What Is WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (WPPT)?

We have a crush on the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (WPPT). It's like the love child of the World Intellectual Property Organization and a convention for protecting performers, producers of phonograms2 and broadcasting organizations (Rome Convention). Like the World Intellectual Property Organization, it was created to address digital technology and communications changes. The WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT) is another treaty born out of this need to address how modern copyright law must adapt to new technologies like the Internet. Like its parents and siblings, the WPPT is an international agreement that supplements the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (Berne Convention). The WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty (WPPT) is an international agreement of the World Intellectual Property Organization that supplements the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works and the International Convention for the Protection of Performers, Producers of Phonograms and Broadcasting Organizations (Rome Convention). Like the WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT), WPPT was created to address digital technology and communications changes, mainly distributing digitally protected works over the Internet. The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has been the international authority on copyright, patents and other intellectual property matters since 1967. WIPO is responsible for both the WPPT and WCT, enacted to respond to new marketplace and technology developments where an increasing amount of copyrighted work is distributed digitally. The WIPO Treaty was created to update WIPO copyright treaties and regulations, primarily with the rapidly evolving development of new markets, distribution, methods of use and types of works. The World Trade Organization established a working group on trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights (TRIPS), which recommended protecting copyright-related rights over digital networks. WIPO member states adopted these recommendations in 1996 as an amendment to the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works. Then in 1997, members adopted another amendment known as the Rome Convention Implementation Act, which provides a model law for countries who want to implement WPPT into their national laws.