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Amendments to the Copyright Act – Copyright Amendment Act, 2006

Background

The Copyright Amendment Act 2006 was passed in the Australian Parliament on 11 December 2006. All amendments came into force on 1 January 2007. Some of the major amendments that affect CSU staff and students are summarised below. If you require specific advice regarding a particular use of copyright material, please contact the Copyright Administration Officer.

Educational Use

Caching

The amendments now allow educational institutions to cache for efficiency purposes. The cached material must be password protected, and only available for the minimum period of the particular course of study.

Linking

The Act now indicates clearly that merely clicking on a link or opening an attachment does not constitute an act of communication, this amendment protects you if you click on a link or open an attachment, not realising that the content is infringing copyright, it does not protect you if you forward the link or attachment on to someone else. Emailing of copyright material still needs to be done under the limits and conditions of the University’s copyright licences.

Film and sound recordings in class

The exception which allows the playing of sound recordings and films in lecturers and tutorials, has for the removal of doubt, been expanded to specifically include playing of these materials using distribution technology such as articulated AV systems. The communication must be in the course of educational instruction and the audience must be limited to persons who are taking part in the instruction.

A new 'certain special purposes' exception will allow libraries and educational institutions to reproduce some works as long as the copying conforms to specific purposes. The purposes of the copying include for educational instruction, for libraries and archives, or for assisting a person with a disability. There is a further condition for this copying, the reproduction must satisfy the so-called 3-step test. To comply with this test, the copy must be limited to 'certain special cases', must not conflict with 'normal exploitation' of the work, and must not 'unreasonably prejudice' the interests of the creator. Whether this test has been satisfied will be decided by the Courts. Further guidance on this new right will be forthcoming and staff should not rely on this new extended right without advice from the Copyright Coordinator.

Broadcasts made available online as podcasts

The part AV statutory licence (Screenrights) has been extended to also include material which a broadcaster makes available online, such as podcasts and webcasts. These can now be copied for educational use under the Part VA licence as long as they are originally broadcast material.

Electronic anthologies

The University's Part VB copyright licence now also permits copying and communicating up to 15 pages from an electronic anthology, even if the 15 pages constitute more than 10% or one chapter of the anthology. This was previously only the case for hard copy anthologies.

Technological Protection Measures (TPMs)

The Act prohibits the use of TPM's to circumvent technological locks etc in the absence of an exception. There are some narrow exceptions for the purpose of education and research, the Copyright Office can assist with these enquiries.