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This book reflects the intellectual contributions and hard work of many individuals, and it could not have been created without strong support from numerous organizations.

But first and foremost, I am grateful to my wife, Collette, and my two young daughters, Maggie and Sasha, for their love and inspiration. I appreciate their sacrifices during the time I spent writing, editing, and working on this book and, even more, during the many days I was travelling for project-related meetings and events.

In 2006 Professor Debra Steger of the University of Ottawa’s Faculty of Law invited me to lead research on issues of international intellectual property law and technology. That was one of several research themes being pursued by the EDGE Network on the Emerging Dynamic Global Economies, a new initiative of Canada’s Networks of Centres of Excellence program. I am grateful to Professor Steger, Director of the EDGE Network, for her confidence in my ability to lead this research theme, and to the NCE program for supporting the network. In addition, sincere thanks go to the International Development Research Centre for the funding to engage a research fellow for this project and to mobilize researchers and knowledge through the EDGE Network and beyond. I also want to acknowledge the University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law, for providing the institutional infrastructure for the EDGE Network and for my ongoing work in general.

Though organizations like the EDGE Network, the IDRC, and the university provided funding to facilitate the project, it was the personal support offered by their leaders and staff that made the results possible. So thank you to Rohinton Medhora, Robert Robertson, Bill Carman, and others at the IDRC, and to Irena Pawlowski, Anurag Sinha, and Peter Szyszlo of the EDGE Network. Thanks also to my colleagues at the University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law, and in particular to my dean, Bruce Feldthusen, and those who are working with me in the area of law and technology, for creating such a collegial and stimulating environment.

Among my first tasks as the EDGE Network’s technology and intellectual property research theme leader was to convene a meeting of experts from around the world to brainstorm project ideas. To that end a workshop was held in Ottawa, Canada, in the fall of 2006. Participants discussed and debated possibilities for a concrete plan of work over the coming years. The result was a consensus that there were more key issues than resources to address them. Of all potential topics to pursue, however, the most timely and important we identified related to a then relatively new proposal for reforms at and by the World Intellectual Property Organization: a proposal for a Development Agenda. By early 2007 it seemed probable that some agreement on recommendations for the agenda would be reached. We knew, however, that an agreement was one thing while concrete actions were another. To identify ways to turn the agenda’s recommendations from words into actions, we met again in Vancouver, Canada, in the fall of 2007. At that meeting we worked on a series of implementation ideas to be fleshed out in essays we agreed to present to each other for critical review several months later. When we reconvened in the spring of 2008—in Hong Kong, China (thanks to support from the EDGE Network, the IDRC, and the University of Hong Kong’s Faculty of Law)—we had produced a number of draft papers. The purpose of this meeting was to present and critique one another’s work, initially with the aid of comments from independent peer reviewers and then in an open roundtable discussion format.

I appreciate the insights of all who attended one or more of those workshops, including Sara Bannerman, Shamnad Basheer, Susan Bincoletto, David Castle, Carolyn Deere, Jennifer Chandler, Peter Drahos, Michael Geist, Johanna Gibson, Richard Gold, Ronaldo Lemos, Lihong Li, Xuan Li, Jean-Frédéric Morin, Elizabeth Judge, Andy Kaplan-Myrth, Ian Kerr, David Krause, Pedro Paranaguá, Martin Phillipson, Andrew Rens, Robert Robertson, Teresa Scassa, Steve Song, V.C. Vivekanandan, Hong Xue, and Peter Yu.

The three peer reviewers on the project—Daniel Gervais, Mindge Li, and Christopher May—deserve a special acknowledgment for their thorough reviews of and helpful comments on our draft chapters. So too does Hong Xue for co-hosting our Hong Kong workshop. In addition, I want to single out my doctoral student at the University of Ottawa and former research fellow with the EDGE Network, Lihong Li, not only for his organizational support but also for his substantive contributions.

Turning a collection of papers into a published book was not a simple task. A debt of gratitude is owed to Andrea Kroetch and David Quayat, a current and a former student who helped me to prepare the manuscript for this book. Further thanks go to Brian Henderson, Clare Hitchens, Rob Kohlmeier, and the rest of the staff at Wilfrid Laurier University Press for their excellent editorial and promotional skills. Max Brem, Jessica Hanson, Daniel Schwanen, Stephanie Woodburn, and others at the Centre for International Governance Innovation deserve acknowledgment for important role they played in the publication of this book.

As I explain in the introductory chapter, my hope is that this book project marks the beginning, not the end, of this group of authors’ efforts to aid implementation of the WIPO Development Agenda. Each chapter in this book represents a potential spinoff for future ideas and strategic discussion. If we proceed as I hope we do, further thanks will be forthcoming in the near future.

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