copyright

In recent discussions I have regularly encountered confusion is misunderstanding about copyright and infringing or non-infringing material. A work can be both copyright and non-infringing. There are two independent concepts at play:

Copyright status

A work can be either under copyright or Public Domain. Public domain is where the copyright has expired, or where the copyright holder has explicity abandoned their copyright. The holder of copyright on a work has the right to establish the terms of use of that work.

License

Where a work is subject to copyright, the holder may decide on the terms of use. It is increasingly common for copyright works to be licensed under "open" terms, where the right to distribute or modify is assigned to parties other than the copyright holder. Popular "open" licenses are the GPL, BSD and Creative Commons licenses which give all recipients of the work the right to redistribute and/or modify the work within limits set ny the license.

Ars Technica has coverage of a Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) report which examines the value of Fair Use to the US economy. Nate Anderson writes:

The CCIA report's numbers are staggering. The "fair use economy" accounted for 23 percent of all US real economic growth between 2002 and 2007. Fair use industries (core and non-core combined) generated $4.7 trillion in 2007. And "about one out of every eight workers in the United States is employed in an industry that benefits from the protection afforded by fair use."

The attendees of the PublicACTA meeting in Wellington this past weekend have published the Wellington Declaration, a statement of their position on whet should and should not be included in the ACTA negotiations.
Please read the Wellington Declaration, and if you agree go and sign the petition by Tuesday morning, 13th April, to ensure your signature is included on the Declaration when it is handed to the NZ Government negotiators.

Ars Technica are reporting that the full ACTA text has been leaked. Just in time for the ACTA discussions in New Zealand in April. I have no time to look into this right now, so I may post an update later.