The DOJ and FTC issued a final version of their update of joint guidelines for enforcing antitrust policy on IP licensing Friday. The agencies’ original proposal got a mixed reaction in September, with several tech sector groups criticizing them for not addressing controversial IP issues like patent assertion entities and standard-essential patents (see 1609280063). The update's final version retains much of the original proposal, including the agencies’ high-level approach to enforcing antitrust policy on IP licensing matters and avoidance of the controversial IP issues. The updated guidelines reflect “intervening changes in statutory and case law, as well as relevant enforcement and policy work, including the agencies’ 2010 Horizontal Merger Guidelines,” said DOJ Antitrust Division head Renata Hesse in a blog post. The update was aimed at reflecting recent IP-related court cases, the 2016 Defend Trade Secrets Act and changes in the lengths of copyright and patent terms (see 1608120045 and 1608180056). The revised guidelines reaffirm the FTC’s “commitment to an economically grounded approach to antitrust analysis of IP licensing,” said outgoing Chairwoman Edith Ramirez in a news release. Commissioners voted 3-0 in favor of the final guidelines. The revised guidelines “are a welcome guidepost,” said Commissioner Maureen Ohlhausen in a statement. The update embraces “principles of commendable flexibility,” including that IP licensing is generally pro-competitive, she said. Ramirez is leaving the FTC next month, she announced separately Friday (see 1701130030).

The Association of American Publishers said it selected former Register of Copyrights Maria Pallante as its next president and CEO. Pallante will succeed retiring AAP President Tom Allen Tuesday, the group said Thursday. Two months ago, Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden ousted Pallante as head of the Copyright Office. Pallante resigned from the LOC entirely shortly after being reassigned to be an adviser on the library's digital strategy (see 1610210061, 1610240052 and 1610250062). Pallante previously worked at the Guggenheim Museums, the Authors Guild and National Writers Union. Pallante “is a creative, forward-thinking leader who has earned the deep respect of members of Congress as well as intellectual property experts,” said AAP Chairman YS Chi in a news release.

Though China has made progress on intellectual property, issues remain, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative reported to Congress on the country's World Trade Organization Compliance. During 2016, the two nations made “significant progress” on ensuring that information and communications technology (ICT) policies don't impose unnecessary nationality-based restrictions on the purchase, sale or use of those products by commercial enterprises, said USTR. It said the U.S. will continue to engage China on ICT policies and technology localization. China is reforming its IP rights regime, but U.S. companies must contend with unpunished thefts of trade secrets for the benefit of Chinese companies, widespread counterfeiting and “bad faith” trademark registration, whereby Chinese authorities “hold … them for ransom,” USTR said. It noted Chinese officials at a November Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade meeting in Washington cited potential harm caused by “bad-faith” trademarks and confirmed they're taking more steps to combat them. Overly burdensome licensing requirements, discriminatory regulatory processes and informal bans on entry and expansion continue to affect telecom and internet-related services doing business in China, the report said.

Alibaba Group Chairman Jack Ma met Monday with President-elect Donald Trump to discuss “how Alibaba can create 1 million U.S. jobs by enabling 1 million U.S. small businesses to sell goods into the China and the Asian marketplace,” a Trump spokesman said. Trump’s meeting with Ma came less than a month after the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative redesignated Alibaba’s Taobao online shopping arm as a “notorious” market for IP infringement. Taobao faced ongoing criticism for not doing enough to combat the sales of counterfeit products (see 1612210068). Trump’s presidential campaign pledged to force China to stop IP theft (see 1606290080).

Patent and Trademark Office Director Michelle Lee said she’s “optimistic” the incoming administration “will share our appreciation of the importance of IP.” President-elect Donald Trump “has promised economic growth and job creation, and IP will necessarily be key to achieving that goal,” Lee said during Friday's speech at CES, according to prepared remarks. PTO is “well situated to address the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead” given its accomplishments over the past three years, she said. Lee noted PTO has reduced the backlog of unexamined patent applications by approximately 30 percent. The office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board proceedings aided in “providing a faster, more cost efficient quality check on the patents in the system,” Lee said. PTO’s Enhanced Patent Quality Initiative is continuing work that will “meaningfully move the needle on enhancing patent quality,” including increasing the clarity of the patent record, Lee said.

ACT|The App Association praised the Copyright Office Tuesday for its deployment this month of its online system for designating and searching for agents to receive copyright infringement claim notifications under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's Section 512. Online service providers that have previously designated agents with the CO will have until the end of 2017 to submit a new designation electronically via the online system (see 1610310050). "App developers will finally have the ability to protect their intellectual property with the click of a button instead of the lick of (thousands of) stamps," said ACT Senior Policy Counsel Brian Scarpelli in a blog post. The old designation system "resulted in an online searchable database that was not user-friendly (for example, many fields were not searchable), often contained outdated or erroneous information, and made it difficult for copyright owners to send take-down requests to protect their work." ACT members "can now know they will be able to submit DMCA take-down notices more easily and accurately through accessing this new [CO] database," Scarpelli said.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation criticized the Association of American Publishers and major music industry interests for recent letters urging President-elect Donald Trump to strongly enforce IP rights and to push for changes to copyright law that appear to favor rightsholders. RIAA and other top music industry entities asked Trump last week to seek “strong protections” to protect IP rights, saying top tech sector firms “should follow others' example to effectively stop theft and assure fair payment.” AAP asked Trump last week to push Congress to make fixes to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (see 1612130023 and 1612150033). EFF believes AAP and the music companies were pushing for a revamp of DMCA Section 512's safe harbor provisions, which “is a bad idea for everyone, including musicians,” said Policy Fellow Kerry Sheehan in a Tuesday blog post. “The music industry has benefited enormously from the Internet’s growth. Not only are there more opportunities for musicians to share their music with a global audience, but the industry itself is profiting handsomely.” AAP “also implies it wants even stricter enforcement against device manufacturers -- presumably through laws like Section 1201 that prohibit users from getting around digital locks on copyrighted content,” Sheehan said. “But locking down users’ devices, as with Digital Rights Management, is a massively unpopular strategy that impairs users’ ability to freely express themselves, interferes with access to books in accessible formats, hinders competition, and takes away users’ freedom to tinker with their own devices.” It appears “Big Content will never stop looking for more government support for their traditional business model, no matter what the cost to the Internet -- and they are never satisfied,” Sheehan said. “We urge the incoming administration to resist industry demands for more copyright regulation that, if history is any guide, will be both expensive and ineffective.”

The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers said it reached agreement with Nielsen to improve reporting of music industry data. Nielsen agreed to give ASCAP “expanded” U.S. radio airplay data, including metadata and unique identifiers for recordings. The Nielsen data, when combined with ASCAP’s membership and copyright data, will significantly improve the transparency of information provided to ASCAP members, the performing rights organization said. The linkage to unique identifiers will particularly improve the potential for accurately reporting royalty information, ASCAP said. “Nielsen’s data will bring additional frequency and breadth to ASCAP’s reporting, enabling ASCAP’s members to have a 360-degree view of the performance landscape for their music, while enabling faster and more accurate reporting and tracking across all platforms,” said ASCAP CEO Elizabeth Matthews in a news release. “This deal also sets the stage for us to provide our members with new business intelligence tools with predictive analytics components.”

The Copyright Office said it's extending to Jan. 30 the deadline for submitting comments on rulemakings to update the office's rules for supplementary registration information submissions, group registration of photos and group registration of periodicals. The CO released the NPRMs earlier this month (see 1612020025). The supplementary registration NPRM would update the rules to require an all-online application process. The photo registration NPRM would allow group registrations of unpublished photos, while the periodicals registration NPRM would require applicants for the group registration of contributions to periodicals to file claims online.

The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers and the Radio Music License Committee (RMLC) said Thursday they reached agreement on the royalty rate for ASCAP's recording repertory that RMLC member broadcasters must pay over the next five years. The agreement, which takes effect Jan. 1 and runs through 2021, sets unspecified increases in the rates for both terrestrial and digital performances of ASCAP members' music, the parties said. The agreement also “expressly affirms the percentage share of radio performances represented by ASCAP -- at a level that reflects that ASCAP licenses more performances on broadcast radio than any other performing rights organization" (PRO), ASCAP said. The new agreement “will provide enhanced financial benefits to ASCAP songwriters, composers and music publishers at a time of tremendous disruption in the music industry,” said ASCAP CEO Elizabeth Matthews in a news release. RMLC Chairman Ed Christian in the news release said: “The increase in ASCAP fees is consistent with ASCAP's established spin share on radio.” A legal battle is ongoing between RMLC and the PRO Global Music Rights in which both parties are making antitrust claims. RMLC claimed in its lawsuit in the U.S. District Court in Philadelphia that GMR's higher licensing rates were prompting ASCAP and Broadcast Music Inc. themselves to seek higher rates from radio stations (see 1611210011 and 1612090062).