The Author, the Fan and the In-between: In Search of a Copyright Regime for the Everyday Creative

摘要

The positions of the major players of the creative industries have been undergoing upheaval. However, copyright has retained a passive role throughout. The few changes it has undergone have been reactionary measures which are already being challenged as short-sighted. The UK and US, under the guidance of art. 13 of TRIPS, have retained a largely commercial approach to the assessment of what secondary creative activities are permissible. There is scattered sympathy for the transformative and non-commercial use, but this has been in the form of defences in protracted legal battles. No attempt has been made to codify those rights which ought to be self-evident-a right to interact creatively with a work you have lawfully obtained, and a right to receive some measure of protection in the independent original elements you derive.