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Show me the Monet
Art and copyright in the digital age
By Susan Devic
Artists, writers and other creative people earning their living making art are now considered under new digital copyright reforms.
The Copyright Amendment (Digital Agenda) Act 2000 came into operation on 4 March.
Its purpose is to cater for the rights of artists in the digital age.
By amending the Act, the Commonwealth Government has taken into account how rapid developments in information technology can affect Australia's cultural industries.
The legislation recognises that the Internet alone has the capacity to affect all fields of artistic work. The open nature of cyberspace leaves creative people vulnerable to copyright infringement.
Online activity, such as publishing on the Internet, should be encouraged to promote the growth of Australia's cultural industries. However, safeguards must be in place to protect the integrity of the artworks and the remuneration of the artists. The new legislation will enable copyright owners of literary, musical, dramatic, artistic works, sound recordings, films and broadcasts to more effectively enforce their rights in a digital environment. This means safeguards will be put in place to ensure artists are fairly remunerated for the commercial use of their work online.
Copyright owners will also be entitled to payments for digital uses under the educational statutory licences. Equitable payment will be ensured where their material is retransmitted free to air.
Civil remedies and criminal penalties are enshrined in the new Act, blocking the use of devices designed to avoid copyright payment. Criminal penalties will also apply to tampering with information attached to copyright material.
The Act provides for higher criminal penalties for the unauthorised commercial use of artists' work. Additional damages are possible under civil law if the copyright is clearly breached and material has been digitised. Libraries and archives will be required to point out the additional criminal penalties and civil damages as a warning to borrowers and researchers accessing copyright material.
The fair-dealing exceptions in the Act allow copyright material to be used without permission for certain recognised purposes, such as research, study and reporting the news. This is provided factors like the impact on the copyright owners market are considered.
The Act currently provides a test so that only ten per cent of a work may be copied for research and study purpose. The user does not have to make a judgement about the effect of their use on the copyright owners' market. Both the fair-dealing provisions and the test will be extended to online uses and digital material.
Users will not be liable for temporary reproductions made during the course of transmitting material or viewing it on-screen. This is subject to safeguards for copyright owners rights as required under international law. Copyright owners will be able to enforce their rights against the person who either transmitted the material, or made it available for viewing.
Existing copyright exceptions for schools, universities and libraries, will continue under the new Act, and cultural institutions will be able to use material in their collections for preservation and internal management purposes without obtaining permission. However, this is subject to safeguards for owners' rights. If an artistic work is lost, deteriorates or becomes unstable, cultural institutions will be able to make a preservation reproduction available online within the institution's premises. Technical restraints are required to prevent users from downloading and printing off the material.
Provisions allowing cultural institutions to supply copyright material for specific purposes-such as for research or study requests-will be extended to allow electronic copying and transmission of the material. This is provided the relevant officer is satisfied by a number of technical conditions.
If material is acquired in electronic form as part of an institution's collection, it may be made available online within the premises of the institution. It may only be made available for viewing or printing out only.
Cultural institutions will still need to obtain copyright owners' permission where material is made available online to users not on the institution's premises. Permission is also necessary if the material is acquired in hard copy form, and then made available online to the public within the institution's premises.
Contact
For further information please see the Intellectual Property website at www.dcita.gov.au/ip