Future directions for copyright law - Laura Simes

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AUTHOR: LAURA SIMES Australia's copyright laws are the chief means by which we as a society regulate the creation and distribution of knowledge. With the digital age well and truly upon us, individuals, corporations and Governments are grappling with how copyright law now 'fits' in with this, with diverse opinions on how copyright law could or should adapt to meet these changes. This talk will look at a few current issues of interest in the world of copyright, and consider where we seem to be heading. Some developments, such as the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) suggest a preoccuopation with stronger copyright laws and penalties. On the other hand, the recent Review of the National Innovation System (aka the Cutler Report) presents a number of recommendations for more 'flexible' copyright law, along with a suggestion that we need to look at copyright law in a different way than we have in the past.

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Future directions for Copyright

Laura Simes Executive Officer | Australian Digital Alliance

Australian Digital Alliancewww.digital.org.au

Statute of Anne (1710)

The Berne Convention (1886)

Australia-US Free Trade Agreement (2004)

By guldfisken, available: http://flickr.com/photos/guldfisken/398144161/ under CC license

By Kevin Zollman, available: http://flickr.com/photos/36144637@N00/159627089/ under CC license

Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement

“To establish a new standard of intellectual property (IP) enforcement to combat the high levels of commercial scale trade in counterfeit and pirated goods worldwide”

Principles for ACTA negotiations:

Transparency and accountability Presumption of innocence Proportionality Impact on other treaties and laws Mandatory IP filtering a flawed means of general

IP enforcement Safeguards against liability for intermediaries

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The Cutler Review

“Intellectual property is critical to the creation and successful use of new knowledge – particularly the cumulative use of knowledge as an input to further, better knowledge.“

“[T]here is strong evidence that existing intellectual property arrangements are hampering innovation”

“Recommendation 7.8: Australian governments should adopt international standards of open publishing as far as possible. Material released for public information by Australian governments should be released under a creative commons license.”

“[O]ne of the major problems here is that intellectual property policy is being managed as a legal issue, whereas although this area like any other must operate through the legal system, intellectual property policy is most fundamentally an aspect of economic policy.”

ABS site

“Digital Economy Future Directions”

Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy (DBCDE)

http://www.dbcde.gov.au/communications_for_business/industry_development/digital_economy

Submissions due 11 February

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