If a picture tells a thousand words, this chart, which graphically demonstrates global royalty flows, instantly demonstrates why the development agenda deserves our support and why Canada – alongside virtually every other country – will continue to face enormous pressure from the U.S. on IP policy. Note in particular the shrinking of Canada, South America, Africa, most of Asia, and Australia, all of which represents significant outflows of royalty fees.
Why the WIPO Development Agenda Matters
January 24, 2007
Share this post
4 Comments

Law Bytes
Episode 277: Kate Robertson on the Risks That Lie Behind Canada's Unexpected Signing of the UN Cybercrime Convention
byMichael Geist

June 22, 2026
Michael Geist
Search Results placeholder
Michael Geist on Substack
Recent Posts
Why the Answers to Hateful Content Online are Hiding in the Platforms’ Own Rules
From CCH to ChatGPT: How Canadian Copyright Law Played the Key Role in Deciding a Leading AI Training Data Case in India
Starting Over: Court Filing Confirms the CRTC’s Streamer Contribution Decisions Are Dead With a Full Online Streaming Act Reset to Come
The Name on the Window Was Enough: The Attacks on Kiva’s and the Normalization of Antisemitic Violence in Canada
The Law Bytes Podcast, Episode 277: Kate Robertson on the Risks That Lie Behind Canada’s Unexpected Signing of the UN Cybercrime Convention

Also interesting to note the similarity it has with their map of wealth distribution. They are almost identical. [ link ]
Fat cats
A funny – indeed ‘exploding’ – parallel to the fact that the USA and Japan are the only 2 Global Economic 8 nations that have governed their participation in the WCT and WPPT copyright treaties into effect/force. Wonder if taking the lions’ share of world royalties has had any ‘sizable’ impact on Americans becoming known for their high levels of obesity (/population), and Japanese for their Sumo largess… At least seems evident in observing Hollywood’s FAT cats!
Canada’s delegation to WIPO
I am wondering if you have specific advise on how Canadians can try to reach the government delegation to WIPO. I doubt many Canadians would recognize how Canada presents itself Internationally on issues such as this.
[ link ]
per capita
Would have been nice to see a map with per-capita data instead, it would probably paint a very different picture (with Luxembourg coming first..)