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ISSN 1039-3498 | no. 47| October 2000


The future of copyright begins on 4 March 2001

The Governor-General signed the Copyright Amendment (Digital Agenda) Act 2000 on 4 September 2000. Commencement of the new law is delayed for six months, until 4 March 2001, to give everyone time to adapt.

The DA Act has been a long time coming. Its origins can be found in legislation proposed by the previous Government but the DA Act is far larger, more comprehensive and just plain better, especially for libraries. This is not to suggest that the previous Government was doing a bad job on copyright, rather that such a difficult piece of copyright legislation benefited greatly from more consideration by politicians, Government officers and copyright bodies of all stripes.

The DA Act received a remarkable degree of bipartisan (or tripartisan) support in Parliament, with the Government, the ALP and the Democrats coming out in support of it. Members and Senators from all three major groups in Parliament spoke of the need for balance between the interests of copyright owners to receive fair reward for their efforts with the interests of users to have reasonable access to copyright material. It was especially heartening to see the number of parliamentarians who specifically recognised the importance of the role that libraries play.

The Act, which combines new technology neutral rights for copyright owners with new exceptions for educational institutions, libraries and their users, is to be reviewed in three years by the Government or within one year of the ALP’s return to office.

More information about the Digital Agenda Act can be found at www.digital.org.au/issue/issue.htm .
—Nick Smith

Copyright Advisor, Australian Libraries Copyright Committee

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