downloading at the present, regulating the transfer of information in a hard drive is the next best thing we have at the moment.
Atty. Cyrus Valenzuela
Thank you very much for replying to my queries. It is indeed a privilege and an honor for me to get a quick response from a high government official like you. I’m blogging on the subject for my readers to understand the issue and not for anything else. I sincerely hope that they get clarified on the questions I posited and may you again find time to answer any more questions that they may ask here.
tanong: yung mandatory registering ba ng mga cd/vdv writers nakatulong sa pagsugpo ng piracy? o sadyang napakalamig lang ng office nyo para di nyo makita yung mga tiangge offering mp3, mp4, video burning? Ito nga katabi ko nagbebenta pa ng mga burned movies…
tapos eto naman hard disk for registration. why single out the internet cafe owners? kami lang ba ang kaya nyong takutin? kung totohanan ang inyong paglaban sa piracy, it should start from you, the government offices. one sided kasi ang laban.
dapat unahin nyo muna sarili nyong mga opisina, i require ang pagrerehistro ng mga hard disks, dapat legit ang OS…
ika nga bago ka tumingin sa putik ng kapwa mo, tignan mo muna sarili mo…
hindi kami against the anti piracy drive ng gobyerno, ang nilalabanan namin yung mga “money making” scheme lang na hakbangin against piracy…
as i understand it, magnetic media falls under your jurisdiction. it doesn’t mean that you can do anything you want, just because of that technicality.
you still have to justify your actions to the public. afterall, you are still a public servant first and foremost.
or has the Optical Media Board become a private entity all of a sudden?
Atty. Cyrus,
I would take your honest admission that you will not pretend you know everything.
I’m an IT consultant from the corporate world who had served MNCs offshore (UK, US, APAC) in accrediting ISO, CMM and ISMS certifications. I find this current proposal of registering HDDs as illogical and without precedence.
We could as a group, discuss this matter seriously with your technical team, and I could, through you, invite lawyers which are certified and knowledgeable in this area. We could clarify gray areas and straighten misconceptions about your proposal.
It’s a flawed technical assumption that you should regulate HDDs just because it qualifies the definition.
Lastly, I believe Article XI section 1 of the 1987 Phil Constitution explicitly states that, among others, the general public should know the rationale of new laws/guidelines instituted by a public official. I believe the era of tyranny was over and public accountability and transparency are the general consensus in government agencies. I simply cannot accept the ‘because I say so’ reply, more so if I have more authority and experience on the matters at hand.
Arthur
[…] OMB Tο Pursue Registration Of Hard Disks […]
wow…this is craziness… i can’t find the logic behind this.
wait…ano ba definition ng “magnetic mediums”?
ahhh wait… yung TV namin may magnet, yung AM/FM radion namin may magnet…. oooppsss… hindi yata mga “mediums” yon.
hanggang nakikita ko pa rin ang mga nasa Poquia…ang masasabi ko lang…hayyy… i don’t want to say more about this baka kasuhan pa ako.
Mr. Albuera – First of all unlike the Intellectual Property Office the OMB is not content based, meaning whether or not counterfeit or original ang data that you are transferring to any optical or magnetic mediums it should be regulated by the OMB. Kung gumawa ka ng album mo na puro original composition mo it does not mean hindi ka magpaparehistro sa OMB if you want it replicated in CD format. We are a REGULATORY agency and the protection of Intellectual Property is just a result of such regulation. Think of it this way, glutathione was used to cleanse people’s liver as a side effect pumuputi ka. Pero mga kababayan natin di naman nag guglutathione para sa atay nila di ba? So meaning kung maka tulong sa pagsugpo ng piracy good, but for us not to regulate the transfer of data to Optical or Magnetic media would go against our mandate. Tinagalog ko na para naman wag na paulit ulit yan arguement na yan, next thing I will hear from you is bakit hindi kami sa quiapo mag concentrate which is soo irritating already. Other than that you are free to go to our office and I would even offer you a tour and if you can find one pirated software in the office computers then sabay natin filan ng kaso kung sino man ang nag kabit.
Bien – I dont know what you are whining about, because if you have been paying attention then you should know that I havent done any action yet.
Arthur – While I admire your eloquence do know that it is not tyrannical for government officials to implement the law, as I have stated the law is there already, it is just a matter of setting the guidelines in implementing it. If you wanted to practice your civic duties then you should have spoken up when the Optical Media Act or R.A. 9239 was being deliberated on in congress back in 2003 such law was made public and the same was published in a newspaper of general circulation for three consecutive weeks before it came into effect, bakit di ka nag salita then. Also do understand that police power is an inherent right of the state vested in congress which passed the law hence the maxim “Dura Lex Sed Lex.” Do know that if ever I will issue a memorandum circular I will make sure that there will be a public consultation and that the same will be published, your offer to assist is well noted.
Eric – First of all there is no such word as “craziness,” second of all mahirap talaga hanapin ang logic if you yourself have stated that you do not know the definition. Do your civil responsibility and know your laws imbes na pabalik balik ka jan sa poquiaps.
NOTE: While my answers might appear sarcastic and crude to some of you do note that like you I am prone to have bad days. But the point is I do appreciate the feedbacks, believe me it helps in getting a general consensus on the matter. Thank you
What i was referring to is your statement that you didn’t owe anyone an explanation. yes, you haven’t done any action yet, but the mere fact that you’re publicly contemplating on it, makes the idea open to scrutiny.
yes, hardisks may fall under your jurisdiction. it may seem to be a dereliction on your part not to regulate it. my point is, what good will registering hardisk do, besides an added red tape and cost to the consumers? from a technical standpoint, though it could be a short sightedness on my part, i simply fail to see it. hence, the request for an explanation.
laws are meant to protect and to serve, but they are not perfect. implementing them to a “T” could sometimes have an effect adverse to their initial purpose, or have no positive effect at all. questioning an implementor’s interpretation of the law should not be taken in a bad way. it’s hard enough to make a peso nowadays, unnecessary burdens is something the consumers can do without.
i do applaud your openess to some of the comments, and i understand that busy days can make your prone to having bad ones. we all have the same issue, and i hope it doesn’t cloud your final judgement on the matter.
Atty. Valenzuela, i have such a huge admiration for you that all i can say is that go ahead and do it. for i understand that you are just doing the mandate of your office which is to protect the interest of your benefactors the very people who pushed for the passing of the optical media act. you can create all the regulations and conduct all the raids that you want but it would not definitely provide to solution to the problem of intellectual property rights compliance in the country since it is based on threats and fear from persecution.
a true intellectual property compliant advocate would create the dynamics for the community to understand that there is a need to respect the intellectual property rights of others while respecting the need of the community for connectivity and equal access to technology. develop and promote the awareness of the community to Alternative Systems that could be downloaded and installed as legitimate copies of program whose license agreement require free to download, free to share and free to use that could provide the same level of productivity in their use of ICT in their daily activities.
will it benefit the filipino people I think not. it will only benefit the corrupt government offices.
Atty. Cyrus,
Unfortunately circa 2003 I was out-of-the-country busily generating OFW dollar revenues for our country (part of it pays for government salaries by the way). If RA 9239 was similar to RA 9775 which i recently took part in, then no amount of civic contestation can halt the powers behind the bill.
Lex Iniusta Non est Lex. Not because some ‘smart ‘ legislator managed to include the ambiguous 1 sec3(d), which practically allows you to ‘regulate’ all (mutatis mutandis) data storage devices : MP3s, CIF cards, USB flash drives, SSDs et al, you can regulate it. Common sense and logical thinking must prevail in this issue, not the letter of law. You are regulating the ‘transfer of data in the digital age’? Go for the source, after it leaves, the permutations are astronomical, any action to contain it will fail. GCR when it decided to censor the WWW went for the source (ISPs), they did not enforce ‘registrations’ of all net communicating device. (yea they can do so if they want, its in their mandate, they’re communists). See the analogy ?
Will it make sense for LTO to enforce registration of wheelchairs, gas powered RCs (remote control toys), golf carts, peddlers carts, kiddie bikes and other silly wheeled vehicles that ply the streets just because their mandate ambiguously ‘includes’ these class?
Police power should be guided by civil rights and common sense. We don’t need to regulate (read: register) ‘lighters’ and ‘matchboxes’ just because they are used in arson crimes. You don’t need to regulate/register HDDs just because RA 9239 ambiguously tells you so, (the fact that you checked it with the US Patent proves it’s ambiguous). It’s plain silly. In my work travel abroad, nowhere I can find precedence that can closely match the issue except for GCR which is a communist state.
Dura Lex sed Lex is non sequitur for this particular issue. we are not deliberating LAW (Law As Written) but a LAI (Law as Interpreted). Vox Populi Vox Deus is more apt maxim since I can prove via poll statistics that the number of people against this ‘proposal’ far outweighs the number of people that will benefit from it.
In my world, the corporate world where efficiency and logic prevails, we don’t add additional burdens if the simple and glaring tasks are not addressed properly and with finality. No sense in starting another project if you can’t finish an ongoing one. If one doesn’t have the will and skill to finish his task at hand it would be unwise to add additional tasks. That’s where the phrase ‘ don’t spread yourself too thin’ comes from. That’s how credibility in the business world are earned.
How fares the ‘pirated DVD’ project? You don’t need LAI, it’s a LAW. You don’t need research, it’s there in every corner. Let us do our real agency mandate first before broaching to other trivial business. Slay the dragon first and then hunt rabbits at your leisure.
Hope to receive your invitation as a panelist if ever you decide to pursue this issue.
Arthur G.