Documents from Gilberto Gil's Private Archive

patents, in its support for the free software movement, and in its resistance to Big Con- tent's attempts to shape global information policy, is transforming itself into an open source nation - a proving ground for the proposition that the future of ideas doesn't have to be the program of tightly controlled digital rights now headed our way via Red- mond, Hollywood, and Washington, DC. No surprise there either, actually. In a world divided into the content-rich and the content-poor, it's increasingly clear to those on the losing side of the divide that the tra- ditional means of addressing the imbalance piracy - is a stopgap solution at best. Sooner or later some country was bound to square off with the IP empire and be the first to insist, as a matter of state policy and national identity, on an alternative. The only question is, why Brazil? Sooner or later some country would square off with the global IP empire. And Brazil was fertile ground for it. In 1996, in response to Brazil's alarming rate of AIDS infection, the government of then-president Fernando Henrique Cardoso guaranteed distribution of the new retroviral drug cocktails to all HIV carriers in the country. Five years later, with the AIDS rate dropping, it was clear that the plan was wise but - at the prices being charged for the patented drugs in the cocktail, utterly un- sustainable. Brazil's economy is the world's 10th largest, but it is also the world's most unequal, with 10 percent of the population in control of almost half the wealth and more than 20 percent living in desperate poverty. Those are the sorts of figures that strain a government's budget even when it's not trying to stop the spread of AIDS. AIDS program, the problem took on a partic- (:08 Thievery Corporation/ DC 3000 ular urgency. His first approach was to go to the key patent holders, the US pharmaceutical giant Merck and the Swiss firm Roche, and ask for a volume discount. When the companies said no, Serra raised the stakes. Under Brazilian law, he informed them, he had the power in cases of national emergency to license local labs to produce patented drugs, royalty free, and he would use it if necessary. Merck immediately caved, but Roche stood its ground until August 2001, when Serra pre- pared to make good on his threat by drawing up the required paperwork. It was the first time a poor country had even come close to breaking a drug patent- and Roche, stunned, returned to the bargaining table with a newly cooperative attitude. In return Such was the arithmetic that led José Serra -economist, politician, and the man who set Brazil on its path toward IP independence - to take an interest in the topic. "I always found intellectual property boring," says Serra, appointed health minister under Car- doso in 1998. "Among economists, intellec- tual property isn't considered one of the noble questions." But with the drug patents for Serra's agreement to play nice, the drug- maker would reduce the price of its drug in Brazil to less than half what it was (and less than Brazil's cost to go it alone). This was a powerful lesson in the politics of intellectual property- and Brazil was fertile ground for it. As it happens, the open source community in Brazil has long been one of the most active, with a half-dozen GNU/Linux versions and the world's first open source bank ATM network. That com- munity is also undoubtedly among the most politically mobilized. "Every license for Office plus Windows in Brazil - a country in which 22 million people are starving - means we have to export 60 sacks of soybeans," says Marcelo D'Elia Branco, coordinator of the country's Free Software Project and liaison between the open source community and the national government, now headed by president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. "For the right to use one copy of Office plus Windows for one year or a year and a half, until the next upgrade, we have to till the earth, plant, harvest, and export to the international markets that "Good artists borrow; great artists steal." So said Pablo Picasso, stealing the aphorism from Igor Stravinsky, who most likely stole it from T. S. Eliot. Half a century or so later, , DC's Rob Garza and Eric Hilton Washington , have built the concept into the name of their celebrated two-man DJ unit. "We don't do our music in a vacuum," says Hilton, alluding to the hijacked international sounds that form their formica-smooth electronic grooves. Spacey Jamaican dub and cool Brazilian bossa nova aret re the dominant ingre- dients, laced with Indian sitar drone, Arabic howls, and local colors from down the block. So they're not about to get all RIAA about their own jams. Says Hilton: "That would be like living in a glass house." - J.D. Le Tigre/ Fake French A decade back, Kathleen Hanna never dreamed she'd be thrilling millions of club kids. She was fronting Bikini Kill - a punk band characterized by guitar distortion and more about screeching vocals - and cared subverting the status quo than getting a groove on. But when the group disbanded in 1998, Hanna came up with Le Tigre: Bikini Kill's feminist message set to a beat. Unlike low-fi riot grrrl acts, Hanna's New York-based crew uses laptops, drum machines, and synths to create music that heats up and enlightens the dance floor. "We've always been somewhat of a concept band," she says. "Now we're focused on sounding good while delivering a powerful message." - A.D. WIRED.11|2004.193